Surreal Strokes

© 2001 Anika Gupta
All rights reserved.

1.1

I suppose you could say that my behavior slipped when Moxie ran away. Granted, Moxie wasn't much. But she was all I had, and she'd known all the people who'd left me beforehand. After all, hadn't she lived with Mom and Dad? And then when Mom died and Dad went to Japan, hadn't she lived with my brother, and all his kids? And when Pete managed to get himself hit by a drunk driver, Moxie had stayed with his daughter Ann for a while. Until Ann's boyfriend dumped her and Ann tried to overdose on Tylenol. Honestly. Tylenol? Who overdoses on Tylenol? They put Ann into some sort of rehab, but cats aren't allowed. So Moxie came to me. I swear, in the past five years, Moxie and I have seen just about everything. Except maybe those freak liposuction accidents that mow women down like wheat these days. Whatever. At least nobody I know woke up in a bathtub full of ice with both their kidneys removed.

But now Moxie's gone. I don't quite know how it happened, I really don't. I guess I just didn't think that Moxie would be the sort to run. Like I said, we'd been through everything. I wouldn't have run away from her. But anyway, I guess Moxie's disappearance sort of brought it all out in me. I mean, for the past six months, Moxie had represented all those lost people. I guess that's a heavy load for a cat to carry.

"Know what, Rose? I think you just need to let go. I mean just let it all go. Relax. Meditate." This was Sandra. She's my voice of reason. Everybody has their conscience, or note of reason, or whatever they call that annoying voice in their head. But most people don't name theirs, or have conversations with them. Or at least, they don't admit it.

"Drink jasmine water and talk about karma?" I demanded. I sat down on the edge of my bed and stared at the blank white wall.

"You'd never talk about karma. You don't even know what karma is," Sandra told me disdainfully.

"And you do?" I demanded. What could I say? The whole Moxie incident had put me in a bad mood that I just couldn't shake. I could barely paint anymore, and that had been my biggest joy before. To just sit in the sunlight when I came up with an idea. I'd been obsessive back then; I had to get it just right. I had to create the perfect personification of that idea before I was finished. I guess that makes me one of those abstract painters. But in my opinion, art is about more than a pretty picture.

"That's not the point," Sandra insisted huffily. "It's not about karma. It's about you. Not everyone achieves spiritual fulfillment by going up into the mountains and sitting in the snow naked."

"That's good, because I'm not going anywhere near snow without all my clothes on," I said. "What about coffee? What if I drank lots of coffee?"

"That won't do it. It's gotta be more. It has to have meaning and it has to be a real escape. Coffee? Come on, that's lame. You can come up with better than that."

1.2

I pondered Sandra's words as I drove out to work that morning. I'm a photographer for a small-town newspaper. Hey, it's a career, isn't it? Besides, you can't really live off painting unless you're willing to eat grass.

It was that morning, as I was leafing through one of the competitor's issues we kept lying around the workroom, that I saw the strangest ad.

FINE PIECES OF QUALITY SCULPTURE

All Sizes, All Types, for All Settings

Inexpensive and Great for Adding

Culture to a Boring Room!

Call 407-331-8282

"That's it!" Sandra exclaimed. She has rotten timing and she thinks I'm a lot smarter than I am. I didn't understand.

"What's it? This guy is not it. In fact, he has no business smarts! Nobody runs an ad like this in the paper!" I said irritably.

"Write down the phone number," Sandra insisted.

"Are you really sure that's what you want to do? Your career is seriously going places just about now," said Bryan. Let me explain this. Bryan is another 'voice in my head.' He's kinda like Sandra, except that he's my voice of timidity. I despise him. I refuse to let him have control over my life.

"My career isn't going anywhere," I said, and wrote down the phone number. Sandra seemed positively smug. In retrospect, I think she put Bryan up to it. He usually keeps quiet, because he knows I don't like him. I tucked the phone number into my back pocket and headed off to take pictures of some elementary school's butterfly-releasing ceremony.

1.3

That evening, when I called up the phone number, I asked about the Quality Sculpture.

"That ad got results fast," said the guy on the other end of the line. "If I'd known that, I would've listened to my uncle a lot sooner. If I was speaking to him then, which I probably wasn't." There was meditative silence on the other end of the line.

"Listen, about the Sculpture..." I began.

"Oh yeah, right," he said in his grunge-rock voice. "That's right. What are you looking for?"

"I don't know," I said, confused. "Shouldn't I be looking at the artwork?"

"Oh, you can if you want. It's all very nice Burnt Haven work." Burnt Haven? Burnt Haven? What sort of haven is burnt? This guy gave me a funny feeling.

