A Picture Worth A Thousand Words

Between the narrow slivers of sunlight at dawn and the hazy feel of the old apartment, Saki looked up at the decorative glass board. Perched neatly between her broken-down twin size bed and rustic vanity, it almost always felt out of place. She glanced over at her digital alarm clock, wiping away a layer of constant dust with her index finger. 6:59. One minute remaining. 

     As if anticipating her arrival, the clock rang on cue and Saki looked up. Small holographic displays popped up throughout the board, filling it with radiant beams of blue and white. She examined the board closer. Finish art project. Commission art project. Consult government buildings for paycheck. 

     Saki buried her face in her hands and sighed. With a name meaning “hope blossom,” she had wished she could be more optimistic about her daily tasks. The tasks on her vision board were getting harder and harder to fulfill each day. The government had promised to only assign personalized tasks that one could handle. So why was she feeling so overwhelmed all the time? She had always disliked the thought of being controlled by the government, but everyone had always been warned to never disobey the vision board.

     Defeated, she retreated to the only other room in her cramped apartment. She referred to it as her art studio, but it was rather a dump with a stove, couch, and easel. The painting sat neatly atop the rickety easel, whose uneven legs and missing screws made it another balancing act in Saki’s life she had to control. With only three tubes of paint and an apron used simultaneously for cooking and painting, Saki picked up her only paintbrush and began gently streaking color across the canvas. 

     Ever since the government installed the vision boards, she had been assigned the job of an artist, but that was far too fancy. Saki referred to herself as a poor painter, simply kept going by the government’s measly paychecks. Since the beginning of the week, Saki had been commissioned to paint day after day, always late into the night, with only one meal and one trip to the communal bathroom in between. But now, she had to do exactly that, but bring it to the government six miles away for approval as well. She checked the forecast. Rain was coming. Her strokes along the canvas became shorter and wider. She ignored smudges and blemishes. She didn’t care as the remnants of other colors on her brush turned new ones into a sickly gray. By the time she had finished, the sun had run its course just past the halfway point, and Saki stepped back and admired her work. Amid a mix of grays, whites, blacks, and beiges, emerged a dull cityscape, sunlight masked by cramped apartments and smog-filled skies. Realistic. Just the way she liked them. 

     She wrapped the painting in a large plastic bag riddled with holes, hardly waiting for it to dry. Clutching it under one arm, and pushing open doors and through crowds with the other, Saki began running through the six-mile journey in a race against the rain clouds. She had approximately four hours to get there and back before it was dark out and the downpour began.

~~

     For the first time in a while, Saki cried. Her painting had been rejected. Droplets of rain had pounded down on her return trip, and her brushstrokes had all melded together in one big, wet, mess. Houses had fused with trees, skyscrapers with the skyline, and the ocean with land. Her vision board hadn’t said walk through a downpour, ruin a painting, or cry hopelessly.

     Saki looked down at the note one politician had handed her. False depiction of citizen life. Too gray and depressing. Paint something more abstract and colorful by the first of the month. 

     She had two days to figure it out. 

~~

     Saki woke up, displeased to see the rain had not stopped. She glanced over at the ruined painting, and then back outside. It seemed similar enough. A maze of ash, charcoal, marengo, and taupe, all distorted by the heavy raindrops on the cloudy window. She checked the old clock, once again wiping off a new layer of dust. 7:06. Past vision board time. Above the clock, the vision board was empty. No beams of blue or white were present, and no holographic displays popped up. It was completely empty. Did that mean she didn’t have to do anything today? What about the note? Was that an informal vision board request?

     Saki didn’t want anything to get worse. Reluctantly, she reentered her art studio, bringing her ruined painting with her. She placed the ruined painting on the single countertop in the room, and replaced it with a fresh canvas. Reds, yellows, and blues were thrown onto it, but it didn’t seem right. It was too abstract. And it had no meaning.

     Saki grabbed her smudged painting and mixed together her colors. Within minutes, she had a full-fledged rainbow palette. Dabbing the brush in the murky water, she then began illustrating a new scene. Gray buildings were suddenly lit up by streaks of red and blue running through them. Parts of the sky turned beautiful shades of orange and pink. The land was reignited with greens and yellows, forming a dreamy landscape from the dull city. 

     Saki admired the new painting. It was abstract. It was colorful.

     She retreated to her room where she looked out through the window. The rain had stopped. Through the dewy window, the sun had started to rise above the rows of apartment buildings. In many ways, Saki realized she wasn’t as realistic as her past paintings had depicted. She was abstract, defined by the colors of her life, and fueled by the endless possibilities. Bright, new colors shone over her colorless past. The painting did have meaning after all. 

     And just like a hope blossom, Saki was blooming towards a hopeful future, free from the vision board’s gray constraints.