a story a day

From behind, strangers often mistook her for a man. Katherine had broad shoulders that could run multiple campaigns advertising beer, strong legs that every marathoner envied, and massive hands that were a smooth canvas for the landscape of her mountain range of knuckles. She had learned to avoid bracelets and rings, as they just called attention to her “sturdy” hands (as her mom liked to describe her unlikely attributes). She had gotten used to wearing heels and makeup in an attempt to cancel out the man-parts, but in that combination, she gave the impression of a unimaginative transvestite.

Katherine’s hair was something else. Her long brown strands fell straight down to her elbows, and swayed with her every movement. They could be woven to be a gown fit only for God’s right hand angel, if he had one. There were certain times of the day when her streaks reflected colors not charted on the spectrum- the type that lives and dies only in one’s dreams. The greatest phenomena with Katherine’s hair was that it had been that length her entire life. Her mother had recalled ten times too many, the birth of Katherine- how her long brown hair had gotten tangled with her umbilical cord, how much it had tickled her mother when the doctor slid her only child out of her womb. She was born with her long wet hair, wrapped twice around her entire body like a blanket,  protecting her fragile little body. When the doctor had attempted to trim Katherine’s hair for her safety, her pulse slowed down to fatal rates as her tiny pinkish body went weak and quiet. Katherine’s mother never let her cut her hair in fear of her life since that first trial.  And for the next eighteen years, Katherine’s slinky hair played the role of distracting strangers from her man-ish attributes.

Katherine’s mother, Janine, was a self-conscious petite woman that had been completely drained of the little love she was born with over the years of heartaches over relatively small tragedies such as brittle nails and a small salary as a local newspaper editor. Katherine was the idea of her father, Sam, who so badly wanted to refill Janine’s life with love. He had read somewhere that women discovered true love only after giving birth to their own child, and Sam wanted to help his wife discover that love. To Janine’s disappointment, the sum of their efforts had created a hermaphroditesque being called Katherine, which was simply added onto the long list of Janine’s dissatisfactions in life after ‘slow metabolism’ and ‘peanut allergy.’ Katherine’s beautiful hair was the only factor that had stopped Janine from putting Katherine up for adoption. Janine felt proudest when she thought about the fact that something in her DNA had created Katherine’s mysterious curtain of silky hair. She blamed her daughter’s masculine attributes on Sam- she had always felt he had too much testosterone. She felt comfort when she closed her eyes and stroked Katherine’s crown, and it would be the closest thing to love that Janine would ever feel.

Vincent finished the last painting of the day and wiped his hands with a washcloth soaked in olive oil. He had always enjoyed the setting sun that painted the bare beige walls of  his studio in bright shades of orange and yellow that he would never dare to paint himself.  Looking down at his hands, Vincent was satisfied of all the oil paint that had gravitated from his soft hands to the cloth. He continued to wipe his hands, as thoroughly as his father had taught him when he was alive- two decades ago, around the same time that he had painted his very first painting for the royal family. Vincent picked up the last thumb-sized oil painting and placed it on the floor of his studio, completing the 10×10 grid of identical portraits of Queen Elizabeth. He would add adhesive to the back the next day.

Vincent was a humble painter that took joy in being a fruit sticker painter. He didn’t like calling himself that, although he knew that that’s what he really was. He had been contemplating of what he could call himself. The right title that would correctly translate every ounce of  honor and craft that Vincent held for his occupation as a Royal Fruit Portraitist- no, Artist of Pomiculture- wait no, does anyone even know what Pomiculture meant? And if they didn’t, was it a bad thing? Maybe they would assume it’s a job from a higher calling… Sovereign Fruit Artist? Royal Fruit Sticker Painter? Vincent had lost many nights of sleep as a Fruit Sticker Painter. He wanted to come up with a title that wouldn’t embarrass Lydia, his wife, and John, his adolescent son, whenever a new townsperson asked about Vincent and his occupation. Lydia had no doubt that Vincent had artistic talent sent from God himself- the same skill that He had used to sculpt the mountains and paint the sky in colors that happened to surround Vincent every evening. She thought Vincent could do something greater with his artistic hands. Her dream was for his paintings to hang in the walls with the Royal family in the presence of Queen Elizabeth and her guests whether they were reading a book or taking a dump. The thought of the beautiful work of her husband being peeled away and forgotten before the core of the fruit could even see daylight made her sick. The next morning, Vincent would do it all over again. She thought of Vincent as the modern Sisyphus.

Vincent looked down at the thumb-sized paintings and admired his work, and all one hundred Queen Elizabeths looked up at him from the ground, admiring Vincent and his nimble hands that had managed to paint all the extravagant detail of her formal attire on an oval canvas that held a large diameter of 2.5 centimeters. Sir Vincent, you are the most dexterous painter in all of England, all one-hundred of them seemed to whisper in unison. Each and every tiny portrait exceptionally portrayed every sliver of shine of every pearl and the delicacy of her lace collar that was on an identical horse-sized painting of the Queen, which hung majestically in the center point of the Crimson Drawing Room on the west wing of the Windsor Castle. Vincent took out his loupe out of his leather box that was lined with soft purple velvet. It was a gift from his father when he assumed that Vincent would be a great portrait painter like his father was. He bent down on his knees and placed the loupe over the last fruit sticker painting. He used to use the loupe to inspect the paintings for any smudges or missing highlights of the Queen’s detailed satin dress, but Vincent could now do his job without having to look at a copy of the original. He used the loupe to justify his own work to himself- that he was not wasting his time and talent, as his family had persuaded.

