The Imp’s Gift

When I opened my eyes, I was greeted by a blurry world. I let out a deep sigh and draped my arm over my eyes, allowing them to be swallowed by darkness once more. It was worse than yesterday – it was starting to become difficult to see the patterns on my ceiling now. I wondered for a moment how long I would have left. A day? Two or three at the most? It didn’t matter. This relentless march would not stop. Before those dark thoughts could consume me, I forced myself to push them from my mind.

Slowly, I rolled over, swinging my legs over the side of the bed. The moment I did, I felt a steady hand take my arm. She was probably just trying to help me to my feet. Not that I cared for it. I wasn’t yet so helpless that I couldn’t walk on my own two feet. And I grunted as much to her as I shrugged her hand away. She didn’t say anything about my attitude, though. She never did. Merely walked a half-step behind me, ready to offer her assistance, should I need it.

She was a sweet girl, that Abigail, despite how much I loathed her company. Sent to me by the sponsor who funded my work, like a not-so-subtle push to continue what they were paying me to do. But I didn’t need any pushing. It didn’t matter to me who they sent or what they did or the insults or compliments they so casually hurled. Nothing could keep me from continuing my work. After all, it was the one thing that never failed me – that never left me. It was the one thing I was always good at. The one thing I was put on this world to do. Even if I incurred God’s wrath in doing so.

A string of words more colorful than any palette spewed forth like a geyser as my small toe slammed into a stool that I swear moved on its own. Maybe there was a rival artist somewhere nearby. I chortled softly to myself at the thought as Abigail quietly moved the stool out of my path regardless of the fact that I never asked her to.

I managed to make my way to my studio without any further incidents. Everything was in the same spot that I had left it yesterday. My tools were more familiar than my own hands. It was difficult to make them out anymore, but I knew exactly where they were. Cups of dirty water placed on every nearby available surface. Brushes with handles covered in layers of paint that coated my hands — a stark contrast to their bristles being the cleanest surface in the room. No less than 12 different sized canvases leaning against walls or tables or chairs. Only one of them was placed in a spot of honor — on the only easel in the studio. There used to be a thick tarp that covered the floor, put there at the request, or rather the consistent nagging, of my wife. Abigail was kind enough to roll it up for me and place it in the storage closet to the side as the times I tripped over its wrinkles increased in frequency. Now, when I overloaded a brush with paint, it simply splattered on the floor, leaving a bright, colorful stain in its wake. I told myself I liked it better this way – a true representation of free, uninhibited expression. Even if that expression stuck between my toes and tracked all through the house.

As I picked up the nearest brush, I found myself breathing a sigh of relief that the colors of the painting that had consumed my attention for months now were still visible to my old, tired eyes, even if only slightly. It was my greatest work yet. A piece that deserved to be completed no matter the cost.

When I was a child, I never understood how a man could continue something even at such a heavy cost. The doctors, the sponsors, the viewers, they all spoke about it the same way. The disease isn’t fatal, they said. You could never practice your craft again anyways, so isn’t it better to leave such awe-inspiring beauty in your wake? The ones who were forced to live with this disease, though, were of a different opinion. They said that if you allowed the disease to progress — and they all allowed it to progress — you could feel a piece of your soul slipping away.

That’s what this hellish plague was. The Imp’s Gift. An infection that allowed you to create something so beautiful that no human could ever hope to replicate it – something so incredible that the very laws of nature were rewritten to compliment it. But such beauty didn’t come without its price. As if God and nature themselves rejected the very foundation of this art, the one thing that you needed in order to create it was stolen from you in return. The musician whose sweet music caused vivid scenes of intense color to fill the skies loses her ears. The actor whose impassioned speeches caused the very stage on which he stood to change form, growing trees a mile tall or cutting deep gorges through the audience, loses his voice. The metal worker whose gold statue stretches its limbs and begins to dance around the table loses feeling in his fingers and movement in his hands. How someone could continue to practice his art even as he felt the very force which allowed him to breathe life into it being stolen from him, I could never understand. When I first picked up a brush, I swore that I would never lose a piece of myself over some paint on a stretch of canvas. But then, it happened to me. And suddenly, I understood.

