The Writer and The Artist: The Cottage

Chapter 10: The Cottage

 

THE COTTAGE

 

1

 

John and Laura Henderson; two soul mates brought together by love. Two people destined to be parted. One painting bound them together in darkness.

The Cottage.

It had been a painting she had forgotten. But now she could remember, she would never forget. How could she have forgotten in the first place?

            It was a unique painting for three reasons: one was that she had never actually finished it.

            The second was that it was her own image – her very last image.

            She explained to John of Isolation (although he already knew) about The Cottage. It had certainly been her last image, for the simple reason that it frightened her. She never really understood what possessed her gift – that portion of her own mind – to conjugate fear and panic into such an incredible nightmare.

            She had witnessed the image after a drunken night out with John and his work friends at a Christmas party gathering. They had been out for several hours and having consumed a fair amount of alcohol, both lager and wine between them. They knew the consequences of mixing, but like any young adult will tell you, you live life for the moment and that particular moment was to get completely smashed as quickly as possible.

            Besides, the sex had been fantastic.

            The same could not be said for Laura’s dream.

            She knew it was not simply a nightmare, one that you could awake from and forget all about after a couple of hours. This had been real. She even felt drunk as she staggered across a long stretch of shadowy green field.

The roses.

It smelt bland. Only a blank white sky accompanied the barren land, baring no light across the shadowed plain. It merely created an eerie stillness in the air, accompanied by distant squawks.

The crows.

            She walked for what felt like miles in only a couple of seconds, minutes before she would find herself awake in a hangover stupor.

            But before that, there were the sounds, like a dozen tiny slurping footsteps coming from over the next hill, out of view.

            Laura instilled panic into her body. But curiosity got the better of her.

            Gradually she made her way to the top of the hill.

            And saw them.

            A dozen suddenly grew into hundreds.

            That had been the wakeup alarm.

 

2

 

‘I once decided to try and paint an image I had seen, one I was going to tell John when he got home from work, so he could then write it down.

‘But I was terrified. I was afraid of what he would write when I told him. I didn’t want to see it written down.’ She paused. ‘So I decided to try and paint it myself, hoping that if I did the thought of it would go away. So before John arrived home that day I started to paint.’ She winced. ‘Ah, all those bland colours I had to use. There was very little brightness there.’

‘But as I painted, I became scared. I was delving into a part of my mind where I was afraid. The painting contains my worst fear.’

‘But it wasn’t the cottage itself?’

‘No,’ she replied, ‘rather, what was outside of it, guarding it.’ Her spine shuddered. ‘I still do not know what the cottage itself means. But something is in there. I drew the basic outline of the cottage as a basic sketch, but I couldn’t go any further.’ She started to cry. ‘I abandoned the painting and I hid it, away from John so that he would never see it.

‘I never spoke of that painting again, or what was involved in my image. That was when I was too afraid to even think about what was inside my own head.’

‘So you stopped completely.’

‘Yes. I stopped and so John never wrote.’ And then something struck her. She cupped her hands over her mouth to stop herself letting out a hysterical laugh. ‘I remember what happened next.’

The third reason for such a unique painting:

‘John knew about The Cottage before he had even seen my painting. He had dreamt it the same night I had!’

 

3

 

‘I hid the painting in the closet under the stairs before John arrived home and it was not spoken about for at least a month.

‘But then he found it and nearly had a heart attack. He immediately came to me and presented it in front of my face on the kitchen table. He had been a little delirious at the sight of it. He demanded I tell him how I knew about it.’

‘So you told me you had visualised it yourself.’ John of Isolation knew. He had been there.

‘And I remember your exact words in response.’

They spoke them together: ‘I saw it too.’

 

4

 

‘It was the first and only visualisation we had experienced together. We had also decided not to speak of it. It frightened us both, for different reasons.’ She gazed at John of Isolation. ‘I reckon you were frightened of The Cottage because of the cottage itself. Maybe the cottage means something to you that it does not to me.’

            John of Isolation merely nodded. ‘That I cannot tell you.’

            ‘Why?’

            ‘It is not the time for you to know, Laura. In any case, you might not believe it until you see it for yourself. The Cottage holds the answer for all of us.’ He gazed up towards the light.

Laura gave a nod.

‘Answer me this, Laura.’ He looked down at her again. ‘Why did you never finish the painting?’

She now remembered why. ‘I grew afraid of it. We both did. John never wrote about it and I never once thought about the painting, especially when John experienced new images and I just kept on painting.