"What's Burnt Haven?"

"You don't know Burnt Haven?" the guy demanded incredulously. I'll bet most of the world doesn't know Burnt Haven, I thought.

"No," I said.

"It's this place down in San Diego," he said. "An artist's community, whatever. You show your work to a panel of judges and they either yes or no you depending on whether they like it. Listen, I thought every artist knew about it."

"What made you think I was an artist?" I was flattered and more than a little curious.

"Oh. It's in the way you said the words quality sculpture. Like they were dirty words or something. As if you thought that the world, and art, was a lot bigger than just someone's definition of quality..." he trailed off. He sounded like a stinking reborn spiritualist.

"Are you into karma?" I demanded on a whim.

"That wasn't polite—" Bryan began.

"What?" demanded the guy on the other end.

"Never mind. Listen, I don't think this is going to work out after all," I said apologetically. I couldn't believe myself. I'd never been this rude on the phone before.

"What?" he demanded again. I hung up.

"There you have it," said Sandra as if some great mystery had been solved.

"Have what?" I demanded.

"Burnt Haven," she insisted.

"There's no way..." I began. "I don't know anything about it and I can't call him again."

"Look it up online," Sandra advised.

"It won't be online," Bryan suddenly cut in.

"I have to go with Bryan on this one. It won't be online. There's no way anyone would put something as stupid sounding as Burnt Haven on the Internet. Get a life."

1.4

It was on the Internet. I'm still not clear on exactly why I looked, but it was there. Burnt Haven Artists Community. And let me tell you, their web-page was bad. When I say bad, I don't mean plain. I mean neon blue text on a cloudy sky background. Strange art turned out by even stranger people. There was some guy on the web-page with neon green eyebrows and pants with cloud shapes cut out of them. He was standing next to a gigantic reconstruction of Noah's Ark. Animals were marching in, except that they weren't your average animals. They were mutated dumpster-material animals. It was called "In the Hold of Future's Ark," which I think was supposed to be clever. Apparently all those people down in San Diego thought it was a big deal.

"It's perfect. You'll be able to explore your own creativity," said Sandra.

"Or bring about your own tragic downfall," said Bryan. "All tragic heroes have a tragic flaw. A bad decision. Something like that. What's yours gonna be?"

"Shut up, Bryan," said Sandra and I in unison.

"I'll write to the committee and send my work," I told Sandra as if Bryan wasn't there.

"As you should," Sandra insisted. Bryan sulked.

1.5

Let me tell you something. Never take advice from the voices in your head.

Sandra had screwed me up big time on this one. When I arrived in balmy San Diego, I immediately realized I was all wrong for the place. Somehow I'd forgotten that San Diego is in California. It's a place for women in red sequined bikinis with fake blond hair. All the guys walk around with little guitars in one back pocket and tourist guides to Mexico in the other. That's the kind of place San Diego is. Plus, the streets are way strange. You keep getting distracted by the architecture. It took me two hours to find Burnt Haven. It was way out on the wrong side of Balboa Park. I'm not talking about the lake side, I'm just talking about the far side. I finally found it and stormed through the gates. I found a stinking welcoming party. They were milling around, just shooting the breeze. There's a lot of breeze in San Diego, and they intended to shoot their fair share. By the time I walked in, I was almost a side show.

"Hey, you Rose?" someone asked. This was the guy with the neon eyebrows.

"Yeah," I said cautiously. He held out a hand.

"I'm Michel."

"That's great," I said. When I looked at the others, they all looked pretty normal. There was this one woman with a T-shirt that read "Worship the Goddess" and another guy with henna tattoos all over his face, but that was the extent of the strangeness.

"You want to see your studio? You're number 21," said Worship-the-Goddess.

"Let her meet everyone. I'm Jenna," said a blonde girl who looked underage. I wanted to ask her if she'd run away from home.

"She's already met Michel," said Worship-the-Goddess again.

"Yeah, that's good enough, right Shane?" asked Michel. So Worship-the-Goddess was actually named Shane. I stored that fact away in my brain. "So, you want a tour or what?"

"Actually..." I looked around at the expectant faces.

"Say yes," Sandra advised.

"Say no. They look scary. So many people!" Bryan insisted. I copped out.

"Sorry, I'm really tired from my flight. Could I just find my studio?"

"No prob," said Shane. "Come on." I followed her through the courtyard and under an arch. "So, do you believe in karma?" she asked. I almost shrieked.

1.6

I found out that I shared the studio with Shane. I discovered this when I stumbled into the studio at five o'clock the next morning after having been hit by an incredible inspiration. I wanted to do nothing more than sit down, turn on the light, and paint my eyes out.

