picked up the paint cup. Splatters only. I picked up the mangled, flattened tube.
I looked at the splatters on the wall next to me. Like a giant blue beast had been slaughtered against it. How many times had I reached into the canvas and yanked my hand out? I just needed one more time. I was certain. I wrapped my fingers around the tube.
“Please, please, please.” I whispered, squeezing the dead tube. “I need just a little more.” I didn't know who I was asking, begging. “I know I can do it.”
“Ren!”
I whirled around to see Will banging on his side of the sketch with one hand, a horrified look on his face as he fastened on the armor I had created for him earlier—complete with pinstripes. I could suddenly feel the paint coated on my cheeks. Dripping from my skin. Some truly feral warrior in a jungle of canvas, cubist lines, pointed colors, and deco blocks.
“I can do it,” I told him, beseeching. “I just need more paint like this. Where can I get more paint like this?” I had the paintbrush gripped in my fist, shaking like a junkie demanding her next fix.
“Ren—”
The building electricity within me exploded with a hiss. “ Where can I get more paint? ”
His gaze went past me, widening. I followed it...to the drawings on my walls. The dragons, the vines, the parties and battles. The cubist lines and deco blocks. The birds and beasts and abstract things. Stick figures and realistic portraits.
And now magic paint in a warrior's hue was on one of those walls. And I was vibrating with energy and intent. To make things live. A Renaissance woman started screaming as a gryphon dive-bombed from the sky. A stylized female Don Quixote dressed in knightly silver rushed in with her gleaming helmet and sword and stepped in front of the other, fending away the giant beast as the woman in the flowing gown gripped her desperately from behind.
Oh no.
I dropped the paintbrush and grabbed the charcoal nub and lunged to help Knight and Renaissance. But near them, the impressionistic lily pads were winding up a bridge and over a couple standing there. They curved around their necks. I slashed my nub through one of the lily pad vines, and it fell to the floor. Others replaced it.
I slashed again and again, and yet similar events were happening all around me. Geometric blocks smashing, modern art squeezing, and old masters piercing. I could never get to everything in time. The savagery escalated, the carnage multiplied, and I could only watch in horror. I needed an eraser, but I had created mostly with paint and ink and I didn't know how to hit undo.
The festive party scenes and whimsical things I had drawn were being consumed by the destructive elements I had also created—sharp mirrored edges, harsh lines, unforgiving borders slashing through their softer counterparts—the balance left unchecked with too few knights and protectors and far too many victims and predators.
I used the nubs, then the charcoal remnants on my fingers, and then I had no more charcoal. I had no more paint.
I sank to the ground, sob unable to release, as everything around me died, dripping and seeping together into a morass of sickly brown at the base of my walls. I clutched Will's sketch, but forced myself to view the last moments of the others, to watch the last one standing on top of the brownish murk that was trying to suck her in—the female Don Quixote in her silver, knightly armor. She had made it to the end, surrounded by the fallen compatriots she had tried to help and the predators she had been forced to kill, covered in paint and pen splatter. And then she fell to her knees and landed face-down in the mud, once-fluffy hair spilling from the back of her helmet in tangled, wet strands. Then she too was absorbed into the endless brown landscape. All lay shattered and still on my walls. The ecosystem collapsed.
Will was quiet. He reached out a hand to me, then let it fall back to his side.
Then his eyes drifted toward my
I looked at the splatters on the wall next to me. Like a giant blue beast had been slaughtered against it. How many times had I reached into the canvas and yanked my hand out? I just needed one more time. I was certain. I wrapped my fingers around the tube.
“Please, please, please.” I whispered, squeezing the dead tube. “I need just a little more.” I didn't know who I was asking, begging. “I know I can do it.”
“Ren!”
I whirled around to see Will banging on his side of the sketch with one hand, a horrified look on his face as he fastened on the armor I had created for him earlier—complete with pinstripes. I could suddenly feel the paint coated on my cheeks. Dripping from my skin. Some truly feral warrior in a jungle of canvas, cubist lines, pointed colors, and deco blocks.
“I can do it,” I told him, beseeching. “I just need more paint like this. Where can I get more paint like this?” I had the paintbrush gripped in my fist, shaking like a junkie demanding her next fix.
“Ren—”
The building electricity within me exploded with a hiss. “ Where can I get more paint? ”
His gaze went past me, widening. I followed it...to the drawings on my walls. The dragons, the vines, the parties and battles. The cubist lines and deco blocks. The birds and beasts and abstract things. Stick figures and realistic portraits.
And now magic paint in a warrior's hue was on one of those walls. And I was vibrating with energy and intent. To make things live. A Renaissance woman started screaming as a gryphon dive-bombed from the sky. A stylized female Don Quixote dressed in knightly silver rushed in with her gleaming helmet and sword and stepped in front of the other, fending away the giant beast as the woman in the flowing gown gripped her desperately from behind.
Oh no.
I dropped the paintbrush and grabbed the charcoal nub and lunged to help Knight and Renaissance. But near them, the impressionistic lily pads were winding up a bridge and over a couple standing there. They curved around their necks. I slashed my nub through one of the lily pad vines, and it fell to the floor. Others replaced it.
I slashed again and again, and yet similar events were happening all around me. Geometric blocks smashing, modern art squeezing, and old masters piercing. I could never get to everything in time. The savagery escalated, the carnage multiplied, and I could only watch in horror. I needed an eraser, but I had created mostly with paint and ink and I didn't know how to hit undo.
The festive party scenes and whimsical things I had drawn were being consumed by the destructive elements I had also created—sharp mirrored edges, harsh lines, unforgiving borders slashing through their softer counterparts—the balance left unchecked with too few knights and protectors and far too many victims and predators.
I used the nubs, then the charcoal remnants on my fingers, and then I had no more charcoal. I had no more paint.
I sank to the ground, sob unable to release, as everything around me died, dripping and seeping together into a morass of sickly brown at the base of my walls. I clutched Will's sketch, but forced myself to view the last moments of the others, to watch the last one standing on top of the brownish murk that was trying to suck her in—the female Don Quixote in her silver, knightly armor. She had made it to the end, surrounded by the fallen compatriots she had tried to help and the predators she had been forced to kill, covered in paint and pen splatter. And then she fell to her knees and landed face-down in the mud, once-fluffy hair spilling from the back of her helmet in tangled, wet strands. Then she too was absorbed into the endless brown landscape. All lay shattered and still on my walls. The ecosystem collapsed.
Will was quiet. He reached out a hand to me, then let it fall back to his side.
Then his eyes drifted toward my
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