‘And The Cottage was forgotten. You know what this means, Laura?’

‘What?’

‘Because The Cottage was avoided out of fear, you stopped visualising. He stopped writing. That was when the sickness began.’

‘Sickness? What are you talking about?’

John of Isolation nearly leapt forward and grabbed her by the shoulders. ‘Because John has not written since then his mind has shut down. The coma is the result. In other words, John is in a coma because you stopped visualising. He has no inspiration to write anymore. He is stuck in a state of limbo that his mind can only hold on to for so long.’

            Laura closed her eyes and felt an arrow pierce her heart. It is partly my fault, she said. But soon that feeling was gone. There was not time for guilt or grievances. ‘I know what I have to do,’ she said boldly. ‘Finish The Cottage and I will find what needs to be found.’

At the time, the colours of the room flowed into the hole in her heart, healing it with purity.

 

5

 

Laura then called out to Ethan to open up the tear, which he did immediately, appearing directly behind her where she had first appeared. She muttered a thoughtful ‘Thank you’ to John of Isolation and left him, standing alone once more, covered in the light of Laura’s past.

            Ethan and John of Isolation met eyes for one split second, each feeling a hint of recognition for the other.

            Stepping outside the crystal, Ethan asked the all important question, ‘We are going back?’

            ‘We are,’ she said.

            Together they walked down the steps of the tower that lit beneath their feet. They said nothing the whole time, as Ethan contemplated what The Cottage would be like and Laura allowed worry to fill her mind.

            They reached the bottom and walked towards the cyan portal, the only escape route out of here. She made a glance back towards the tower. My design, she thought, it had been my dream. She smiled. It had been my first visualisation in so long.

 ‘Ladies first,’ Ethan said with a smile, gesturing for Laura to step forward. She did so, stepping onto the portal and concentrating hard on the place that was true and everything surrounding was a haze.

           

6

 

Without even realising, her feet lifted off the ground and she was soaring through the air towards the black hole in the distance.

            The sound of air rushed and bounced against her ear drums, as she began to pick up speed, flying into the forefront of the painting Bad Day. She could hear the yell of the black telephones up ahead, which nearly consumed the howling screams of her husband, wanting only for the nightmare to end.

            Soon it will, Laura thought to herself through a discouraged heart. Soon you shall be set free.

            As she was about to land in touching distance of John of Bad Day, a brilliant light engulfed her entire vision, leaving her stranded and helpless for a few seconds. Then, as the white mist shielding her eyes began to fade, she found herself back within what Laura would later call the true world, within the confining walls of the view room.

The closed door to the room faced of her and the canvas of Bad Day stood behind her. Turning to face it, she felt the still, stationery brushes of paint did no justice to what this painting now meant to her – what all her paintings meant to her.

            She then noticed the daylight emitting from the room’s windows that looked out to the street in front of the house. She swore it was the same amount of light there had been before they first entered the painting.

            Nothing outside of the view room had existed. Perhaps not even time itself.

            And then suddenly everything was immersed in light again, as Ethan came through the painting and returned to Laura’s home.

            She looked at him, standing next to Bad Day in the view room of her house; in her life; in her world.

It begged the question she had already asked him the moment they had met. But things were different now. Ethan was more than just a stranger to her.

She had a right to know.

            Before he could even raise a smile, she had already started the questions. ‘Who are you, Ethan?’

            The smile suddenly failed.

 

7

 

‘What do you mean?’ he asked, suddenly feeling intimidated.

            ‘You are the missing link between me and John,’ Laura replied. ‘You see my paintings alive as John had done when he experienced each image.’

            ‘What are you saying, Laura?’

            ‘How did you know?’ she asked, raising her tone. ‘How did you know you can look into these paintings?’

            Ethan hesitated, stumbling over his words. ‘I told you, I could not remember anything that happened before I visited your house! I hardly even remember what happened at the hospital!’ He unintentionally began shouting at her.

            ‘I don’t believe that. I can’t, Ethan.’

            ‘Well I don’t! I don’t know anything!’

            Laura ceased her next breath and stepped away from him. She saw the tears of pure frustration spill over onto his flushed cheeks. He looked to be gagging as he tried forcing words out to attempt any explanation.

            But there was only one thing he could think to say: ‘I have forgotten my past like you had forgotten yours. I don’t know how or why.’ He paused. ‘But I must know.’

            Laura observed his troubled expression. ‘You want to know before you help me?’

            ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Maybe I have brought you some of the way in finding John, I cannot go the whole way unless I know what my role in all this is.’ New tears formed as he wiped the old away. ‘If I fulfil my purpose without knowing why, I may never find out again.’

            Laura approached Ethan and placed both her hands on his shoulders. ‘You are a wonderful young man,’ she said, helping him to raise a smile. ‘I’m sorry I shouted at you, Ethan. We are both frustrated, both full of questions we cannot yet find answers for. I think you should try and discover…’

            ‘The reason why I am here?’

            She smiled. ‘Your purpose. Then we will find John. I have trusted you so far, Ethan. I found a glint of hope the first time you knocked on my door. But I have always wondered your reasoning for being here. We both took it to mean fate, but there is something more than that. Not only do you need to know, I need to know. If you really are here to help me save my husband, I want to know what it is that brought you to me.’

            ‘Okay,’ he said, taking a deep breath. ‘Where can I start my search?’

            ‘Start from the beginning,’ she said, already working out in her mind the next move Ethan should make. ‘When you first met me, you knew my name and Johns. That means you knew of our relationship. That must mean someone told you about us…or you have met one of us before.’

            Ethan thought about this. ‘That does ring a bell, now that you mention it.’

            ‘Which part?’

            ‘Meeting one of you.’ His eyes widened. ‘I think I have met John.’

            ‘Why?’

            ‘Because,’ he said, collecting his thoughts together carefully, ‘when we met eyes for a instant back in Isolation, I found myself piecing together shards of my past. He was in there somewhere.’ He hesitated. ‘There was something else as well.’

‘What?’

‘I think he recognised me, too.’

            Laura nearly clawed her nails into his shoulders. ‘Really?’

He nodded.

‘Okay,’ she said analytically, her eyes gradually floating to the floor. ‘That means we have some sort of connection. But what else?’ She looked at him. ‘What was your last proper memory, Ethan? When exactly did you start to forget?’

            As Ethan’s memory started to catch up with him, he nearly collapsed, if it wasn’t for Laura holding him upright. He became short of breath and started to pant. His eyes bulged to the size of cherries. Everything was coming back; fragments of a broken memory were now falling into Ethan’s mind like a newly bought jigsaw puzzle. Now all that was needed was to put the pieces together.

            The first piece was clear: ‘I started to forget,’ he said through heavy breathing, ‘not long before I met you…’

 

8

 

‘Try to remember,’ Laura said, comforting him within her gentle hold. He cried against her bosom, searching desperately for an answer.

            But none came.

            ‘I can’t see it,’ he said, after slowing his breathing down. He moved his head away from Laura’s chest and looked into her eyes. He suddenly felt an emotion inside of him, growing and twisting – like a flower from a seed planted within his stomach. But these butterflies were not simply feelings of love instinct.

            It was guilt; sheer terrifying guilt.

            Why?

            ‘I’m sorry,’ Ethan said to her, not knowing in what sense he meant it.

            ‘It’s okay,’ she replied, stroking his hair. ‘You cannot force the memories. But think elsewhere.’ She thought back to what he had said before. ‘You said you may have met John previously. Not me, but John specifically. Can you think when?’

            ‘Not now,’ he said, wiping tears from his face. But there was a memory, straying in his mind like a colour inside the crystal. If only he could, like the crystal, create a tear in his mind and reach inside! But gift or no gift, he was still undoubtedly human.

            But it was a starting point, something that would get his feet off the ground and start looking for an end. He placed himself in focus and turned his attention onto Laura. ‘You need to finish The Cottage,’ he said, stopping her hand from stroking his matted hair. ‘Whilst you do that, I shall try and remember.’

            ‘Okay,’ she said, ‘but I don’t know how long it will take me to finish.’

            ‘Give yourself as much time as you need.’

            She nodded. ‘Right,’ she said, ‘I will set the canvas up in the front room and paint there. If you need me at any time, just knock on the living room door, okay?’

            ‘You wish to be alone?’

            She gave a weak smile. ‘I’m going to need as much concentration as I can muster. This painting is more important than any other I have painted.’

            ‘I understand,’ he said. ‘Remember to take a break now and then. Do not let the painting rush you.’

            ‘I won’t,’ she said, eyeing the canvas that Bad Day rest upon.

 

9

 

She took the easel into the living room and went to the kitchen table to find her paints and brushes. Ethan stood momentarily in the view room, before deciding to sit alone on the kitchen table. Laura offered to make him a cup of tea or coffee, but Ethan insisted he did it himself to give her more time to work. After filling a mug with cold water and retrieving a tea towel on a peg by the door, she left him to work as well.

