She looked down at her phone and blinked in bewilderment, stunned that the address her college friend had given her had directed her to a suburb. Hesitantly, she switched on her left blinker and turned into what appeared to be the setting of the film Pleasantville, yet, she couldn’t ignore the fact that she felt less than pleasant about being there. Out of the corner of her eye, she looked at her black purse, sitting in the passenger seat of the car, and she tried to remember how many Xanax pills she had left in her prescription bottle.
Carefully, she drove through the suburb, noting that each house she passed was larger than the next. Some were brick, with two car garages, while others were white, complete with columns on the front porch. Of course, she knew that the lives lived in these homes were filled with just as much disarray as everyone else’s, and suddenly, her curiosity peaked, and she felt far less uncomfortable. She knew that behind the perfectly manicured lawns and the expensive curtains, carefully drawn to conceal the lives of those lived, behind them, were human beings, each with their own individual challenges and struggles. As she turned into the driveway of her friend’s home and heard her phone announce “You have arrived,” she looked at the large house in front of her and wondered what war her college friend was quietly battling, behind the closed doors of her home in Pleasantville, USA.
In the front lawn of the home her phone had directed her to, her college friend was standing, talking to what appeared to be her next door neighbor. Her college friend was still beautiful, of course, with her long, almost black hair pulled into an interesting side ponytail. She was wearing a black, lightweight windbreaker that was unzipped, revealing a black sports bra underneath, and her flat stomach, along with a pair of black leggings, and black running shoes. Of course, her figure was still svelte and as perfectly proportioned as it had been in college. That wasn’t unexpected though. She didn’t have children, and she always made physical exercise, along with her physical appearance, a priority. What was more surprising was the fact that she seemed so comfortable with her neighbor, a woman sporting short, platinum blonde hair, neon pink fingernails, and wearing what appeared to be a pink and green Lilly Pulitzer patterned dress.
Feeling slightly awkward and still uncertain as to why her college friend had contacted her, after almost a decade of them not having a relationship, she stepped out of her car and onto the plush, perfectly manicured lawn, as her friend began walking toward her. Unsure of how to start their conversation, after so many years had lapsed in their friendship, she decided to break the ice with the dry sense of humor they had always shared.
“You’re friends with a woman that wears Lilly Pulitzer dresses?” She asked her college friend.
“I am friendly with a woman that wears Lilly Pulitzer dresses. We are not friends.” Her college friend replied, giving her a cheeky grin, just as relieved that their friendship had fallen back into place so easily. “Besides, her Lilly Pulitzer dresses are one of the least annoying things about her,” she added.
“What could be more annoying than her wardrobe?” She asked her college friend, half sarcastically, half seriously.
“For starters, she’s blonde, and her name is Cammie,” she replied. “Of course, there’s also the fact that she only ever wears a pink shade of nail polish, which she somehow works into conversation with almost anyone she meets, as if committing to a certain OPI palette renders her a superior human being.”
“If I recall correctly,” she replied, “You were an adamant fan of OPI Linkin Park After Dark, and I’m quite certain you’ve shared that personal preference with multiple people.”
“Whose side are you on?” Her college friend asked, in a jovial tone.
“Yours, obviously. I spent the last ten hours in my vehicle, driving here, to visit you.” She replied, nudging her annoyingly svelte friend in the side.
“Now,” she asked her friend, “Are you going to tell me why you asked me to come here?”
“We should have that conversation, inside, in private,” her college friend replied, and the two of them walked across the manicured lawn, mowed in diagonally lines.
She walked out of the beach house, leaving her shoes behind. As she made her way toward the sand and water, she noted the uneven earth, beneath her. The house that she exited had been the scene of many epic events, throughout her lifetime, including an elegant dinner party that she and her husband hosted, nights before their elaborately expensive wedding. All that was behind her, now. She thought, at one point, that she won, with him, but their constant fighting was as much a part of her life as breathing, and she realized that their marriage was lost.
Silently, she sat in the dark room, listening to the sound of the rain, falling outside. It was not cascading down. This rain was not a harsh one. Untame was not how she would describe it. Wild was not an appropriate adjective, either. Rather, this rain was the opposite, she decided, as she listened to it gently tapping on the roof, above her. Like music to her ears, it was lulling her back into an early morning slumber. Calming, she decided, after racking her brain for the perfect word was the best way to describe the sound she heard. Yes.
