by J. Thorn
And Henry, still shaking, told his father what had pushed him to the brink of his sanity that beautiful March afternoon: a series of events so terrible he wouldn’t allow himself to remember them once he grew up. He did his best to describe what had caused him to run as fast as he could through the woods and to hide under the bed, as if the bed might protect him from the horrors he had witnessed, as if the misery chasing after him wouldn’t be able to find him in the dark. As if the monsters would leave him alone there.
“Son,” his father said when Henry had finished, “the monsters don’t live in the dark corners waiting to pounce on us. They live deep in our heart. But we can fight them. I promise you, we can fight them and we can win.”
Henry listened to his father’s words, which were soothing and comforting and wise. Then his father suggested he get a piece of paper and some crayons. His father said, “I know something that’ll help you feel better.”
Henry did as his father instructed, and before the night was over he would be repeating a mantra:
I paint against the darkness.
Those words made Henry feel strong in a way he couldn’t describe. The words opened doors within his mind; they set him free and gave him courage to face the night.
But in the end, would that courage and his father’s wisdom be enough to truly save Henry from the monsters he feared so much? Or had he just delayed the inevitable?
The answer to those questions wouldn’t be determined for another twenty years.
THE PRESENT
(1)
The Blank Canvas in the Farmhouse Attic
These days Henry has no memory of the events that led him to hide under his bed when he was five years old—and because of that his father’s advice has a different meaning for him.
Whenever a blank canvas is staring at Henry, he hears his father say, just start at the beginning and the rest will take care of itself, and then the path into his troubled imagination becomes clear enough for him to paint his demons and worries away. Normally this process is second nature to Henry, like breathing, but today something is wrong.
Henry’s hand caresses the silver crucifix dangling from his neck—a nervous habit he developed as a child—and he repeats his father’s words while the grandfather clock downstairs ticks off the hours, but the canvas remains blank.
Whenever Henry closes his eyes, all he can see is a stone wall blocking the path he must follow to the images. The wall in his mind is not giving an inch, no matter how hard he pushes.
The strength of the wall worries Henry as he stands barefoot in the attic of the old farmhouse on this blustery winter afternoon. Today’s creative block is lasting longer than any he has ever experienced; the wall has never been so tall and thick before.
Occasionally Henry paces the room, but mostly he stands facing the canvas, prepared to paint when the inspiration comes. The floor is rough, but that’s part of the process. He doesn’t want to get too comfortable.
The attic is long and narrow with small windows at both ends, a low ceiling, and no lighting at all—and that’s fine with Henry. He has never used anything other than natural light to see his work. He has even painted by the light of the moon when the lunar cycle allowed. And sometimes, when the images in his head just become too much for him to endure in the middle of the night, Henry will come here to paint in the dark.
When he’s painting, Henry travels into an extraordinary world of his own creation and it doesn’t matter how bright or dark or hot or cold the room is once he crosses the threshold from reality into his imagination. He is immune to the problems and concerns and realities of the outside world. Only the images that need to escape his mind—which are often a byproduct of his fears in the real world, although he’s not always aware of their significance—matter after he has traversed the familiar path to the fantastic lands of his own creation.
But today Henry simply stands in the attic, waiting for inspiration to come. His wife, Sarah, and their three-year-old son, Dillon, aren’t home, so the house is deathly silent, with the exception of the grandfather clock and the growing fury of the winter storm.
Occasionally, Henry will stare at the snow falling on the slate roof shingles beyond the attic window. Sleet taps on the glass. The branches hanging from the big tree in the front yard are catching ice, growing heavy and bending at their tips. The gravel driveway leading to the winding country road is gray-turning-white. The brown grass of the lawn is still showing, just a little, but not for long. The heavy, dark clouds above aren’t moving fast; this storm will dump a lot of snow tonight.
The family’s blue minivan, which would normally be parked in the garage under that big tree, is currently in Pittsburgh, along with Henry’s wife and son. Dillon loves car rides, but the visit to Sarah’s parents was not planned and Henry hasn’t spoken to his wife since the van drove away the night before. He silently watched from the attic window as they left.
The fight with Sarah was sudden and unexpected, like most bad things in life. Henry had just emerged from the cellar where he was taking care of their ancient steam boiler’s twice-a-day maintenance cycle when Sarah looked up from the onions she was chopping and said:
“Henry, you were up there in your cave when I left for work this morning and you’ll still be there when I’m fast asleep in our bed. Do you realize that?”
Henry stopped. He was in a hurry to get to the attic to continue his work on his newest painting—yesterday there had been no creative block at all, only the thrill of creation—and the only reason he was even in the kitchen was to get to the cellar. His fear of what might happen if he forgot to maintain the boiler every twelve hours was stronger than his fear of leaving his artwork unfinished.
“I’m not working that much,” he replied.
In the corner of the kitchen, Dillon stopped playing with his toys and watched his parents with wide eyes. Above him was one of the kitchen windows. A dead rose vine scratched across the glass in the wind. The roses were beautiful during the summer when they covered the east side of the house, crawling up a large trellis to the roof, but Henry found the sight of the lifeless vines during the winter to be disturbing.