            After placing the tea towel and mug of water in the living room, she retrieved her easel into position and placed it in the middle of the room by the twin sofas, opening up the legs so it stood firmly on top of the carpet. She placed her unclean paintbrushes in the mug of water and swirled them like stirring sugar in tea. Leaving them to soak, she then had the gruesome task of retrieving her lost painting. It was coincidentally placed in one of the darkest areas of the house, amongst the accumulated clutter under the stairs.

            She went to the cabinet door underneath the stairs and twisted the little gold door knob until the door became free and loudly creaked open. Peering inside was like staring into a mouth of a bat’s cave, you knew what was in there but had not the desire to disturb it. Unfortunately, this had gone undisturbed for long enough.

            Under the stairs were heaps of old items that John and Laura tended to place here when they became bored or wanted to forget about it (hence the reason why Laura left the painting here in the first place). There was at least two piles of old board games they played when they had so many gatherings all those years ago; there was an old bike that belonged to John when he used to go cycling instead of walking (he had always said to Laura that walking gave more time to think); there were even some unwanted wedding presents kept right at the back towards the foot of the stairs, in case certain guests from the past came snooping around.

But the canvas itself was a lot easier to find: it was still placed within bubble wrap taped haphazardly together, when Laura was ignorant to believe it would disguise it amongst everything else. But it was like looking for a tall adult amongst short children; the canvas was clearly the bulkiest item of them all.

Begrudgingly, Laura reached in and took hold of the bubble wrap. Carefully, she started to pull at it, tearing away the loosely-fitted tape and peeling away the skin of disguise to reveal the true colours. Or lack of, Laura thought, as she started to see splotches of white paint. She could feel her stomach churn.

            But she kept it down, for the sake of John and the forgotten promise they had made so long ago.

I love you so much, John Henderson.

With these thoughts to drive her determination, she tore away the last of the skin and pulled the canvas carefully out of the rubble.

 

10

 

Ethan warmed the ridges of his fingers centimetres away from his mug of hot coffee, as his memory brewed elsewhere. He took a delicate sip that burnt the edge of his tongue, and then took another. It did not help clear his bubbling mind to see the way, rather it felt like he was more torturing him with the burning sensation.

            What exactly have I forgotten? There were fragments, something to work on.

I remember…John. I have seen him…I’ve met him, a long time ago. When?

I can’t remember.

What was he wearing?

I…a suit…maybe?

            How did you meet?

            He met me…no…I met him?

            What was he doing in a suit?

            He works, doesn’t he!

            Wait a second. Go back a step.

            The suit?

            Not just the suit! His work.

            His work? He blinked. John works in London as an editor.

            How do you know?

            He told me himself? Yeah, he did!

            So you might have a lead!

            How?

            You saw him in a suit, he might have been near where he worked in London.

            Ethan thought about it. Yes, he was!

            Where?

            I’m not sure.

            Okay, that doesn’t matter. Just think about what you’re saying.

            What?

            London!

            London?

            London! Come on Ethan.

            And then it struck. If I met John in London.

            When the hell was I in London?

 

11

 

Laura sat down upon her stool in the living room and started blankly into the horrific mess she called The Cottage.

            The top half of the rectangular canvas was purely white, with a couple of sketches pencilled over the top of foreground scenery. But the white was not merely a primer; it was the actual sky of which Laura had seen originally. But there were scatters of information missing amongst the white sky, dark wisps of black paint that needed to be added.

            The crows.

            The dead crow in the pizza box.

            She took her wet brushes from the jar and used the tea towel to carefully relieve them of sticky paint.

            The towel was most probably ruined. She did not care.

            She found her black acrylic and unscrewed the lid, as her eyes settled on her palette.

            Her head pounded as the first stroke was made.

 

12

 

When was I in London?

            Ethan scratched at this question over and over until it was ready to pop. He had been in London and it had not been long ago.

            He needed a month; a date; maybe a time of day would help.

            A month? Two months? Three?

            No, too far. Two months.

            It was a start. The month was currently July, so Ethan was in London during May. What had I been doing in May?

He stopped. His bubble was about to burst. He took a sip of his coffee. It was a lot easier to swallow; it no longer burnt the tip of his tongue.

No more torturing myself.

He took a huge gulp of coffee and rested his eyes, allowing his nostrils to ventilate the smell of acrylic coming from the living room.

 

13

 

She had started The Cottage and could not stop.

