One Stroke

Outside, it was warm. 

July in Boston was always a little bit sticky, and at 6:00 pm it was just hot enough for Aspen to shed the light, denim jacket she’d worn to work as she made her evening walk to the subway. Her mother, who owned the creative co-working space Aspen worked at, liked to keep the building at a crisp 68 degrees, a little too chilled for Aspen’s tastes. 

The Blue Line ‘Aquarium’ subway stop was only a five-minute walk from the co-working space, but it was enough time to have sweat dripping from Aspen’s nape and down the back of her blouse. Her brown hair was pulled up, but the fine hairs that had escaped her bun began to plaster themselves to the back of her neck. She relished in the feeling, after working eight hours under the cold blast of central air conditioning. 

The heat and humidity felt more suffocating once Aspen traipsed down the stairs to the subway platform. It was a busy time to ride the train, and the platform was packed with people eager to go home from a long Thursday of work. A few years prior, MBTA had installed an upgraded cooling system in the subway stations, but the slightly cool air blowing out of the vents that dotted the concrete walls did little to compete with a crowd of sweaty, tired people. Aspen didn’t mind so much, as she tucked her hands into the pockets of her pants and waited. 

The subway arrived one minute late, in all its blue and grey glory. The inside of the car was much colder than the platform, and Aspen slipped her jacket back on with a shiver and found a vacant seat, the blue plastic hard beneath her thighs. A screen across from her, near the top of the car, played a silent music video as the train took off, causing her to sway in her seat. So much of the twenty-first century had been dedicated to technological improvement, but Aspen didn’t understand the appeal of useless screens in a subway train. Surely the money could’ve been spent on something else, like fallout protection equipment. The video didn’t offer anything freshly creative, so she turned her attention to the other passengers. 

Everyone looked tired. Aspen felt tired; she understood. A small boy, perhaps eight or nine, stared into space from his spot on his mother’s lap. His brown eyes fought sleep as the subway gently rocked him. His shirt was white, a mistake made by whoever had dressed him that day, and it was covered in blue splotches from something he’d drunk earlier. His shorts fell to his knees, striped blue and yellow, and he wore sandals, putting his small, dirty feet on display.  A small smile curved at the corners of Aspen’s lips. 

Aspen exited the subway at the Government Center stop and began the fifteen-minute walk to her apartment on Chestnut Street. The route took her past a portion of the Boston Common, and the park seemed quiet, for such a warm evening. The trees rustled in the light breeze, but the usual chatter of people, the fluttering of birds’ wings, and the shrill screams of children playing in Frog Pond were subdued. Aspen crossed Beacon Street earlier than she normally would, deciding to play victim to the uneven, brick sidewalk rather than the eerie quiet of the park. 

By the time she turned right, onto Walnut, Aspen’s ankles already ached from the uneven bricks, but she did not forget to step carefully over the hole where three of them had been missing for several months now. She suspected someone had stolen them for one reason or another since they’d disappeared overnight. Tourists sometimes stole bricks, thinking they somehow had a historical quality.

When she finally made it to her apartment building, the large, bright-red doors of the entrance greeted her, the same as they always did. The color was strange and glossy against the muted red of the brick building, but it certainly added flavor to the otherwise unremarkable apartment building. She took the concrete steps two at a time and pushed through the vibrant doors, before continuing up another flight of stairs to her apartment. She struggled for a moment to get inside, her key sticking and refusing to turn in the old, brass knob, but when she finally stepped inside, it was with a sigh of relief. 

The apartment was dim, heavy curtains obscuring the living room windows, turning the furniture into silhouettes. Aspen moved to the kitchen area, tucked next to the living room, and flipped on the light, bathing the room in a soft yellow. The countertops were glossy white to match the tile floor. A dark grey rag hung over the lip of the stainless-steel sink. There was a single fork in the sink, reminding Aspen that she needed to empty the dishwasher, which she’d run before leaving for work that morning. 

The refrigerator was made of darker stainless steel than her sink. The front was barren, aside from a single picture of her whole family—mom, dad, two brothers—and the inside fared no better; the shelves were mostly empty, save for a questionably old quart of lactose-free milk, a half-eaten can of green beans, a carton of eggs, and some leftover rice. Hidden behind the milk was also a small bottle of soy sauce. Aspen grabbed the sauce and the rice. 