There was a soft knock on the door that Vincent had been expecting. He stuffed the washcloth in the pockets of his spotless apron and set the loupe carefully into its satin home. Vincent walked around all one-hundred drying Queen Elizabeths to get to the door. Henry was already in the middle of his sentence as Vincent swung open the door. “-thirty pears-ars, and the twenty banana-anas make one hundred pieces of royal fruit for the royal fam. il. ee.” He smiled as he scratched his belly that looked like a sack of water- no, a pouch of moonshine. Vincent had worked with Henry for over a decade, but their relationship had never gone further than a few drunk slurs from Henry and a nod here and there from Vincent. But he had never seen Henry so intoxicated before. Vincent walked carefully around Henry, just as carefully as he did with his drying paintings on the ground. He unloaded the wagon, which held large wooden crates of  only the perfect fruit, free of bruises, free of wormholes. They had been hand picked especially for the royal family, from farms all over the world.  “Let me help you, Vincent sir,” Henry slurred. He stumbled to the wagon and got the last of the delivery that Vincent had already carried into his studio. Vincent took the crate of Pineapples that were uneasy in Henry’s plump jittery fingers and set them against the wall. “Henry, you shouldn’t ride that horse in this state. Come lie down for a while until you can see straight.” Henry looked at Vincent and slurred a soft noise. Henry was led by the hand to Vincent’s cot that had been set up for his rare nights when he was required to paint up to 500 portraits for large gatherings that would require more bowls of fruit. Henry had never been inside Vincent’s studio- there wasn’t much to take in. He looked around in his half-slumber and abruptly stopped when he saw the grid of tiny portraits laying on the ground. Vincent pulled on Henry’s slunk arm, as he tried to distract clumsy Henry from the work he had spent days on.  “Come, on Henry, let’s get you over on that side of the room- there’s a nice cot you could rest in.” Henry suddenly took a stiff stance and turned to Vincent. “May I? I can be careful.” Vincent reluctantly picked up the first painting and placed it in Henry’s dirty hands. “It’s still wet.” Henry lifted the oval portrait to his face. He looked at Vincent and then again at the Queen. Vincent slowly lead Henry to the cot as Henry studied the painting that was now held up over the bridge of his bulbous red nose. Henry’s eyes welled up with tears as bloated as his belly. They overflowed out of Henry’s red eyes as he sunk into the thick cot. “This is the most beautiful painting, I’ve- I’ve ever seen.” The tears streamed down his warm cheeks that left large spots on Vincent’s cot. Vincent, touched, let Henry keep the painting that sat in his palm as he fell sound asleep. It was the first truly honest piece of praise that Vincent had ever received. The walls of his studio had turned from orange to blue. Vincent started to paint one more Queen Elizabeth in the moonlight to the sound of Henry snoring.

Free, first come first serve  it read. Anna, as thorough of a woman she was, skipped the fine print and filled out the required fields with her pale  fingers, powered by a sudden urge to get her life back to where it was- she was tired of mourning. As soon as she sent in the application, there were 3 solid knocks on her front door. Anna, not expecting the response to come so quickly, chose the heat over embarrassment and threw on her thick robe over her faded pajamas. The tail of the robe knocked down the mounds of used tissue all over her bedroom floor. Through the peephole stood a dapper young man dressed in a white tuxedo, denying the heat of the Indian summer. He was made exactly how she remembered him, down to the small scar on his chin. He was holding her favorite flowers- dark purple Daphnes that only grew in the winter, fresh and winning the battle with the sweltering heat, as though he had picked them straight out of the snow. The man in white looked through the peep hole, straight into Anna’s ordinary brown eyes. “Anna? I’m here. It’s me, Gary.” Gary’s calm voice was strong enough to project through the door and into Anna’s naked ears. It was the same voice that Anna had fallen in love with during college,  except the tone of his voice when calling her name was different from the Gary she used to know. She would be able to fix that later. Anna had heard much about this new technology and how advanced it had become, but she hadn’t prepared herself for the speed of the service.

Overpowered by the same impulse that had occupied her fingers moments ago, Anna swung open the door to the replica of her dead husband. Gary met Anna’s eyes and smiled that smile that she was so familiar with. She started to cry as he picked her up effortlessly into the living room, which was still full of dead flowers from Gary’s funeral. Anna would get rid of those later.

He had that feeling again. That inkling feeling that someone was in the room, watching everything he was doing. Robert had gotten used to the strange phenomena since he had moved into his new, well- old apartment. His new-old apartment. All the traces of where he had spent his “peak years” were now gone, replaced by the aftertaste of the last renters. Robert stood very still in the middle of his living room, surrounded by half open boxes and abandoned velvet curtains. His window looked out onto the window on a gray concrete wall of a minimal home, which looked out onto the Pacific Ocean. He could see the waves lapping through their window when he hunched down a few inches. He felt it again- someone’s eyes going up and down his back- the same route and rhythm of his mother’s eyes when she used to worry about his health. Robert slowly turned to look down the hallway that lead straight into the bathroom. The toilet he once hugged every day was surrounded by wallpaper of sand and coral shells that were hastily pasted. Robert studied the stupid pink shells from his living room as his feet sunk deeper into the plush green carpeting that was not his.