Chapter 11.1

 

Roisin didn’t sleep well. She lay awake long after midnight, the images from the paintings drifting behind her eyelids like afterimages burned into her vision. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw the curve of a rib dissolving into colour, the mottled purples that resembled bruised flesh, the pale smear that might have been skin or light or something between the two. She told herself it was just art. Just paint. Just imagination. But the thought didn’t settle. It hovered, unfinished, like a sentence she couldn’t complete. Was Paul right? Was there someone else who saw the world as she did, and painted not the angels she could see emerging, but the shell left behind after the transformation?

She managed a couple of hours but woke suddenly, bathed in sweat with the feeling there was someone in her room. Not the bit with her bed in it, but the outer area she was using as a studio. “Hello?” Her voice was raspy with fear. “Is that you, Paul?”

There was no reply, but she would swear she heard the creak of a floorboard and the swish of a cloth. She swallowed the knot of fear she felt in the back of her throat. What could she use as a weapon? It had been twenty years since anyone had tried to interrupt her sleep and she’d lost the habit of sleeping with a knife. She’d never forget again.

She rose cautiously, trying not to make a sound. What was worse? Being upright and ready to confront an intruder or huddling against the headboard, hoping they’d leave her alone? She’d put up with the second option too many times in her life. Better to face a threat than accept fate.

She slipped between the two curtains that divided her room and looked around the studio. The lack of light worked in her favour; her eyes had already adjusted to the semi-darkness, and the ambient light from the street made the room appear well lit to her. She reached toward the desk and picked up a 25mm hog bristle brush. A palette knife was an obvious choice, but the length of thickness of a background brush gave it an edge as a self-defence weapon. Better than a knife, really. A knife proved you had intent to injure, whereas a a paintbrush classed as an improvised weapon but was still pointy enough to drive into the soft flesh of a neck, ear or eye socket.

With no-one in her room, she turned her attention to the door. Had she closed it when she came to bed? She couldn’t be sure, but it was certainly ajar now. Shutting it and staying here was the same mindset as staying in bed. Better to confront the fear and let it flow through her and leave her stronger. She’d heard that somewhere. Was it an army recruitment ad or an AIDS awareness film?

At the doorway she opened it half a meter and looked out into the hallway beyond. It was shrouded in shadow, but the kitchen light was on, leaving the dogleg between the kitchen and living room in a partial penumbra. She crept forward, holding the brush by the ferrule, the shaft preceding her steps like a wooden stiletto.

At the dogleg, she glanced into the dark living room, thankful to find it was empty, but Paul’s door was still shut, and she knew if he was wandering about at this time of the night he’d have left his door open to make it easy to return to bed without putting the hall light on. He was almost certainly still asleep, then.

As she approached the second corner, the one that led to the kitchen, she had to pause to let her eyes adjust to the increased light. Here were no sounds issuing from the kitchen, but she could feel a damp breeze coming toward her which meant the back door was open. That, she was one hundred percent certain, had been closed when she and Paul had gone to their separate beds. She peeked around the corner as quickly as she could, allowing her brain to process the image once she was out of sight again. Unless there was someone by the stove, hidden from her line of sight, the kitchen was empty of people, but the back door to the fire escape was wide open and propped that way with a small garden statue. There were also several sealed crisp boxes piled on the table and the floor. Where had those come from? Had a burglar brought them in? What burglar delivers instead of stealing? She crept forward again. If she was in the kitchen, she could make a good argument about grabbing a knife to defend herself.