The Artist
By Mark Tullius

The artist climbed the final flight of stairs, opened the door, and then locked it behind her.  Today would be a busy day, just like every other one, and she couldn’t be bothered while she was at work.

She climbed onto the swivel stool in the middle of the tiny room and turned toward the north-facing window and the easel directly beneath it.  After placing a blank canvas on the easel, she looked out the window, admiring the beautiful nothingness before her.

With remarkable speed, she painted the T-intersection where Main Street ran into Live Oak Avenue.  A few moments later, a row of beautiful trees lined the east side of Live Oak, their massive bodies blocking the early morning sun, shading the blacktop.  The artist sat up and looked out the window, pleased with her work.  The deserted streets miles below her were exactly as she had rendered them on the canvas.

Afraid she’d lose her inspiration, the artist applied the brush and created a peaceful Sunday morning.  An elderly couple on the west side of Main street walked hand in hand appreciating the beautiful morning, each of them aware they only had a limited amount of time left on earth, enjoying every wonderful moment they were granted.  On the other side of the street, nearing the intersection, a young mother pushed a bright red stroller and smiled down at her infant daughter who stared in wonder at the world.

Knowing the people were outside the window just as she had drawn them, the artist continued her masterpiece.  With a few strokes of her brush, she painted an eighteen-year-old boy who was out on his father’s Harley for a leisurely ride up Live Oak.  One day, God willing, he would have a bike of his own and a loving son he could lend it to.  A few strokes later, the artist had painted a yellow school bus full of the elementary school honor roll students.  In acknowledgement of their accomplishments, the PTA had rewarded them with a day of fun at the beach.  Laughter floated through the bus as the kids celebrated a Sunday free from homework, chores, church, and other obligations.  They worked so hard every day and now they finally had a chance to enjoy themselves and act like kids.

Finished with the painting, the artist set it against the wall and looked out the window.  Her creation slowly came to life, time inching by so she could enjoy every expression, appreciate every emotion. 

As the bus approached the red light at the end of Main Street, the driver tapped the brakes.  The biker held up his hand and waved at the elderly couple who were longtime friends of his grandmother.  The mother, who was now stopped at the corner waiting patiently for the walk signal, bent down and smoothed her daughter’s fine blonde hair.

Panic didn’t set in on the bus driver’s face until the third time he tried the brakes.  He had no way of knowing the cable had snapped after years of use and poor maintenance, but he did know he was just a few feet from the intersection and the motorcycle that had just entered it.

Even from way up in her tower, the artist heard the blaring horn.  The biker brought his hand back to the handlebars and tried to swerve out of the way.  It wasn’t due to the lack of skill or slow reaction, but the bus struck the tail end of his bike and knocked it toward the opposite corner where the young mother looked on in horror.

After clipping the bike, the bus driver jerked the wheel to the right, losing control of the vehicle.  Young screams pierced the crisp morning air as the bus rushed toward the row of trees.  At the exact moment the biker sailed into the stroller, the bus wrapped its front end around an ancient oak.  The engine slammed back into the main compartment, severing the driver’s legs and pinning him in his seat, rendering him helpless as tiny bodies flew past him, smashing into and through the windshield.

The artist studied the smoldering wreckage.  She cringed at the pained, confused expression of the biker who broke his back against the lightpost, completely unaware why the mother was screaming at him to get off her baby.  She counted the little bodies hanging out the bus windows and smashed against the old oak tree.  She breathed in the familiar scent of gasoline and watched as sparks ignited the back of the bus, trapping all the survivors in the inferno.  The scared screams pierced her mind as she watched the older lady that was torn between helping the children or her husband of fifty-two years who was lying in the grass suffering a massive heart attack.

Discouraged with her first attempt, the artist turned to the eastern window and contemplated the nothingness, wondering what she should fill it with.  After a few moments, she sat back on her stool and designed an elaborate amusement park.  What would take others years, she painted in seconds, each calculation precise, every angle exact.  The brilliance behind its design was evident as she looked out the window and admired its grandness.

The artist returned to her seat and set back to work.  An amusement park not being enjoyed was the equivalent of the perfect snowflake melting before anyone could see it.  Quickly, she moved the brush across the canvas, leaving thousands of bodies in its wake.  Eighth-graders raised their hands and screamed as they rushed down the steep descents while their older brothers and sisters became better acquainted on the Ferris wheel.  Parents gave their children their first taste of cotton candy before taking them into the petting zoo.  The lines weren’t too long and the weather was just right.  She had just created the perfect day.

After setting the canvas against the wall, the artist stood at the window and watched parents hold their babies on the carousel, fork over fistfuls of money at the concession stands, and then down beer after beer as they waited in line.  As she watched the roaming crowds, the artist heard a loud crack come from the largest of the rollercoasters.

The first car, which was occupied by a five-year-old redhead and his father, had just reached the crest of the ten-story climb and was about to race down the decline to build enough speed to complete the two corkscrews.  The father also heard the crack, but he figured it was part of the ride, not part of the ride breaking.