Noises, certain ones, at least, are more harsh than others. Guns can be startling, for some listeners. Ammunition, interestingly enough, can both incite and dismantle fear, depending on the person and the circumstances. Bees, buzzing and bumbling about, can be relentlessly annoying. Deafness, even, can leave a constant ringing in the ear. Fire, crackling and generating heat, can make the most grounded folk startle with an unexpected pop. Honks, sounding from automobiles, can forewarn of anger and danger. Jolting noises can force you to either focus or lose your train of thought. Quick whistles, particularly familiar ones, can point you in the direction you need to go. Xerox machines, with their constant humming, can be maddening. Zippers, providing closure and protection, can be either calming or frightening, depending on whether you’re prepared for the fact that sometimes, they break, and like life, you may find yourself locked in, unable to breath, and yet, incapable of an escape.
Perhaps sitting in the dark room, listening to the calming sound of the noise, gently falling outside, was exactly what she needed to hear in that moment, before preparing for the day ahead of her. Often times, the boisterous booms she hears from the world outside are thunderous. Knowing that she had the opportunity to sit indoors, cozily curled up in a warm blanket, was the perfect way to start her day. Exciting was not how she would describe the sound she heard, as the moisture fell from the ominous sky above. Measured and careful was more accurate, in fact. Very pleasing and considerate, rather, was the rain.
She gazed upward, admiring the vast darkness of the night sky. The stars, brightly beaming overhead, cast down upon her, providing her with the opportunity to see, in the otherwise vast, never ending dark, which loomed above. The light illuminated the throng of trees she was standing amongst, and quickly, she found herself running toward the thicket to hide herself from the man behind her.
As she ran through the forest, she heard her feet quickly hitting the earth below her. In the otherwise silent forest, each crack and crunch of the fallen bark and leaves echoed amongst the trees, giving her location away, until she decided to stop and shield herself from the man by hiding amongst the trees.
She tried to calm her racing heart, which pounded so loudly in her chest, she was certain he would hear her anxiety and fear. Placing her hand over her mouth, in an effort to control her breath, she crouched down, trying to hide herself even more, as the sound of his footsteps grew closer and closer to her in the golden night.
The fire that was once within me The charisma you once knew It is almost gone It has been subdued
First, you accused me of being someone Someone that I so obviously am not You cast me in the role you needed me to play So you would not be distraught
You want me to be weak You want me to be wrong But those are not my lyrics That is not my song
I want you to be you As much as I only want to be me I need you to let me go And I want you to set me free
Please do not be mistaken Do not misinterpret me That is not a request Nor is it a plea
My story is mine And it is mine alone Please don’t expect me to be your everything Do not ask me to be your home
I have sacrificed and served I have answered the call and paid my dues And now, I need my freedom Even if that means you must lose
She heard the knock on the door and glanced at herself in the mirror, once more, before walking toward the front of the house. She knew, of course, without any doubt, that the man waiting for her on the other side of the door was one of the most attractive men she knew, and as she reached to turn the doorknob, she smiled to herself, knowing that she was not only greeting an alluring, enticing man, but a man that had, for whatever reason, also managed to be a good friend.
“Hi,” he said, smiling shyly upon seeing her.
“Hi,” she replied, smiling back at him.
“Are you ready to go to dinner?” He asked. “I can wait, if you need more time.”
“I need one more minute,” she shared with him. “Come on in.”
She observed his discreet reaction as he stepped through the front door, into the living room of the house she rented.
“That’s some bright paint,” he shared.
“Subtle,” she sarcastically responded.
“What?” He asked, jokingly. “I only said it was bright.”
“I didn’t choose it,” she shared. “In fact, I really dislike it. It isn’t exactly my style, but the owner liked it a lot.” She replied, before silently considering the neutral and dark interiors of the properties of his that she had spent time in.
“I only said it was bright,” he jokingly replied, again.
“I’m happy we don’t have a disconnect in interior design.” She said, walking back into the living room, where he was waiting for her.
“I have excellent taste,” he said, winking at her.
“I noticed,” she said, smiling back at him. “I do too,” she replied, reaching into her purse for her keys, to lock the door behind them, as they left the house to go out to dinner.
She woke up from her nightmare, abruptly, gasping for air. She squinted her eyes a few times, allowing them to adjust to the stark darkness of the room. She placed her index finger and middle finger on her neck, feeling the rhythm of her heart begin to slow its pace, and she became more calm.
Suddenly aware of the fact that in her hastened awakening, she may have disrupted her sleeping husband, she glanced at the clock on her bedside table, revealing the hour to be midnight. Concerned about the time, she turned toward the man laying next to her in bed, ready to adamantly apologize for any disruption she may have caused to his sleep.
As she reached out with her left hand, feeling for her husband, however, she was startled, when what she felt laying next to her in bed was not the warm body of the man she had fallen asleep next to more times than she could count but instead, a cold, arid, lifeless corpse.
Still struggling to see in the bleak darkness of the room, she squinted her eyes a few times, desperately willing them to adjust to the all encompassing blackness that surrounded her and the dead body laying next to her in bed. As slowly, she began to be able to start to see in what had once been a place of tranquility for she and her husband but was now an atmosphere overcast with gloom, she saw the pool of blood on the white duvet that she and her husband were sleeping under. Confused and horrified, she began to scream.