After warming her rice in the microwave and dousing it in the salty, fermented soy condiment, Aspen went back to the dark living room and asked Aurelia to turn on the TV. The AI sparked to life with a confirmation, and a small, black box on the wooden console table across from the couch woke up. From it, pixels of light sprouted into the shape of a bright screen. Bold, dark letters flashed across the field of light—what would you like to watch—while Aspen made herself comfortable on the grey couch, sinking deeply into a wide, worn cushion. 

“Randomize,” she spoke. 

The hologram flickered for only a second before landing on a channel in French. 

“English, please,” Aspen said, around a mouthful of rice. 

A dubbed version of the show took over the sound; the woman on the TV, draped in a beautiful red dress, was speaking to someone on the phone. I need to know that you’ll be there on time. No, listen, if you don’t keep up your end of the bargain, then our deal is off. This is your last chance, Lucien. 

“Next,” Aspen said. 

The channel changed again, the hologram now showing drone footage of a forest in South America, while a soothing voice spoke about the Incan Empire. Archaeologists have found yet another ancient, sacrificial burial site in the Peruvian Andes Mountains. Two bodies were found entombed, with evidence of having frozen to death—a young adult female and a male child.   

Aspen left it on the channel for a while, but her mind wandered from the documentary as she ate her dinner. The rice was a little crunchy, maybe a couple of days too old to be eating, but she rationalized that it, at least, didn’t smell. She’d added a little too much soy sauce, and it pooled, soupy, at the bottom of the white bowl, and her mouth yearned for water to wash away the too-salty taste. But her mind wandered.

Sometime later, Aspen snapped out of her daze and took another bite. 

“National news,” she said. 

The screen flipped to a story about a gunman in a rural town in Ohio. Aspen grimaced and changed the channel again. 

“World news.” 

War. Of course, it was war. That had been the only topic of world news lately. Aspen shook her head but left it playing, taking a bite of her saline supper. 

“Mute,” Aspen asked, setting her bowl on the black coffee table in front of her. 

The sound died, but colored pixels continued to dance across the invisible screen, showing footage of South Korean troops camped near Busan. In the top left corner, images of people shuffled past, each one labeled in capitalized red letters as either ‘MISSING’ or ‘DEAD.’ Aspen watched carefully, as though she might see someone she knew. She wouldn’t, but the churning in her stomach and pounding in her chest grew worse with each new face. The world was crumbling. The world was dying. 

“Stop, turn it off,” she croaked out after several minutes and pushed herself suddenly off the couch. 

She swayed as static overtook her senses, a hand lifting to rest over her eyes while she regained her balance. She then moved across the room, her feet dragging across grey carpet, to a liquor cabinet her father had gifted her for Yule two years prior. It was the nicest piece of furniture in the room, made of heavy, natural oak and braced together with matte, black metal. The front had two large, beautiful pieces of glass, etched with a delicate rendition of Yggdrasil, the world tree. Her brother, Grey, had done the artwork.

From the cabinet, she pulled a bottle of Broker’s gin, a nearly empty bottle of Cinzano’s 1757 Vermouth Di Torino Rosso, and a bottle of Campari, and carried them to the kitchen. She opened the small, white cabinet over the sink and reached for a standard old-fashioned glass but grabbed the double instead. She popped in a large cube of ice from a silicone tray pulled from the freezer. She eyeballed the pour—roughly three ounces of Campari, maybe three ounces of vermouth, probably a little more than three ounces of gin. She swirled it, the liquids almost blending into a warm sunset-red color. She didn’t have an orange peel, but what was the fucking point? 

Aspen took a healthy slurp of her drink and headed down the dark hallway to her spare room. Inside, a large easel sat in one corner, covered in flaking spots of paint. In front of it was a stool, its seat a caramel-y leather that had split a little in the middle, and its legs were made of dark metal. In another corner was a stack of large canvases, leaning against a beige wall. Aspen set her drink on the taboret next to the easel and began fingering through her options for canvas. Her gut landed on a medium-sized canvas,18x24, or thereabouts. The canvas was bare, the plastic already removed, since she’d applied a couple of layers of gesso to it weeks before. She walked it across the room and gently placed it on the easel, before taking a seat on the stool. 