“Oh, Henry, that’s bullshit,” Sarah snapped. “Where have you been going in that head of yours lately?”
Sarah had never cursed in front of Dillon, but Henry still didn’t quite comprehend how upset his wife was. He just wanted to return to his painting, the one of the princess in the dungeon. The painting was calling him to the attic. The painting wasn’t completed yet and he couldn’t leave the work half-finished. That simply wasn’t possible. Henry opened his mouth and said….
Now Henry shakes his head. He doesn’t need to remember what he said; thinking about the conversation makes him uncomfortable. Last night was the first time he and Sarah had ever fought so seriously that she decided to pack up Dillon and visit her parents for a while.
This development worries Henry—and he knows that worries are one of the big reasons the stone wall is blocking his path into his imagination. Worries always cause him creative problems, but they can also unleash some of his most innovative efforts. They are, unfortunately, a double-edged sword.
Just start at the beginning, and the rest will take care of itself.
Henry barely hears the words as he stares at the blank canvas perched on the easel. He finds his attention drifting to the window and the huge tree pregnant with ice. There’s a darkness spreading across the world.
The darkness growing inside the house might be worse, but Henry doesn’t notice it yet. He’s too distracted by his creative troubles. Yet the darkness is there, and it’s even colder than the night wind, and it’ll be calling for Henry very soon, much louder than any painting ever has.
THE BIRTH OF THE ARTIST
(2)
The small brick house on Maple Lane was the center of Henry’s childhood universe. His mother worked odd jobs from home until he was old enough for school, but once Henry was able to climb the stairs of t
he beat-up yellow school bus every morning, she returned to work at the hectic emergency room in the hospital in Pittsburgh.
Henry’s mother often arrived home late at night, sometimes not even until the next morning, so when the dilapidated bus dropped Henry off after school, he was met by Ms. Winslow, the elderly widow who lived next door. She would look after Henry until his father—one of the maintenance men for the Black Hills Community School—was finished with his work, usually after six o’clock.
Henry spent some of each afternoon watching television with Ms. Winslow, but he always found his way to the backyard sooner or later. The yard was simple and square, surrounded by evergreen hedges and bordered by the woods between his home and the Slade River—and Henry was a young boy with a big imagination, so the enclosed area could represent a million things in a million places on any given day.
With a baseball and a glove, the hedges encircling the yard became fences and Henry was the center fielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates. They always won the World Series thanks to his homerun in the bottom of the ninth in Game Seven.
With his toy gun holstered in his pocket, he was a cop on patrol or a soldier in a war zone. Either way, he was heroic and often suffered several dramatic flesh wounds until the triumphant moment he conquered the bad guys and saved the day.
With a mini-football in his hand, he became the running back and quarterback and wide receiver for the Steelers, leading his team to yet another Super Bowl victory. There was very little defense in his imaginary games.
But sometimes the yard wasn’t big enough for Henry’s imagination, and on these days he would sneak off into the woods behind the house, usually when Ms. Winslow was supposed to be watching him. She tended to get caught-up in her soap operas—her “stories” was what she called them, which always made Henry laugh, although he wasn’t sure why.
On the days he felt the urge to roam, Henry would flip a bucket on the concrete patio where his father’s grill idly gave witness and he would peek through the kitchen window. This vantage point gave him a clear view of the living room without bringing attention to himself so he could make sure Ms. Winslow was really caught up in one of her shows or maybe even napping with her head slumped to the side.
If she was sleeping, he could always tell: when awake, she was very involved in what she was watching. Her curled, gray hair would bounce as her head shook; her wrinkled hands would point things out to the people on the other side of the screen; and sometimes she would even shout, her voice carrying throughout the house.
Once Henry was certain the coast was clear, he crept across the lawn, as if there might still be an authority figure waiting to ambush him, and then he pushed through the bushes that sometimes served as the outfield fence for his baseball games. Past the threshold there were deer trails leading deeper into the woods, through the heavy undergrowth and the towering trees. Out in the woods, his imagination could truly run wild.
But on the morning that would change his life forever, an hour before sunrise, Henry was wide awake and he wasn’t thinking about the woods…although they would call to him soon enough. He was tucked under his warm blankets, feeling like a freshly toasted marshmallow, staring at the glowing green stars his father had stuck on the ceiling years ago—and he was trying his hardest to go back to sleep and pretend he didn’t have to pee so badly his belly burned.
Eventually, though, Henry knew there was no way he was going to sleep. He crawled out from under the covers, shivered as his bare feet settled on the hardwood floor, and he scurried off to the bathroom. He was finished and debating whether to flush, which might wake his parents, or not to flush, which might get him scolded in the morning, when he realized there was frost on the window above the toilet. He closed the lid without flushing and climbed up for a better look. There were thick ice particles on the glass and snow was clinging to the trees in the backyard. The lawn was buried under a blanket of white powder.
