Creative Inspiration

She had been texting Fatima so gleefully when the message came through. Mid-conversation, mid-enthusing. A nice deep cut, slicing right through the excitement. 

-I had a great time last night, but I just don’t see it going anywhere. I’m sorry.

She literally couldn’t believe it. They’d had such a great evening. She had just been giving Fatima all the details. The easy-going vibe, the flirting, how he actually was cuter than his pictures. For once. They’d been talking for a week before (they never talk to me for a whole week Fatima, you know that), he’d told her his passions, she’d told him hers, he’d even helped her with her homework for the week. He made webtoons, he wanted inspiration for his next drawing. He told her he would show her on the next date. 

And now this. One message, one swipe of the blade, cut off. Done. Not interested. Sorry. Full stop. 

She tried texting back, asking why, if it was something she did. Telling him how great a time she had had and how she just wanted him to give her a chance. 

-It’s complicated, I can’t explain. Sorry.

And then no more. No more read messages. She couldn’t find him on Instagram, even though Fatima could. Blocked then. All ties snipped. That was it. 

Her eyes stung as Fatima fired off her best rallying cries. No good. Obviously trash. I didn’t even think he was hot to be honest. You are worth so much more than guys like this hun, seriously. Fuck him. 

The stinging became flowing, tears pouring down her face, along the rivulets of her neck, on to her forearms. It was all so embarrassing. Feeling so happy, so excited, and then being beaten down with one simple message. Her face was hot, probably red, and her chest was heavy. Again. Another good date, a fun date, I did nothing wrong, I was good, I was nice, and still this. 

She sat for untold minutes on her sagging bed, staring at the blurred floor in front of her. Phone gripped, pinging with light intermittently, now damp from the crawl of tears pooling in her cupped hands. How was it possible to be so humiliated in your own room, all alone on a Sunday evening, because of a few sentences? 

She shook her head, focussed her eyes, tried to get rid of the blurring. Tried to concentrate on something else, anything else, that would help. She finally read the flashing screen on her phone. 

Jen, reminding everyone about the challenge. Her challenge. Yet again. In case any of us had forgotten how well she was doing. 

“Guys, it’s day 15, halfway throooough now! Don’t give up on me now gals haha #cringe #30daysofyoga” 

Complete with a selfie in downward dog, resplendent in a matching beige two piece from some company no one else in the chat could afford. How the fuck did she even take that? A self-timer? Mirrors? 

Her boyfriend, probably. Well, I guess it’s something to do, she thought. It will shut Jen up for the next few hours at least. 

So she slumped off the bed, crawled along the floor and grabbed her mat. Spongy and black, she slapped it down on the floor harder than one imagines the yogic community would care for, but still. She had to achieve something today. Maybe it was a good idea to wipe her face or get some water, but she was determined. Ignoring Fatima’s latest salves (what kind of grown man even makes webtoons anyway?), she opened up the latest video in the series the group had all decided to follow for the month. By the group, she of course meant Jen, everyone else nodding and liking along to stop another hissy fit rising up. It’s one hell of a friendship when you’ll take continuous exercise over an honest conversation. 

The theme for today’s video—sorry, practice—was ‘create’. Sure, whatever. She propped her phone up against a pillow, pressed play, and attempted to arrange her limbs into something aesthetic. Even the breathing was hard, with her ragged pants stuttering out of her at jagged intervals. As elegant as a duck on ice, her Mum had always said.

She laboured through the moves, sending her energy towards resenting Jen. She couldn’t even bring herself to concentrate on the date without shaking and crumbling, so Jen it was. She wasn’t, in all honesty, letting go of the pressures of the day or relaxing through her breath, but at least she was doing something. The lady in the video rambled on about creating space, creating time, creating god-knows-what, as she wavered through her stretches, lunges and folds. After twenty minutes, she was generously permitted to lie on the floor.

“And now, as you relax into the Earth, find the space within yourself for something more. There is the potential to make something powerful, something that speaks ourselves to the world, in all of us. Go forward and create something today, something that takes your emotions and truth, and sets them free.”

And as she lay there, one hand on her stomach, the other on her heart centre, she understood. Her eyes sprung open, her breathing finally calming as she took in her lesson for the day. Create. Set it free. Get those emotions out to the world, get them out, and put them where they were meant to be. It would take time, but what art doesn’t? 

She rolled herself up, grabbed her phone, and prepped her proof for the day. Curling her right hand into a tight fist, she sent the selfie with the caption ‘the pen is mightier with the sword’. Jen liked the message within minutes. Fatima sent a confused face emoji twenty minutes later, then messaged her again, but it went unread. 

As she stared out of the window, lazily watching the first snowflakes fall, she knew. How to stop the sting in her eyes and the heaviness of her chest. 

************************************************************

Only the light cracking through under his blinds gave him any idea what time it was. He groaned and rolled slowly away from the window, only to squint his eyes at his phone and see the various chat icons glaring out at him. 

At least five new messages from three chats, probably should look at those. He kicked back his sheet and rolled himself upright. Seven thirty p.m. One hell of a siesta, even in this heat. 

He pushed his hair out of his eyes and stared at the screen in his hand. 

