Clown's Glow

Lyra Triftens, a part time artist and fast food employee, a young insecurely minded young adult, who was trying to pursue art, though it wasn’t her parents intended career path. Her stupendously realistic drawings, although of great talent, did not seem to be doing well socially. Her drawings of dark, menacingly scary places or people, were not a popular choice for living room decor. Her minimum wage job was doing better than hyper-realistic serial killers. 

It wasn’t that Lyra was darkly minded herself, yet it seemed when she drew flowers or enchanted sceneries, it didn’t provide a knack of mystery and story, each drawing had a tale of its own, from rather a nightmare or hallucination, these traumatic incidents, were turned into art, almost like a coping mechanism. 

Violet, a close knit friend of Lyra’s, and horror story consumer, found the drawings as museum artwork, and always was around for ideas from her eerie storybooks.

As Lyra had ordered new paints and art tools from a website with what little money she had left, she found a surprisingly cheaper glow in the dark paint online, that would give her drawings a nice vibrant pop of color and fear, and for the low 50% off price of $9.99, although the website wasn’t widely known and not a large brand of art supply.

Just after placing the order, Violet calls, vibrating her cheap phone. 

“Hi Lyra! I finished a new book and this might be a new one!” Violet exclaims as she sounds like she is shuffling through pages of a novel. 

“Awesome! You’re always ready somehow!” Lyra gratefully replies “And I just ordered a new glow in the dark paint set!”

“Great! I’ll give you the details!”

A detailed description of a sinister clown was given. Lyra took note of the many adjectives that make it come to life in her head. Under a decrepit bridge, with glowing gold and beige accents, a clown with a few glowing red accents, a sharp ax in hand, and a very curvy smile and sneering eyes. 

A few days later, the glow paint had arrived, its neon colors gave more of a luminescent shine than a complete nightlight, but maybe it was better on paper.

Lyra ripped open a fresh canvas, and started sketching out her design, filled it in with glowing and non glowing paint, added the accents of color, and finished with small tiny details. The formidable clown Lyra painted sat near the sun to dry out. Lyra went for a quick bittersweet coffee break to the Starbucks near her apartment. 

After her coffee run, she went back into her room, which was awfully quiet. The only noise hitting her eardrums were whistling winds. She checked on her painting only to see that the clown in the picture had disappeared! Only a white canvas where the clown should have been. Suddenly, she heard a formidable thump. Something she wished she had never heard. She slowly inched closer to the bathroom that the noise was coming from. Walking in, she gasped for air as she hyperventilated. She checked every corner except the bathtub, which was covered by a sheer silky curtain. To herself, a mental pep talk was given. 

‘You’ve lived here long enough to know that every scary noise is just this drafty apartment. There’s nothing behind that curtain.

As she placed her hand on the thin fabric. She yanked it open. Revealing a bathtub, just an empty bathtub.

She panted in relief. Then she turned around only to see the same sinister clown, with the same sharp ax, and the same bloodthirsty eyes. Lyra had let out a shrilling scream, then had either been knocked out with its giant bloody ax or fainted in disbelief.

After her little nap, she immediately jumped up out of bed. First staring off into the room, then back to the painting, the clown was back, same position, same ax, like nothing changed. It must have been a dream, all a dream. Nothing else.

She then tiptoed right to the bathroom, discovering writing on the foggy bathroom mirror, ‘Sparky was here.’

Taking deep breaths, she immediately texted Violet for closure of this major coincidence.

Lyra: Hi! What was the name of the clown I drew today?

Violet: His name is Sparky. Why?

Lyra: Just wanted to um.. Put it on the back of the drawing.

Violet: Ok, see you later!

Lyra: Bye.

As chills ran down her spine she started searching on her cell phone beside her, many results were not successful, until she spied a singular article of how a certain type of chemical used regularly in glow paint or any glow object, that contained a bacteria that almost seemed to be a life granter, turning anything it was on alive in a way. The only way to keep it controlled was to make sure the light was on, and the beastly chemical was not glowing.

Rushing to her painting, she stuck them into the bright storage area, basking in the defeating light. Lyra started panting in relief and sudden safety. 

Her rusty old apartment’s lights flickered, and then left her in darkness, at such a great time. She scrambled her phone out of her pocket and shined it to the closet door.

“BOO!” Sparky exclaimed as his two yellow eyes peered at Lyra’s, the snakely pupils staring into her soul.

She shrieked into the darkness. As she shined her bright flashlight, the clown groaned in distress, and melted into the paper. Lyra ran to get the lighter and bursted the book into flames. She saw its ax slowly wither away, and its little red nose shatter into a million microscopic pieces. Lyra’s heart thumped like a marathon runners as she threw away the burnt paper. The glow in the dark paints she bought went out and away as well. She knew that she would be braver than anytime before from now on.

THE END

Thanks for reading “Clown’s Glow” see you next week for more great stories!