Echo

She felt as if she was there and not there at the same time. Partially present, like the contours of her body have melted and some of the atoms slipped away in a parallel universe. She was there, but also a world away. Tiny sweat drops were covering her body, giving her the illusion of being fluid, even liquid. A little bit and she would merge with the background. The colours would soak her up.

They painted here for years. The splashing happened one night when they were drunk, and continued whenever there was a stronger emotion. A whole turquoise bucket for the sold out exhibition. The remainder of the deep blue after a perfect night out. The loads of white for the small quarrels. The black for the first cheating.

They threw parties in the studio and tipsy guests drew on the walls and on the floor. There were bits and pieces of scattered thought, emotion and lust on their doors and windows. A spontaneous poem in yellow in the desk on the left. A scary amount of red with imprinted hands on the middle wall. A childish cloud-filled sky on the ceiling. Their quarrel splashes mingled with someone’s profession of love, their happy sprays stained someone’s darkest hour. They were exhaling everything from deep down inside, and it transcended and changed meaning and echoed and came back in them.

She slowly walked around the space, close to the walls, touching the paint. The different layers of colour were telling a story of their own, a subtitle of their lives. There was too much of them, too much of everyone else in these four walls. We need a new beginning, she thought, we need a fresh canvas. She kneeled down and picked up the spatula. She started with the black.