Strangely enough, fate had different plans. I almost tripped over someone sitting on the floor when I reached the bottom of the stairs. I reached for the light, my mind still in that fuzzy half-awake sleep-hangover state. Bright fluorescent light came on. I stared.

Shane sat in the middle of the floor with her legs crossed in the Lotus position. Strange music full of flutes and heavy voices played softly. In one hand, she held a paintbrush. She was letting the paintbrush roam randomly over a large canvas, her eyes clamped shut.

"What the..." I began in astonishment and high irritation. How was I expected to turn out creative masterpieces with Baba Yaga shouting at me out of a stereo system? Shane's eyes opened and she sighed peacefully. She looked at the aimless lines wandering over the canvas and then turned to me.

"Do you normally wake up this late?" she demanded. I ignored that question as beneath comment.

"Do you usually do this in the morning? In other people's studios?" I responded.

"This is my studio, too," said Shane, dunking the brush in a plastic glass of paint cleaner.

"Then where's mine?" I demanded.

"We share," said Shane.

"Not if you plan on communing with the mystics every morning," I retorted. I would have said more, but by now Shane had shut off the music and was heading behind a painted paper screen. She still hadn't answered my last question.

"Shane?" I asked, deciding against trying to peer behind the screen.

"Just a moment," she called back. "I'm putting on my running clothes. I jog every morning for half an hour."

"Oh," I said.

"It's not that I'm obsessed with health or anything," said Shane as she reemerged wearing a white tank and black spandex shorts. "It's just to give you some time alone in the morning. But if you keep waking up late, you might miss it."

"Right," I said, wondering if she actually expected me to thank her. She waited a few more moments, then gave up and shrugged.

"Bye," she called. And with that, she unlocked the studio door and slipped out into the dawn light. I stared after her for a moment, then walked over to my half of the studio. I had a few wrapped canvases sitting in the corner, and my paints. The airline hadn't allowed me to bring anything else.

"Here we go," I said unnecessarily, unwrapping the canvas. "Thank God she's gone."

"I liked the mystic music," said Sandra suddenly. She had been remarkably quiet all morning. I had thought she was asleep.

"Shut up," I told her, and began to paint the view from my window.

1.7

Shane returned halfway through my painting and put on Celtic flute music. It totally ruined my peace and quiet. She puttered around in the back of the studio for a few minutes, then came up and looked over my shoulder as I worked. The view from the window had been slowly emerging. My eager fingers flew over the design. I only stopped every so often to dunk my brush in brush-cleaning fluid.

"The Safe Alternative to Turpentine," Shane read off the bottle. The Celtic flutes were still going in the background. "There is no safe alternative to turpentine. That's why I use watercolors so much. No turpentine." I didn't answer her. After a few moments, she kept on going. "I think you've got that line wrong. It sort of intersects with the wall and creates a hard angle. You want a soft angle. Soft morning light, you know?"

"When I woke up, there was no light," I said from between clenched teeth.

"Don't you have any imagination?" she demanded.

"Deck her," Sandra suggested inside my head.

"The music's not that bad," Bryan commented.

"Shut up!" I snarled at both of them. I was trying to concentrate! Shane gave me a funny look and then stood up, looking offended.

"Right then. I'll just head over to Brad's and get myself some granola. Talk to you later. When you're in a better mood or something." With that, she made her retreat.

"How does that woman ever find time to paint?" I demanded.

"She's right. You've painted hard angles. It contradicts the early morning effect," Sandra instructed.

"Hey, she left the music on," Bryan observed. I wanted to deck them both.

1.8

As the days passed, I grew more accustomed to Shane. After that first morning, she usually left me alone. Relatively. So to speak.

When I came down in the morning, she was typically gone. Either out at Brad's or jogging or her Goddess-knew-what. And yet her part of the studio was still filled with new works. Where did she find the time?

"Maybe she doesn't sleep," Sandra suggested. I sighed. I had gotten used to Sandra and Bryan's loquaciousness. I didn't know what brought it out—then I would have gotten rid of it—but I was more resigned. That morning, the Celtic flute music was playing softly in a corner. As I picked up my paintbrush, I could feel the flute music literally wrapping around all the air in the studio. It had that transcendental sound.

"The Celts believed in fairies," said Sandra suddenly.

"What?" I demanded.

"They believed in otherworldly spirits. Can you hear it in the music?" I stopped for a moment and listened. Yes, I could. There were several different musical voices, each flute with a different timbre. They even followed different melodies. If I listened closely, I could just hear each flute as a voice, and each melody as a story. They flowed over green fields and danced in full moon light. They tripped over each other, they argued, they laughed. One voice, in particular, was very audible. That was Reagh, the king of them all.