When I began this painting, I felt it deep in my chest, the disease’s fingers spreading out within me. There was no explaining it. No overt symptoms or reasons to believe I might be in danger. Just a knowledge that if I continued down this road, I would never be the same. I, as I’m sure all the others did before me, convinced myself that I was being paranoid – that there was nothing wrong. And yet, even as my vision started to fade and my world grew dim, I never set down the brush. Because I couldn’t give up on this painting. I could never set her aside — my greatest masterpiece. My heart.

I could feel Abigail behind me, watching in fascination as each stroke added a new blend of colors – a new layer of life. Back when she used to try making conversation, she told me that she was an art student herself. That when my name appeared at the agency she worked for at the behest of my sponsor, she immediately volunteered to be the one to accompany me. She wanted to learn all she could from me while I still had something to share. I’d frowned and barked at her something along the lines of stop being a child and put your effort into something meaningful. But she didn’t say anything. In the face of my admonishments, she simply smiled and handed me the blue I’d been reaching for. I regret being so harsh with her. Perhaps, if I was kinder, she might have heeded my advice and given up on art. After all, the remnants of the young man who sneered at the artists who had embraced their disease still remained in me.

With each stroke of the brush, I could feel the pain in my eyes grow, the blurriness that rapidly consumed my vision threatening to overwhelm me. I could hardly see my own hand anymore, much less the room that surrounded me. Yet somehow, I knew that my task and the perfection it promised was nearly complete. There was only one thing left to add before this plague’s gift would truly bring my work to life. Before the imp took my vision forever.

My hand shook slightly as I dipped the tip of the brush in the color I needed. When I raised my arm, though, my nerves stilled. A consequence of years of practice in keeping my hand still, I suppose. The ability to stop my fingers from shaking had become ingrained into me.

Slowly, with the precision of a surgeon tying his final stitches, I placed the last dot of color on its rightful spot on the canvas. No trumpets sounded, acknowledging the gravity of the moment. No cheers came from the masses, waiting for its completion with bated breath. No bell rang to signal the finality of my action. It happened quietly, without any fanfare, as the blurriness that I’d somehow grown accustomed to over the past few months disappeared with the rush of a cold sea wind.

I could see her now. For the first time, in all her beautiful color and detail, the “gift” that I’d sold my soul to obtain. I could see her smile grow just a fraction of an inch as she turned to face me, her gaze gentle and sweet as I remembered it to be. I could see her hand reaching out to me, the canvas stretching in its wake so she could brush it softly against my cheek as she used to before we went to sleep. I could see her lips moving slowly like the falling of petals on an early spring day as she spoke the words I’d longed to hear since the day she left me. Tears fell from my eyes, cascading like a garden stream over millions of small, smooth pebbles as her voice reached my ears. I could feel my heart ache, ripping itself through my chest all over again, just like it did the last time she’d spoken those words as I held her hand in clenched desperation to keep her by my side. Like it did when I lost her forever.

I could feel the pain returning to my eyes, but I fought against it with everything I had in me. I didn’t want to lose her again. I would do anything not to lose her again. But as the seconds dragged on, the pain only grew. And eventually, my eyelids were forced to close.

When I opened them again, the world had become completely dark. There was no studio, no canvas, not even the color black for my eyes to settle on. There was simply nothing. I was left alone, in the dark, with only her words to echo in my head – words I’d heard countless times over the years. Words that filled my heart with an electrifying vigour each time she spoke them.

I allowed the paint brush, still clenched in my hand, to slip through my trembling fingers as a smile drifted over my face and my head fell back. Tears trailing down my cheeks were the only indication that my eyes were still open. The pain was gone, but it had taken my sight — my ability to create — with it. But I didn’t care. If it meant I could see her again, then I would do it a thousand times over. Perhaps soon I might be able to join her. But for now, hearing her voice again brought me peace.

Gently, Abigail took my arm and guided me to my feet. She seemed to know instinctively the weight of what I’d just done. I pictured her marvelling at the painting that was as alive for her as it would be for all those who viewed it — as alive as I wished she still were every moment of every day. And I knew that my benefactors would be pleased with the culmination of the priceless magic that had taken my sight.  And still, she said nothing. Just as she always did. Instead, she guided me slowly to my room and onto my bed, so that I could rest. The sun must have set without my realizing it. I let out a soft laugh and closed my eyes, though I could hardly tell the difference now. As I drifted off to sleep, the smile never left my face. It was good to see you again. And don’t worry. I will be with you soon, my love, my heart, my beautiful wife.