Aspen sipped her drink and stared at the canvas. It stared back, white and empty. One corner was already dirtied with the faintest smudge of dirt, somehow, but it would be easy enough to cover up. Aspen swirled the drink in her hands, cold condensation clinging to one of her fingers and dribbling down to her palm. She shivered at the sensation and considered turning the thermostat up, even though her apartment was already 74 degrees. She was so tired of feeling cold. 

There was nothing for it. In a couple of large gulps, Aspen finished off the drink and put the sweaty glass back on the taboret, before leaning down and opening one of the drawers, to pull out a handful of acrylic paints, as well as a pallete. She set the pallete down and began to squeeze out random colors, though making sure to include black, white, and the primaries. The pallete was already coated in layers of old, dried paint, peeling back in a few places. As she squeezed out a dollop of ultramarine blue, the faint chemical smell hit her nose, and she drew in a deep breath. 

Once she was satisfied with her pallete, she pulled out a variety of paintbrushes and turned back to the canvas. Her skin was buzzing, fingers itching, but she still didn’t know what to paint.

Begin with one stroke, and go from there, her mother’s voice suggested, drifting through her head. 

Aspen rolled her shoulders back, cracked her neck a couple of times, and blew a stray piece of hair out of her face. Her right hand reached for the brushes and picked up a one-inch Winsor and Newton brush and ran her thumb across the bristles, watching them spring back into formation. One stroke. She just had to begin with one stroke. 

She pressed the brush into the ultramarine blue and pressed it to the canvas, watching in satisfaction as a bold line streaked across the page with the slow drag of her hand. When she sat back and looked at the stripe, however, it didn’t feel right. She returned to her pallete, swirled some of the colors around with her brush, to hell with pallete knives, and then tried again. 

This time, a darker, duller streak of blue appeared on the canvas. It was muddied with the additions of black, white, and the tiniest smidge of yellow. She began to coat the entire canvas in the drab color. Some spots were bluer, others were greyer, and a couple of areas looked a bit too green, but it was right. However, once the canvas was full, the blue-grey-green stretching from corner to corner, Aspen frowned. No, no, no. 

She pulled another pallete from the taboret, this one clean and made of acrylic, and began again, squeezing out mars black, titanium white, cadmium yellow, cadmium red, titanium blue. She mixed, dipping her fingers into the different colors, swirling them together on a clean section of the pallete until she had a warm flesh tone. She then selected a medium-sized round brush and began transferring strokes of paint to the canvas again. 

A face took shape; it was slim, with high cheekbones, pink lips—the bottom fuller than the top—and dark eyes. She added hair after that: shoulder-length, black, and straight, with a portion of it tied back. Stray bangs framed his forehead and cheeks. She gave him a hint of shoulders, draped in a black shirt, the collar stretched and loose around his neck. Aspen sat back and observed him and the sick feeling returned to her stomach. 

His eyes were on fire. She’d added a bit of angry red, burning orange, to the highlights of his dark brown eyes, and he stared at her with a look she couldn’t place, but it made her restless. Thick eyebrows were slightly drawn together, the line of his mouth straight with apathy. She’d seen him on the TV, the word “MISSING” emblazoned across his photo. She’d painted him with a neutral expression, the expression she’d seen on the TV, but his eyes were on fire. 

Aspen was sure she was going to be sick if he kept looking at her. She reached for the 1” Winsor and Newton again, her fingers shaking, and dipped it into the black paint. Finish with one stroke, she thought to herself. Begin with one stroke. Finish with one stroke. And go from there. 

Beginning at the left edge of the canvas, Aspen carefully dragged the brush horizontally, across dark hair, a temple, the top of a cheekbone, over his right eye, cover the eyes, across the bridge of the nose, now his left eye, cover the eyes, and over another temple, more black hair, to the right edge of the canvas. 

She slowly set the paintbrush down and looked at the boy. He couldn’t look back now, but Aspen still shivered. She got up, leaving him to dry, and went to turn up the thermostat. 

Inside, it was cold.