Brush With Life

(Content Warning for grief about the death of a pet.)

It was a few days after my dog died that I learned I could create life.

Samson was a good boy, and losing him hit me hard. I took the day off work and buried him in the backyard. Once I had the last bit of soil stamped back down, I went inside, cleaned up, and eventually found my way to my studio in the garage. The easel already waited for me, a fresh canvas set up weeks ago that I hadn’t the time to touch until now.

I painted a portrait of Samson, letting every emotion, both good and bad, flow into my brush strokes. Since I picked up the hobby in high school, I found it a great method of catharsis. My best friend moved far away, so I painted. My boyfriend dumped me, so I painted. It was my way of telling myself if I could turn my pain into something so beautiful, then I didn’t need to fear it so much.

I hadn’t touched it during the many vet visits over the past weeks because I knew I would need it for this moment. My dog died, so I painted. Normally the result would be whatever raw expression I could get out on the canvas, but today I had an image in my head barking to be let out.

With so many years shared between us, recreating him in a painting came naturally to me. I already knew what shade of brown to use for his fur, and which to use for the shadows and highlights. Then I dipped into black for the spots that ran along his side. They came out darker than they actually were in reality, but the contrast looked nice on the canvas. For the finishing touches, I painted his collar a shade of pastel pink, and carefully wrote his name on his silvery tag.

By the end, I had a nearly perfect recreation watching me with watery eyes. The emotions did not disappear, but they felt manageable.

I left the canvas to dry in the garage and went upstairs to bed. Honestly, I didn’t think anything more of it.

In the morning, I opened the sliding back door to let Samson out while I got his bowl and filled it with kibble. When I put it down in its usual spot on the porch to call him back, it occurred to me that I didn’t have to do this anymore. This little part of my morning routine was not necessary. I could call for him all day but he wouldn’t appear again.

The pain settled in me as a dull ache in my heart. It hurt but it didn’t stop me in my tracks, meaning the painting had helped. I cleaned up the bowl, shut off the porch, and had just started up the stairs when I heard a whining at the back door. Then an urgent tapping of paws on glass.

When I turned to look, I thought I had caught myself in a dream. This scene before me was a step too far to be believed. After watching Samson pass on, after burying him with my own hands, after painting his portrait in my grief, I knew this couldn’t be reality.

Perhaps this was really him scratching to be let in for breakfast, perhaps this was where his soul resided in a world of dreams. But this wasn’t my world, it couldn’t be.

The steps felt solid under me. The handle of the door felt slightly cold. It slid open with that familiar screech, and there he was. Bounding through the opening, jumping up to place his paws on my legs and yapping at me to be fed. His tag declared his name to be Samson, his collar was the same pastel pink one I bought for him years ago.

I played with him and fed him, expecting at any moment to awaken. When I didn’t, and when he settled into his dog bed by the fireplace, I grabbed the shovel. If he had come back as a zombie, a very friendly zombie, that would be fine with me, but I had to know.

The original Samson was buried right where I laid him to rest. In a way, it felt good to know his sleep hadn’t been disturbed, but in many more ways, this seemed worse. What was this strange copy of the dog I knew and loved? Where did he come from? Why was he here?

After reburying my dog and cleaning up, I settled in on the sofa and watched his copy sleep. When he awoke, he jumped up onto the cushion beside me and laid his head on my lap. I scratched him behind the collar and his back leg began to kick. Maybe it didn’t matter what he was. I had him back, couldn’t I be happy with that?

I was, but the how of it continued to worry me. It went around and around in my mind with nowhere else to go, all the while I kept petting Samson, throwing away any concerns about copies or zombies.

“Don’t suppose you can tell me where you came from?” I asked. He looked up at me with big dog eyes. No, I suppose he wouldn’t know either.

It boggled my mind how exactly he looked like my dog, even now I knew he technically wasn’t. His fur, his collar, his… spots. His spots were not exactly right, I realized as I took a closer look. Samson’s were dark brown bordering, but these were entirely black like little pools of ink sitting atop his back.

The painting. Of course. But how? I had painted many things and none of them had appeared in this way.

I hurried out to the garage to check, the dog trailing at my heels. The portrait was where I left it on the easel, at a glance unchanged from before. The mirror image of this new Samson watched me from the white cloth.