“Really, Liz, I would much prefer you didn’t do that,” she heard a male voice state, calmly. “You know no one will be able to hear you. Your nearest neighbors live miles away.”
The sound of his voice, a voice she had not heard in so very long but could identify anywhere, sent shivers down her spine, and she looked in the direction it had come from. She blinked a few times, wiping away the large tears on her face, now making out the figure of the man sitting in the oversized leather chair in the corner of the room.
“What have you done?” She asked him, unable to hide the trembling terror in her voice.
“I’ve done what you’ve always known I would do,” he calmly replied, leaning back in the chair, making himself more comfortable.
He looked at the psychiatrist, seated in an oversized brown leather chair. Her office was painted an ivory color, which he knew was intentional, as it isn’t an anger inducing color. As he observed her, he considered her wardrobe, which was a navy blue dress, and he wondered how much thought she put into what she wore everyday. Did she look at her schedule before she got dressed every morning to review the list of patients she would be seeing? Did she know their triggers and utilize her wardrobe as a way to avoid provoking them? As his mind began to formulate more questions, she interrupted him.
“What are you thinking about?” She asked her patient, noticing that he was no longer paying attention to their conversation.
He looked at her long, black hair, pulled back into a sleek ponytail, away from her face. He noticed the two gold wedding bands on her ring finger, curious as to whether she had intentionally hidden the diamond on one of them because it was large, and she didn’t want to give an unwanted impression in her profession.
“I’m thinking a lot of things,” he replied. It was, after all, the truth.
“And what might those things be?” The psychiatrist asked, pushing him for more information.
The objective of his sessions with the psychiatrist was to work toward having a healthier relationship with his adult daughter, not to develop one with the psychiatrist, after all. So far, however, his therapy sessions had done little more than make him question so many things about himself, including his interpersonal relationship skills.
“I’m thinking I was wrong about a lot of things,” he finally admitted to the psychiatrist.
The psychiatrist was surprised to hear her patient, the man she had been working with for the past three months, admit to any wrongdoing in his relationship with his adult daughter, but of course, she didn’t reveal this to him.
“And what might those things be?” She asked her patient, encouraging him to explore his thoughts in greater depth.
He considered all the effort his adult daughter had put into maintaining a relationship with him, in spite of his indiscretions, but his ego prevented him from admitting this to himself, let alone another human being.
“I should have never gone down that rabbit hole,” he finally stated.
The psychiatrist and her patient sat in a comfortable silence for the remainder of the hour. His admission that he has been wrong had made this a breakthrough session for her patient, and today, at least, that had been enough for her.
As I looked around the gallery at the pieces of artwork created, a sense of calm rushed over me. The artwork displayed in the room was beautiful, there was no denying that. The work was produced by artists, after all, and they had spent much time perfecting their pieces. I, of course, was not an artist. At least, I wasn’t an artist in the same sense that they were. Their creativity shown through on canvases and in photography and sculptures, while mine had only ever been on display in my writing. This was the first and likely last art contest I would enter, and yet, I knew, looking around the room, that mine may be a contender for winning.
Right next to me, there was a traditional oil painting of a landscape that utilized color and precision to portray a specific setting. So delicate in its exactness, I found myself, the observer, getting lost in the scenery it provided. To me, the setting was that of an English countryside, but the young man that had created the piece was standing in front of the easel, anxiously pulling on his suspenders, so I thought it best not to ask any questions.
On the other side of me, another artist was unveiling another piece of work, but hers was much more contemporary. She had torn hundreds of eyes out of magazines and covered an entire canvas with them. Of course, I did not ask her what the eyes represented, as the purpose of contemporary art is to provoke thought. My own interpretation of the piece was that it represented diversity by providing the observer with the opportunity to understand that the lens from which one person views the world does not always align with the lens another crafts their interpretation from.
Across the room from me, a woman dressed in baggy, oversized clothes stood in front of an unveiled sculpture. She glanced around the room, as if she wanted to ensure she wasn’t attracting any attention to herself before she hesitantly pulled the white sheet off the sculpture, revealing her artwork. I was surprised as I watched, because beneath the sheet was the sculpture of a nude woman, and I turned my attention back to the artist, who so carefully concealed her own body in oversized clothes and considered what a contrast her conservative appearance was to that of her more liberal work. To me, the artist was perhaps even more interesting than her sculpture.