"Our tribe shall not journey today," he insisted.

"Why?" demanded a light voice.

"I feel too old to dance," he responded.

"You were old when the world was young," someone else said. And their laughter became the music again. I laughed with them, seeing Reagh's pride and watching the girl's light feet.

"What are you laughing at?" said a coarse voice.

"What?" I said furiously. Who interrupted me? Then the voices faded away abruptly as someone switched the music off. "Why'd you turn it off?"

"Are you okay?" asked Shane, coming over and peering at me intently. "Hey, your imagination is improving." I followed her gaze to the empty canvas in front of me. Only the emptiness was gone, replaced by long beams of light over a thickly wooded river-bank. The glimmer of wings marked the passage of tiny sprites. As I stared at it, I was drawn into it again. The voices began anew and I could hear the wind rushing and the trees rustling and—

"I didn't realize you were into that sort of stuff," said Shane, popping open a grape juice drink.

"Neither did I," I said, pushing myself away from the canvas. I threw a sheet over it and the last of the voices faded from my mind. Shane threw me a funny look. For once, Sandra and Bryan were both silent.

1.9

That night, I dreamed very strangely. I dreamed the music was once more playing, and I was a different person. I didn't touch the ground when I walked, and my hair and skin were the color of moonlight. So was my horse. We galloped over dew-wet grasses, the night sky huge and open above us. Far ahead, the sidhe of a different leader rose from the ground. I drew in my breath as the sound of music drifted toward me on the breeze. I could feel the wind rushing by, the sounds of revelry spurring me onward. When I finally reached the grassy mound, I threw myself from the horse's back and floated to the ground. I prepared to say the words that would grant me entrance. I whispered them in my mind, and the tall grass of the mound melted away. A lit banquet hall stood in its place, with dancers and diners alike moving through the room. Although there were hundreds of us at this feast, it was not crowded. I looked around for my place, but at that moment a young woman, dressed all in cobweb silk, came forward. She wore a circlet of purple flowers on her brow, and she held another in her hands. She placed it on my head and I granted her respect.

"I see you've finally found your way here," she said softly. A jolt went through me as I recognized her voice. Sandra?

Then I was falling, falling away from the fading dancers, away from the light and music. I reached out to grab Sandra's hands, but I only caught the edge of her dress. She stared after me with a rueful expression until her face was swallowed by the darkness.

When I came awake, my hair was wet from rain and a few strands of cobweb silk twined around my fingers.

2.1

From that night forward, the voices stayed with me. I tried to ask Sandra or Bryan about them, but both my voices were notably silent.

By day, I tried to pull myself back from the edge of that unreality, even while I desperately wanted it. I've never been so frightened in my life. I forget how many times I called the airlines to book my ticket back home, but suddenly Shane would put the Celtic music back on or I would remember how little I had waiting for me, and I couldn't go through with it. Shane stopped talking to me altogether. I don't blame her. I can't quite remember (my memory of 'reality' is hazy) but I think I snapped at her several times. Between her silence and Sandra and Bryan's refusal to speak, the only people I had to resort to for company were the fairies of my imagination. It never occurred to me to seek out the other members of Burnt Haven. I thought I was crazy.

2.2

The only thing I remember clearly was the last dream. I had fallen into restless sleep, lonely and afraid. The strange paintings wouldn't let go of my mind. This time, there was no wait. I fell into the fairy world immediately. Groups of pale faces clustered around the edges of tables. Their expressions were wide-eyed and anxious. I saw the figure who reminded me of Sandra, but she had not spoken to me since the day I had first recognized her.

"We are gathered to discuss a matter of grave importance," said Reagh suddenly, rising from a chair in the center of the gathering. "It is rare that the sidhe are grave, but our current dilemma only arises once every several generations.

"It is rare that one of our own leaves us," he continued. "And rarer still that they return. But when they do, they are vastly changed." I scuffed my toes in the dirt under the table. I felt out of place at this gathering. All I'd seen so far had been revelry and merrymaking. I hadn't known that the sidhe had councils like all others ... and then a strange memory wafted over me, and I realized that I had known.