            Throughout the painting she was two steps ahead: the location of each crow; its size and wing span, every bit of detail was thought about. Her concentration for this painting was like no other.

            After the crows were set, she applied the primary thin coat of green that would be needed for the field – a murky snot-coloured green. After the thin coat had dried, she then applied the strike of each individual blade of grass, from top to bottom; their position; their curvature. Every bit of detail was thought about. Her concentration for this painting was like no other.

She took care to remember each overlap of foreground that was yet to be painted.

The cottage itself was located atop a hill at the very back of the painting. The scenery itself contained a number of dead flowers, except for one vibrant flower that were left alive.

            The roses.

            The rose in the hidden cupboard of Cosy.

            Roses were scattered across the fields, almost in lines, similar to crosses of the D-Day soldiers buried in Normandy. Laura knew what they represented, the living death – the dark red colour managed to shine compared to the limp flowers surrounding them, each with petals the colours that Laura chose to use.

            Light over dark.

            Except it was dark succeeding over light, obscurely placed against a lifeless white sky, patrolled by the hovering crows, looking to await the next victim.

            Her instincts had been right; the roses were in lines – criss-crossed with one another.

            Leaving details of the cottage as a sketch for now, Laura made herself face her fear, the colour war that she has lost across the ground. A major gut-wrenching detail needed to be applied.

            Her greatest fear, with the acrylic she truly wished she could forget.

 

14

 

A date. All I need now is a date.

            Ethan opened his eyes and set his mind on the task once more.

            There was indeed a date; to be more accurate there were several, each somewhat apart from the other. Yet somehow they were all significant to Ethan in some way. One involved a time in London.

            But which one? This was far from easy. There was the first few days in May; the second weekend of the same month; and then a day toward the end that nearly crossed with June. The 28^th, maybe?

            So the beginning, the middle and the end of the month.

            Brilliant, he thought, closing his eyes again.

 

15

 

Laura’s hope sank a little deeper.

            Her hand shaking, she picked up her sketching pencil and started to outline the first of the creatures.

            But she could not bear it, not right now. Her breathing became erratic and she suddenly flinched and dropped the pencil, which collided with the foot of the wooden easel.

Take a break, she thought, moving her stool further away from the painting. The Cottage would have to wait its turn.

 

16

 

Ethan resumed his vision of the kitchen ceiling when Laura entered the room. He immediately grew concerned when he saw the sadness in her eyes.

            ‘What’s wrong?’ he said, pulling out the chair beside him.

            She said nothing but took his offer of sitting down. She then held her hands up to her face and bawled loudly into them. Ethan placed an arm around her and let her sink herself into his shoulder.

            He too started to cry. This was more difficult than they had both imagined it to be.

 

17

 

Moments of silence passed before Laura and Ethan were their usual selves again. The tears had been wiped away and their concentration on the matter in hand was restored.

            But they continued to sit next to each other at the kitchen table. They enjoyed each other’s company. It was a comfort to know that someone else besides themselves was involved with what they were going through. It meant someone could understand the pain; the emotions; the feelings that were involved.

            They both looked at each other and smiled. No words were needed right now. The connection they shared at this very moment was all that was needed. It was a love, not a true love or maybe not even a pure love, but it was a love of respect for the other. Ethan respected Laura for her dedication to John and her devotion to find him again; whilst Laura respected Ethan for standing by her and putting others before himself, even when he did not have to.

            Ethan was the first to speak. ‘Are you ready to carry on?’ he said, rubbing her shoulder.

            She nodded, really out of knowing that she would have to eventually. ‘And you?’ she then said.

            He frowned. ‘I am still stuck. I know a month. I have several times of the month, but I have nothing to aid my search besides that…’

            ‘Wait a second,’ she interrupted. ‘That doesn’t make any sense. What month. What time? What are you talking about?’

            ‘It was in May that I met John, Laura, before all this happened. It was May of this year; two months ago. I have certain dates in my head of when I saw him in London, but I can’t remember anything that happened.’

            Laura found herself smiling uncontrollably. The solution to Ethan’s dilemma was so simple to her, for she new exactly what Ethan needed.

            ‘You couldn’t have said something about that earlier, could you?’ she said, revealing a gorgeous smile.

            ‘What do you mean?’

            ‘You want to check what John was doing in May?’

            ‘No, I want to check what I…’ But then he ceased speaking saw her beaming a smile back at him. ‘John has a diary, doesn’t he?’

            ‘He does,’ she said, thankful that something was going right for one of them.