Darkness

They said I had no passion. That I was finished, that my work lacks commitment. Too trivial, they said. Too light. Bastards.

Pulsing blue lights in the darkness, a cordoned building. Old, narrow stairs, trash on every landing.

"Top floor sir, sorry about that."

The stairwell was rank, full of graffiti and the smell of urine. On the third floor they stepped over more yellow tape, moved slowly through the open door and into the crime scene.

"Music a bit loud for my tastes."

"Too loud for anyone surely. The even worse news is that it just keeps repeating the same track - Puccini isn't it sir?"

"I believe it is." He paused, listening. It was hauntingly beautiful. "So, what do we have?"

He let himself absorb the scene. The large easel in the centre, the sprawled body, face down, one hand still holding a brush as if in some futile gesture. Dark blood spread over the wooden floor.

"A mess sir, if you really want to know. Blood everywhere. Dead and mutilated male, late forties maybe, artist it seems. Modern, not my scene. To be honest sir, its a bit unpleasant, a bit weird."

The detective just nodded, looking thoughtfully around the studio.

"Forensics aren’t here yet - so we haven’t started looking. Don't even want to touch the sound system, though maybe unplugging it wouldn't hurt?"

"Just leave it - you never know. Anyone see anything useful?" He had a soft voice, a quiet presence. For some reason he didn't want silence.

"No - no-one saw or heard anything - not that we can find many people to ask. Except the music .. that would be hard to miss. That's what caused the woman who lives below to come up, bashed on the door and she found this. She's in a bit of a state."

They will not hear my screams. No interruptions.

The teeth bothered him the most. He had a small hammer that he used to prepare canvasses and frames. He had been completely undecided about the best time to smash them, and start the crushing in the small pestle to make the contrasting white for the highlights. He felt sick. He would start with them.

Searing pain. Racing pulse. He vomited violently. Knelt on the floor and wept. He gathered up the fragments, wiping away the tears so he could find as many as possible. The fragments glinted on the dark floor. Not enough, he struck again with the small metal hammer. He vomited again and cursed at the pain.

The work needs more substance. He needs to find a way to add darkness to his work, there is nothing remarkable in this exhibition, just more of the same superficially clever but light weight style he has been producing through the last few years of his career.

On into the darkness. The blade glinted, waiting.

The public quietly pussy foot around the galleries, looking at programmes, listening to audio guides. Reading the damn critics, trying to learn what they are looking at, what they are supposed to feel. Spending more time reading the labels than looking at the art.

He had decided to allow himself the alcohol, but no other drugs. He took another mouthful of the whisky, searing against his bleeding gums, and began to cut. He had studied, he needed lots of blood, the canvas was large. He had decided he would need to be conscious for at least 20 minutes. He worked patiently, avoiding major arteries, blood spilling into the pots.

If anything his palette has lightened over the years and this exhibition has no significant work of any power at all. A great disappointment given his early promise.

He used a single large brush, scooping from the pots and pausing every few minutes for more blood. He kept glancing a the cheap alarm clock he had placed on the shelf of the easel.

He felt himself get lighter and lighter as the dizziness took hold. The last breaths of his life were minutes away. He focused all his failing energy on the work. The repeated aria lifted his soul as the rage and the anger and the pulsing pain beat into his mind. He desperately stabbed with the brush. He fought to die with his eyes open and with his final work burnt into his conscious.

Reds, browns and blacks. Shapeless forms in paint that he had laid down first had been brought to life and blended together with dark blood and small glints of shining white. It was over, he span and collapsed to his knees, straining his neck to look at the painting as he fell to the floor and his life slowly slipped away from a world filled with raging pain and anger.

Just a few hours later the detective walked around the body then knelt down to look closely. The twisted snarling face was a complete mess, vomit and blood and blue bruising everywhere. A grey tee shirt left cuts and slashes in full view, his bare feet were covered in blood and he was wearing light trousers tied on with a rope belt. A discarded half full whisky bottle smeared like everything else with blood. The brush was held out away from him, as if pointing at the work, or reaching to add just one more stroke.

He stood up and walked slowly backwards toward the easel, the music yet again reaching a crescendo. He slowly turned and lifted his eyes from the blood splattered floor to rest for the first time on the painting.

In the foreground a dark red sea. At the horizon a blood red sun. Glints of light across the water.

The detective felt tears in his eyes, as always he spoke softly. "All these years, and I never got used to how dark blood stains."