“Mom! Dad! It snowed!” Henry cried, jumping off the toilet and running to the hallway. He pushed open his parents’ bedroom door and scampered into their room, leaping onto the bed between them.
“What’s wrong?” his father mumbled, rolling over, blinking his eyes open in the darkness. His mother covered her head with a pillow and muttered something.
“It snowed, Dad, it snowed!” Henry cried.
“Are you sure you didn’t imagine the snow?” his father asked, checking the clock on the nightstand. It wasn’t much past six.
“No, Dad, it’s real this time, I swear!”
“Okay, okay, go get dressed and we’ll check it out together,” his father replied, rubbing his eyes.
Henry didn’t wait a moment to run back to his room and start digging through the closet for his snow pants. He tossed everything else over his shoulder, creating a lopsided pile of discarded clothing and toys in the middle of the floor.
As far as Henry the Child was concerned, today was going to be the best day of his life. Maybe the best day ever.
THE PRESENT
(2)
The Monster and the Princess
Start at the beginning, and the rest will take care of itself.
Henry understands these words are true—they’ve never led him astray—but right now all he can do is stare at the huge oak tree outside his window. The view reminds him of a tree he once discovered in the woods behind his childhood home. There was something unusual about that particular tree, but his memory is faded and he doesn’t try to delve into the thoughts. Some topics, he suspects, are better left buried.
Henry loves the home he and Sarah bought last summer, using their life’s savings as the down payment, but he now understands how truly isolated it is. The former farm borders a state park on three sides and there’s forest for as far as the eye can see. Dozens of streams and ponds are within a mile of the main house, too. This is the perfect place to raise a little boy; that was Henry’s first thought when he and Sarah visited with the real estate agent last summer. A little boy and maybe even a man with a lot of little boy left inside of him—a description Sarah has lovingly tossed at Henry from time to time when he’s lost deep in thought.
Henry touches the silver crucifix hanging around his neck and he watches the tree twist in the wind. Under the window is the painting he worked on yesterday, but he has placed the finished canvas against the wall so the image faces away from him. There are a dozen paintings in a row like this one, turned so they can’t be seen—and although Henry can’t remember the subject matter of most of them, he doesn’t need to see yesterday’s artwork to remember it.
There is a lot of red and gray and black flowing across the front of the canvas. The scene is set in an ancient dungeon, and not the type you’d find in any fairy tale. The rough stone walls are damp with blood. The dirt floor is littered with the bloody remains of hundreds of dead rats.
In the middle of the canvas, he painted a princess wearing a tattered gown standing between a lumbering monster and a small child. She has put herself in the path of certain death and there’s a fierce determination in her eyes. She holds a sword in her right hand.
The monster leans forward like some kind of insane hunchback, growling and snarling with slimy teeth. Hidden in the dark shadows are dozens of red glowing eyes. Henry cannot remember the actual act of painting the image—which isn’t unusual, he rarely recalls how the paint made its way onto the canvas once all is said and done—but when he finished, he wondered where this idea came from and why he didn’t choose a dark knight or some more traditional villain for the setting. Why does he always return to the monster?
Henry never understands exactly why his paintings are what they are, no matter how many times he tries to decipher what’s happening inside his mind. He simply paints or draws what he sees in his head, and doing so keeps his dreams sane.
Once, a few years ago, he stopped creating any kind of artwork for a week, just to see what would happen. The result was clear and instantly noticeable: his dreams became warpe
d and disturbing. His future wife, who was then simply his girlfriend, claimed his mind needed to release its creativity, one way or another. The theory was good enough for Henry and now not a day goes by that he doesn’t draw something. The work is his own form of therapy.
Henry’s eyes shift from the back of yesterday’s finished painting to today’s blank canvas. The canvas stares at him and the sensation is unsettling. The white space has never felt so huge—like the emptiness is trying to pull him into an inescapable void. The fear of having hit a permanent creative roadblock is stronger than ever.
“Just start at the beginning,” Henry whispers as he closes his eyes. He takes a deep breath and adds, “I paint against the darkness.”
Finally, after hours of self-imposed isolation, stars appear in the empty place behind Henry’s eyelids—and then there’s a burst of color in the distance. The stone wall in his mind starts to crumble—a few pieces near the edges at first and then larger sections in the middle—and finally Henry pushes through his accumulated worries to the place where the images are trapped, just waiting to be released.
Without even opening his eyes, Henry begins to paint. One stroke at a time. One color at a time. One step at a time, like the journey of a thousand miles. His toes curl on the cold wooden floor and he rocks on the balls of his feet.
Henry easily slips into the in-between world where he lives when he’s working, half-asleep and half-awake and not totally aware of anything beyond the canvas and the scenes unfurling in his head. He paints and he translates those visions the best he can, releasing the images through his nimble fingers.
It won’t be until much later that he’ll realize he’s painting the princess in the dungeon again.
THE BIRTH OF THE ARTIST
(3)