The car slowly began its descent, pulling the rest of the train with it.  When the final car passed the crest, the train zoomed toward the corkscrews.  Every passenger raised their arms and screamed as they plummeted.

The broken coupling connecting the first car to the second held halfway through the first corkscrew.  When it gave, the first car shot off the tracks and headed for the lake fifty yards away.  The little boy didn’t realize they had left the track until his father’s arms were severed by an electric wire.

Both the maimed father and his son died on impact, saving them from the ensuing disaster.  They didn’t see the wire fall onto the brown building that housed the house’s fireworks.  They didn’t see the building blow into a blazing fire that spread like the wind.  They didn’t see the thousands of people caught in the flames and run down by their panicked fellow man.  But the artist did.  The artist saw everything.

She rested her arm on the window ledge and watched the story unfold.  She listened to each unanswered prayer and every damning curse.  She smelled their fear mixed with the sweet stench of burning flesh.  She felt their fear, their anger, their sadness, their loss.  When she couldn’t handle any more suffering, she sat down on her stool and turned to the Southern window.

The emptiness begged her to fill it, but she was hesitant to try once again to create a perfect picture.  Finally she decided that sometimes the simplest thing was best.  She began depicting the core of the human race: one man and one woman who had taken each other in marriage, vowing to love one another til death do they part.

The artist glanced out the window and watched the disheveled thirty-three-year-old enter the living room and head to the dining room table.  Saturday night’s business dinner had turned very unprofessional and all he wanted to do was close the blinds and crawl into bed.  His wife waited for him at the table, holding an unmarked small box behind her back, smiling from ear to ear. 

Before the couple could move, the artist returned to her canvas and filled in the details.  On the table, in front of the husband, lay a mound of unopened mail that the man hadn’t had the courage to open.  The white box held a pregnancy test that had finally read positive after so many failed attempts.

The artist remained seated and listened as the wife asked her husband how the dinner went and if he made the sale.  He grunted something about the same old bullshit and opened the mail.  His wife’s next question was drowned out by his curses and the tearing of a letter in two.  This was repeated three more times before the artist painted the couple’s deceased son’s Louisville Slugger.  They kept it mounted on the wall, just within the husband’s reach.

After setting the finished piece against the wall, the artist listened as the wife broke the good news that they would once again have a family.  The husband, overwhelmed by an unsuccessful career, a demanding mistress, and insurmountable bills, didn’t tell his wife the baby couldn’t be his.  He couldn’t admit to her that he had a vasectomy after their son died.  He couldn’t admit that he’d been lying to her for every month of the past five years when she cried and said she wasn’t pregnant.  He also couldn’t contain his rage as he wondered whose baby she was carrying.

The artist winced at the first thump.  She didn’t want to watch what he did with his dead son’s baseball bat.  Knowing the doctor had botched the vasectomy didn’t make it any easier for the artist to watch the wife cower on all fours to protect the baby, screaming for God to stop him.  God didn’t and he continued the onslaught until the house was silent except for his heavy breathing and the sound of her blood dripping onto the hardwood floor.

Sickened by the display, the artist took a blank canvas and set it on the easel below the Western window.  In a matter of moments she had created a glorious church.  She looked out the window and studied the pained expression of Jesus hanging on the gigantic crucifix.  She counted the countless gold items, wondering how much money the church had spent on them instead of on the hungry and meek it claimed to serve.

Sunday was the one day of the week people populated the church.  With a few strokes of her brush, she filled the pews with every type of villager.  The farmer and his family were in the front row, trying to get closest to God so he would answer their prayers for rain and an abundant crop.  Across the aisle, an elderly woman said a prayer for her dead husband and asked when she might be reunited with him, not understanding that she never would.  Believers and skeptics held hands as they wished for salvation and survival, peace and prosperity, fame and freedom.

Conflicting prayers bounced off the towers four walls.  The farmer’s prayers for rain were just as heartfelt as the travel agent’s desire for clear skies.  The teenage boy in the back held his girlfriend’s hand and prayed she would abandon her beliefs and have sex with him while she prayed God would give her the strength to hold out until they were married.  Some prayers were silly, many were selfish, most unrealistic, but all were heard, and all were unanswered.

The artist studied the canvas.  She reached toward it and stroked the hair of a beautiful eight-year-old girl who promised over and over that she’d be good if God let her younger brother walk again.  The boy had stepped on a land mine and lost both legs, but the girl truly believed God could change that.

A few strokes later, the artist finished her painting and set it against the wall.  She stood at the window and took in the entire scene.  As the villagers set aside their differences and all joined hands to say the Lord’s Prayer, rebel insurgents crouched outside the building, holding their submachine guns, their fingers anxiously tapping the triggers.  They too were after peace and had decided that this was the way to achieve it.  When the rebels stormed the church and gunfire erupted, the artist shook her head and left the tower.

END