Part 1 Chapter 1

Let me make it fairly clear to you, reader of mine: my two greatest loves are (and respectively, were) art - and dead.

My love story has a happy ending all of its own. Of course it’s happy - Lukas died happy (enough), and I killed him happily. We happened to be in love, as you might’ve gathered, whether he chose to declare it to the public or not. In the end, however, I made the public all too aware of our love and how ingrained our (my, they’ll tell you, my) obsession for one another was. We couldn’t keep our hands off of one another and if, from time to time, we left bruises on each other’s body then it was only from how hard we fought to not let go when we had to - when time and people (and time to see people) got in the way.
                He wasn’t my only love, however. I cheated on him quite frequently - both when he was and when he wasn’t there, right in front of me, in his house or mine. And now, even in his passing, I carry on my open affair - perhaps more of a coupling now than a ménage a trois, as it was previously.
                Let me make it fairly clear to you, reader of mine, attempter of understanding my heart and perhaps your own in the stirrings of love or - god bless you - devotion: my two greatest loves are (and respectively were) art - and dead. And in the most physical form of offering passion without the act of consummation I offered up to my art Lukas, and to Lukas my art.

                My love story - my own life given to you, the public, in the aftermath of my Lukas’s death and of his being given over to the artistic world in one of my, dare I say, more riskier exhibitions - is far superior to any fairy-tale. Though my Lukas is a corpse - and his corpse now ashes, cremated in a rather nice varnished-oak coffin (love spares no expenses) - we have had our true ending together. There can be no heart-break and no disillusionment due to his death, and though I am left with an agony that cuts deep into my heart, I can at least - and at most, and forever - say that he was mine. The pain of his passing will one day leave - as surely as the haters outside of my cell’s ward will - but I will always know that I kept him. He belonged to me. He died in my possession and a part of me died when I took away his last breath (my fingers grasped tightly around his neck, and sealed with a kiss).
                I have lived my love story, and before that I lived my life without Lukas. Cinderella might’ve been able to whinge that her life was monotonous and dusty before Prince Charming came along, but I had no complaints. I used to fill up my days with the rough caress of canvas stretched out on plywood frames, and the strokes of brushes laden with paint and diluted with water. My release was the outpouring of colour on a blank sheet of paper and I was fulfilled by the light weight of water in a cup used both as a medium and a cleaning tool. Natural light used to pour in from my open bay-windows regardless of the pollution of London’s streets outside, the sun’s rays strong enough to break through the soft haze painted in ashen-grey that drifted by like clouds wisping down from the sky above. When the sun dipped down between the charcoal- and rustic-buildings and the only light came from London’s tenants in their own apartments and the Soho strip, then I would pack away my utensils - paintbrushes, palette, scrapers, paints; all the instruments of my muse - and prop the canvas against the wall (or if I had been splashing paint on a sheet of paper it would stay clipped to the upright easel). The night was mine to do with as I liked and though you, the casual office-worker (isn’t everyone nowadays if they’re not working in a shop, or otherwise freeloading off the government to attempt to put to flight their artistic dreams?), might not feel like greeting the city in the night as well as seeing it in the harsh light of day, I could sometimes perk myself up enough to want the city to greet me.
                Perhaps now, as I recall looking in the mirror, I can describe myself to you. You should know what I look like, and what Lukas saw in me, and what I saw in myself in order to have felt worthy of him: rounded cherubic - but by no means fat! - cheeks that curved nicely on high cheekbones; eyes - wide enough to be noticed, but not baby-wide - with brown irises ringing my pupils; thin and naturally pouting lips that made it appear as if I was perpetually sulking unless I smiled, in which case I showed off teeth that balanced on one another. Eyebrows and lashes: nice enough to note, not enough of them to (thankfully) be over-bearing. My hair was accustomed to hanging just below my ears in whichever style I had it cut in, but at this particular point of remembrance I had let it grow out to a length which framed my entire face and brushed my shoulders. Put this on top of a lean body - muscle mass enough to be noted as male, but not quite enough to be entirely seen as masculine - with a fair bit of height (5’11) and that’s the sum-up of me.
                That night I was interested in me and how I looked. That night I went out and enjoyed myself. Now I understand that to have been one of the last nights of my carefree existence where I could afford at my leisure to think of myself.
                The next morning I woke up late and received the post, reading it as I brunched on toast by myself. Putting the bills - repaying a student loan from Art College and the apparent overdraft on my bank account - to one side I sliced open an unfamiliar cream envelope with a butter-knife. I took out a thick cream sheet of paper neatly folded in three places and skimmed it over. It would be a dramatic pause to say that the remains of toast fell from between my teeth, but I was taught reasonably respectable table-manners and followed them even when alone. Alas, the print on the paper was dramatic enough as I re-read them at a slower studious pace, as if my eyes could absorb the ink through sight alone.

                Your artwork has been selected to be exhibited at the M____ Gallery.
            The curator of the Gallery, Mr L. Giovi, will have someone contact you within the next three days (the date printed at the header of the letter read 04/24/01 and the current date was the 25^th) to fully arrange a date for your exhibition. You will be required to arrive at the Gallery prior to the date of your exhibition in order to set up and arrange it.

            I was flabbergasted. In a state of shock I gripped the edge of the table and sat down. I had previously been allowed to exhibit my artwork - abstract art and mosaic pieces - at a charity gala that had attracted quite a crowd, but little in terms of finances. I had been dismayed at this, even with my gratitude for the exposure, but now the lack of monetary gain was the furthest from the front of my mind. The gala - I presumed this to be the source - had attracted the attention of the M____ Gallery for me! Daily it attracted on average 11,000 people. The gala had drawn in about 2000 people and had allowed me to sell a few paintings (originals and prints). I could only hope - I couldn't say dream: it was coming true - that the appreciative viewers of the M____ Gallery would be interested in what I had to show.
                I was grateful for being an established artist - I was fairly well known in the underground art circles I moved in and was noticed by those ‘above-ground’; I had a small commercial set-up with my prints on post-cards which added up to pay the rent and I worked a few nights doing painting classes to buy food and keep my stock of paints up. It also meant I had freedom to choose my hours in the outside world, and when I could allow myself to stay at home.
                I pushed my plate out of the way and smoothed out the letter. My eyes was skimming over the text but my mind was already imagining the potential space of the exhibition and how I would arrange my art and - a higher priority - what art I’d actually pick out. Would I have time to paint up something entirely fresh?
                I won’t be one for useless detail - not where it can be helped, at least. What I did until I received that phone-call from fate itself isn’t so much as less important as it is repetitive: you only need to know what you’ve already been told -I’m an artist - in order to come to the conclusion that I’d paint in my spare-time (my productivity and work time, essentially) which is what I did - include eating, drinking, pissing, any activity that anyone does - as I waited for that brilliant and expected interruption; that booster to my career and to my life. Not that I was to know it as anything but a well-wanted step on the rung of my career’s ladder until later however.