-OMG a bouquet of rosessss? Literally this is soooo sweet I can’t believe it. I love you so much babe, I can’t believe you have to be away for our 1 yearrr. Your boss is such a biiiitch haha. Have an amazing time, hurry back soon cos I miss you <3 

Plus three emoticons and a GIF. Not too shabby. She’d probably already shared it on her socials (yup, she had), but without tagging him, she knew how cringey he thought that was. Next up: 

So like, is tonight on or no? I think I can meet at like, 8 or 9, but my friend has this thing that starts at like, 12 and I really should go. You said yours is OK, right?

Oh shit yeah, today was Friday. He had work to do, but that could all be done at his desk, and there was no way in hell he was ever going to pass up Kim. Obviously at hers though. He wasn’t about to be that stupid. 

He tapped out replies to both, following the strict new ‘always in order’ system he’d imposed after the near disaster last year: he didn’t have the energy for that. He swiped the other app notifications on his screen away like flies, finally leaving the only message he actually wanted to read in his email.

Stretching slowly and kicking over a (mercifully empty) ramen tub on his way to the chair, he opened the message. 

-Man, I knew you’d get it. Of course you would, you just know. I posted it yesterday, it should all be with you today or tomorrow, let me know once you’ve got it man. This is going to be so epic, I just know it. Thanks for getting my process, I can’t wait for what you can show me. 

Electricity jolted up along the back of his neck. It was coming. An actual manuscript, handwritten, to him, the only person trusted to take that story and make it in to something more. 

He never would have pictured himself getting so excited about writing coming in the mail. But no one had ever connected to his work like this before. 

He’d met Artemis_943 on one of the many forums he lurked on some time a few months ago. It had started with a few little compliments of his illustrations, then a question about a panel he’d posted to one of the sites. He was so excited to see someone, for once, actually get the work he was putting out there. He asked about the linework, the shading, was it a reference to this particular graphic novel from so and so? Yeah, yeah, you have to be humble, and this was probably some troll, but no one else even replied to his posts. No feedback, no reception, nothing, until Artemis. 

They started DMing when they realised how similar their influences were. Artemis had read everything, right through to the one issue zines he thought no one else could even find. And Artemis saw that in his work. It was embarrassing to admit to himself, but he had never felt acknowledged like this before. 

After a month or so of the back-and-forth nerding out, Artemis had come out with it. He actually wanted to make webtoons himself. He had ideas, even stories, but thing was: he had no artistic ability at all. His hands were as elegant as a duck’s feet on ice, he joked. It was a weird request, sure, but like, would you maybe like, be the illustrator for the story? If you didn’t mind?

Well, normally a webtoon author creates the story and the visuals together, but like, graphic novels are the same thing right? And Alan Moore didn’t draw his work alone.

 He was genuinely excited. If the story was good, and he could add his imagery to it, this might be the one. The story that actually gets some views, some likes, some notice. Send it over, he replied.

-Amazing! I’ve seriously been mulling over this for like, so long man, you understand. I’ve got it all fleshed out, I think it’s all tied up, but man, I NEED to see some visuals with this. 

The thing is though, I have this process. I know you do too, like, you need it to really create, you know? So like, for me, writing it out like, actually physically is how I have to do it. Like actually on paper, with pen! #oldschool I know. I think it’s something about the actual physical exercise of it, it really helps me like, express it, you know? Now obviously I could type it up (lol, I will, god I am sooo lazy haha), but like, how do you feel about me sending it through to you and you like, mock up the illustrations/layout from there? Is that like, crazy difficult? Let me know man. If it’s cool just send me your address and I’ll get it out ASAP, but like, no worries if not. Let’s get this going though!

OK, wow. A physical story, written out on pages for him to read through. A lot of work, yeah, absolutely, but there was something admirable in the desire to get the words onto paper, like they used to do. And Artemis had done it for him, because of his work. How many people recognised him like that?

He swiped away a notification about a picture he’d been sent, a pair of lips pursed above a burst of red roses, and opened his notes app. While he hadn’t received the actual story yet, Artemis had sent him some outlines, some themes to play around with and get the blood pumping. It was a dark story centred around an antihero—he wasn’t exactly unfamiliar with these in the world of online illustration. This figure hunted down ghosts in the dead of night, ghosts who had done wrong and needed one last dose of vengeance to kick them off this mortal coil. It was a neat twist on ghosts and revenge, and he’d already mocked up some amazing panels from the first real scene that Artemis had given him. While the notes didn’t offer much (mysterious figure, dark room, blood and shadows), he had taken the imagery he’d been given and run with it. He’d worked all night and into the next day, ignoring the incessant pinging of his phone in utter bliss. 

Finally, a real project to undertake. Replying to everyone else was no fun at all, and none of them knew a fucking thing about creativity. Just one bunch of flowers, or sometimes just one damn message, and these people were done. He was so excited to get something to really do that he even forgot to reply to Kim when she pinged on the screen again. 

Opening up the window to move some of the dead air around his room, he scrambled for the aircon control. He jabbed it upwards at the ceiling until cool air eventually sighed out, and thought about ordering in. 

Like these things do, his thoughts seemed to summon an action. When he was just about to open up the delivery app on his phone, there was a firm knock at the door. After the brief daze where he thought the phone had somehow read his mind, he remembered the post he was waiting for. Normally this would come earlier in the day, but he had no idea how things worked when the package was sent by special delivery. He looked around for something to wear aside from underwear, calling out to the waiting parcel to hold on for just one moment. 

************************************************************

She stood solidly, unmoving and silent, staring at the door. Gripping paper in one hand, her fingers curled around cold hardness in the other, she wondered. Would the blood spatter in the same way as he’d drawn it for her?