The artwork I made for the contest was not as confrontational, but instead, it had been created with the intention of provoking thought. In the piece, I had utilized a small paintbrush to embed a thin, white line across a canvas that I had painted black. The line started on the left side of the painting, but it ended abruptly, only three fourths of the way across the canvas. I wanted the observer to question what the ending of the line represented. I wanted the observer to wonder why it ended so abruptly, as well as to contemplate why it was unable to complete its journey across the dark canvas, making it from one side to the next.
My own interpretation was that the dark canvas represented life and how dark it and often times, the people in our lives, truly are, while the white line represented the moments and the few people in life that actually make the often mundane trek worth it. Originally, I questioned whether it was somewhat cliche to utilize white and black in the piece, but then I realized colorism was perhaps the best way to encourage the observer to consider the concepts of darkness and lightness in their own lives. From an analytical perspective, those were the only two colors whose contrasts most captured what I wanted the artwork to convey.
When I created the piece, I thought of all the darkness I had encountered in life and all the dark moments people had created for me. As I painted the white canvas black, I felt a sense of relief, as if their chaos was exiting me and finding its way into my art. The white line, on the other hand, much like the color, was a stark contrast to the darkness. At first, I worried that the observer may interpret it as a hospital instrument used to monitor a heart rate, but then I realized that interpretation would not necessarily be unwelcome. To me, however, the precision of the thin, white line represented orderliness, or rather, the absence of chaos. To me, it represented the moments and people that had, in some way, beckoned me through the darkness of the whirlwind of situations that life had created around me, and that I, somehow, had the strength to endure. To me, it represented the moments and the people that made me want that line to continue.
I stepped back from the canvas and took a deep breath, again, feeling a sense of calm wash over me. After all, the hardest part of the art project had been completed. There is no interview with art. Instead, it falls upon the artist to not only ask themselves questions about their work and what they want it to represent but to utilize their creativity to answer those questions as well, which is what I had done.
As I glanced around the room, I felt confident that my piece may be a contender for winning. When I looked back at the black canvas with the thin, white line, only making it three fourths of the way across the piece of art before reaching its abrupt end, I thought about all the people and places both the darkness and lightness represented. Perhaps more importantly, however, I realized that it didn’t matter if I won an award for my work. No acknowledgement could surpass the feeling of triumph that I felt, knowing that the piece of artwork I created was symbolic of the difficulties I had already overcome at such a young age.
In spite of all the darkness on that canvas, along with the moments and the people they represented, I was standing there, in front of my artwork, and I smiled to myself, looking at the thin, white line, recalling the few, though significant people that I had compressed into that thin, white line, as well as the fond memories of them that I had carried with me.
For whatever reason, though admittedly, not for a lack of once trying, my own thin, white line, unlike that of so many others, had not abruptly ended. For whatever reason, even though the darkness people had created for me had, at times, been too much, I had survived. Looking at the thin, white line, I realized that in so many ways, and perhaps for reasons beyond my understanding, I had already won, and that achievement meant far more to me than any award ever could.
Of course, I did not vocalize what the artwork represented to me. After all, I created it to provoke thought, not to force an interpretation on anyone. To me, however, the thin, white line, with its abrupt ending, was in honor of so many that had been overwhelmed by the dark situations they encountered that were out of their control and did not make it through. To me, the thin, white line, with its abrupt ending was in honor of those that had been overwhelmed by the dark situations they had encountered that were out of their control, yet somehow, did manage to find their way through. To me, the thin, white line was a silent salute to them and both their victories and their losses, and it was a silent salute to me and mine too.
She looked around the small prison cell that had become her home. Below her, the cement floors were beginning to reveal small cracks in their foundation. On the walls of the small space that had been assigned to her, she had decided to take a cue from Anne Frank, during her days in captivity, and as decor, she hung posters of her favorite actresses on the wall.
As she sat on her bed, looking at the posters on the otherwise bare, white walls, she felt immensely disheartened. All throughout her life, she had been surrounded by so many women that she had the opportunity to learn from. She had been exposed, through literature, film, and media outlets, to women that encouraged young people to prioritize themselves and their educations. And yet, there she was, laying on a twin size bed, with only a thin white comforter covering her legs, looking longingly at the actresses that stared back at her.
She had researched them, of course. She had utilized her time in the prison library to develop a greater understanding of how they had not fallen prey to some of the situations that she had. Now, of course, that was all behind her. Now, of course, she was living with the consequences of her actions, while the actresses that adorned the otherwise boring walls, were living their lives to the fullest, excelling for not making the same decisions she had.
She thought back to the life she had lived prior to her confinement to a prison cell, and she breathed a sigh of relief. Gone was the chaos that had once overstimulated her mind, preventing her from thinking for herself. Gone was the madness that had once enveloped her life. Gone. It was all gone.
She crossed her legs and assumed a comfortable position on her bed, before opening her book to read. Of course, she had not made peace with her decisions. Instead, she found peace and tranquility away from turmoil.