The longer I stared back at it, the more I felt something had changed. Nothing physical, but my emotions in response to it. The painting seemed flat and empty to me when it looked so vibrant and full of life upon its completion. Had those feelings transferred into this new life wagging its tail behind me now?

Now I knew, I decided it didn’t matter. I would accept this opportunity for the gift it was and love this dog same as I had Samson. I also vowed to myself that I would never paint again. Perhaps this was a fluke, but I feared more that it wasn’t, and that I might accidentally create something I was not prepared to deal with.

“Come on boy,” I said to Samson, calling him back into the house. He bounded past. With one final look at the portrait, I turned off the light and closed the door.

#

A decade passed and I didn’t touch a paintbrush once in that time. I found a different hobby in knitting, which I enjoyed doing without fear I might accidentally create life again. Samson also appreciated having the extra time with me on the couch, and I didn’t mind being buried beneath a pile of yarn and a dog.

Aside from my getting older, not much else changed. Certainly not Samson. The one other aspect he differed from the original was that. Whatever magic had brought him to life from my painting also kept him in his prime. His energy did not abate from year to year, though my own waned. An immortal dog, would you look at that?

As I found out, he was only immortal to a point. He was immortal until the fire happened.

According to the fire department, it was caused by faulty wiring. I woke to the blaring screech of the fire alarm sometime past midnight. I spent a few moments thinking it was a faulty alarm going off, probably a battery that needed replacing, until I smelled smoke. I jumped out of bed and grabbed Samson. We were both outside before I saw a lick of fire.

The fire started in the laundry room which was adjacent to the garage. It spread fast. I was still on the phone with the fire department when the flames reached the garage.

I had left all my old supplies in there. Tubs of paint, brushes, tarps, and canvases, both blank and not. I guess that’s what happened. The fire got to it. So one moment I’m on the phone, speaking frantically to an operator while Samson is whining beside me, and the next all I can hear is the sound of the man on the line asking me my address.

Smoke rose beside me. Samson’s portrait must have burned at that exact moment. The magic that brought him back went with it. When my neighbors came out to check on me, they found me alone on my lawn, staring down at the place where he stood.

The fire was put out before it could burn through the rest of my home. The damage it already did could be repaired, and insurance would take care of most of that. They couldn’t replace the portrait, though, and that was all I cared about.

I said I wouldn’t paint again because I didn’t want to accidentally create something else. So, I wouldn’t do it accidentally.

#

I could not get him right.

“Dammit!” I grabbed the easel and knocked it over, portrait and all. It did nothing to soothe my frustration.

I had been trying for weeks to capture his likeness as I had that one night, but a decade without practice couldn’t be easily ignored. The brushstrokes did not sit right like they used to, and the colors looked too faded. The hardest part became admitting to myself I lacked the skill I once polished to a gleaming edge.

That wasn’t only it, though. Something else was missing, some spark I found when I brought Samson back. For all I knew I lacked the ability to grab it now, I also felt it wasn’t there anymore for me to take. That even if I could get this portrait just right, nothing would come of it.

I picked up the easel and threw the half-finished portrait into the pile to be burned later. I set a fresh canvas up. But this time I hesitated, my brush hovering over the blank surface. Instead of seeing the image I wanted to paint in my mind’s eye, I had only a question rattling around in there.

Why was I doing this?

It didn’t feel like the right question, but I thought it was close. Instead of why, I had to wonder who. Who was I painting this for? The dog I had lost twice now? He had a lifetime and then some.

It was for me. I was painting it for me, but this wasn’t what I wanted to paint. It wasn’t what I needed to get out of me.

As soon as I realized that, I felt stupid for not figuring it out sooner. My skill had atrophied but that shouldn’t stop me so fully in my tracks. The real block came from elsewhere. I had to let go, and I only knew one way to do that.

I wiped away the brown paint from my brush and dipped it in black instead. I cannot describe the painting I made next, only that it came from my grief, my pain, my fear. Each horrible thing I could wring from myself and get on that canvas.

The feeling that came over me once I finished wasn’t entirely pleasant, but it wasn’t entirely unpleasant either. Mostly, I just felt tired.

I set this new portrait atop the rest and took the stack into the backyard to burn. Maybe that spark was still there, maybe not. I didn’t need to find out anymore. And these things? Well, if the fire could take something good from me, it could have the bad too.