"And sometimes," Reagh said suddenly, "they cannot ride with us again." I was too busy caught up in the memory to heed his words. I had stood right in the center of this gathering, the angle of my head defiant. The other sidhe had looked exactly the same, even all those years ago. Their expressions had not changed as Reagh had forbidden me to ever go near the mysteries again. And my fury, it rose up in me like a bubbling wave and I had tried to find the one way to hurt them the most. Then I knew, and the walls of the sidhe were flying past me, the trees of the forest were no comfort to me then. I stopped in the center of a bare clearing, the magic sparking between my palms. I raised it angrily, shouting the words that would weave the most deadly spell of all ... let me take their precious secrets to the other realm! They could condemn me then! I felt the power wash over me, encase my body, spin me into another form ... and just as I finished, I saw their faces. My greatest friend and my greatest enemy, both had followed my flight from the hall. She reached out towards me, entreating me to stop even as the magic swirled out of both of our control. I heard her words, and I suddenly knew the foolishness of my own action, but it was too late. I was already mortal.

The memory left me gasping. I stared at the faces around me with new recognition, and I knew then what I had been led to.

"I remember!" I said suddenly into the gathering, shooting to my feet. Heads swiveled to face me.

"So," said Reagh firmly. "You almost sold the secrets of the sidhe for a chance at vengeance."

"I repent," I said, feeling a strange ritual hovering in the air. Reagh's expression was unhappy, but I could feel nothing.

"Sandra stayed with you, though it was against my orders and it cost her dearly. She was the one who led you to Burnt Haven, one of the few places where we can cross between worlds."

"I respect," I said, turning to throw a glance at Sandra. For Bryan, the one who had tried to lock me forever into mortality with his whisperings of fear, I spared no glance.

"You still do not deserve to ride with the sidhe once more," Reagh said sadly, and he turned away.

"Wait!" cried Sandra's voice. She had sprung to her feet with an entreating expression. "The sentence you pronounced on her years ago was unjust, Reagh. Her unhappiness at it was fair, even if her reaction was foolish. But we were all younger then, and we were all foolish then. She knows better now. Who would know better than I? I stayed with her for the full twenty-nine years she spent with the mortals." Sandra's large soft eyes were filled with pleading. Reagh turned to look at her and his gaze softened. "I'll vouch for her," Sandra said in desperation. He paused a moment. I could feel the desperate pleading in my eyes as I fastened them on his back. He looked from Sandra, to me, then back to Sandra. A helpless expression came over his face.

"Yes," he said in resignation, "we were all more foolish then." Sandra smiled broadly and leapt into the air, clapping her hands in delight. I just stood for a moment with my eyes closed, remembering everything I had forgotten.

2.3

The horse's bridles jingled eerily in the warm air. Long streams of silver hair flowed out behind the riders. We did not have to pause. I delighted in my first returning ride with the sidhe. No mortal expression I knew could express the joy I felt in that moment. My heart soared up and mingled with the many stars.

"...what to do," said a voice I just barely recognized. I stopped short. The voice came from a nearby copse of trees. I knew that a reflecting lake stood between those trees, one of the windows onto the mortal world. Distracted, I slowed my horse and turned it toward the copse. The needle-like leaves of the trees brushed my face as I came within view of the lake's waters. They were smooth, but not blankly mirror-like. An image sparkled in their depths. I walked my horse slowly to the edge. When I looked over, I saw the owner of the voice I'd recognized. Shane.

The artists of Burnt Haven stood in a semicircle around an easel in an empty studio. Many of them wore expressions of consternation.

"She's just disappeared," said Shane. "When I left, she was here; when I came back she was gone. She left everything. When I say everything, I mean everything. Even her toothbrush." There was a moment of silence.

"I just don't understand it," said Brad. "How can someone vanish without a trace? She left her things, the airlines haven't seen her, the police haven't seen her, there's no body..." he trailed off. I felt a momentary pang for their confusion, but I couldn't bring myself to regret it. After all, mortals only lived a handful of years.

"I painted ohm's around the spot in green fingernail polish," Shane informed them, "in case she was struck by the Goddess' justice. But by the Goddess, that's a beautiful painting." I strained for a glimpse of it.

"I guess it could have been worse. She was a bit eccentric," Michel said. This coming from a man with neon green eyebrows? I almost laughed.

"Well, I'm done with this whole mess," Brad said. "I'm going back to my place. There's nothing we can do but board this studio up and keep making art." There were murmurs of agreement. They all filed out, one by one. Shane was last, and as she left, she threw a last curious glance over her shoulder at the painting that had captured their attention. I glanced at it. The canvas was small, but the pale moon-colored image jumped out of the dark background. It was a sidhe woman, riding a tall silver horse. Her eyes glittered with life, and I almost put my ear to the canvas to hear her laughter. The image expanded to fill the entire mirror-lake, and I realized that I was staring into the eyes of my own reflection. Yes, a beautiful painting.

I smiled one last time in farewell. Then I turned, jerked my horse's reins, and rode off after the glimmering column of fairyfolk.

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