Sarah is a big help at Mini Sledgehammer, especially on a super-secret project we’ll be announcing in the next couple months. But this month, she’s featured not for her helpfulness but for her writing. Congratulations, Sarah!
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Prompts:
Character: Little sister
Setting: A covered wagon
Prop: A paintbrush
Phrase: The light shines through it
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Tolya
by Sarah Farnham
He worked patiently. He worked frantically.
He worked by light of day and by the moonlight herself.
He was building a time machine.
“Aw, you doin’ that stuff again?”
He ignored her, focusing on spreading the paint as far and as wide as he could reach.
“Hey–”
A small tug on his painter’s smock caused his eyebrows to rise.
A shake of the ladder got him to put down his brush.
“Yes, hermanita?”
“I tolya I don’t know what that means. And we’re not Mexican.”
He tossed his bangs out of his face irritably.
“Little sister. I use it because I like–”
“Don’t care.”
She started walking away, tiny feet pounding into the ground.
“Well, whatdya want?” He called after her.
“Dad’s dead.”
That’s all she spoke, and then her mouth was shut for good. She refused to talk entirely. She hadn’t lost any of her sass–just the will to propel it past her vocal cords and into the air. She became very good at pointing.
The funeral was hellish. His mom barely held it together. She kept on going around the funeral telling people to leave, telling them to “go eat something–go fuck someone. Funerals are horrible.”
He crept out a side door just to get some air and smoke a joint.
A small tug on his button-up made him choke.
“God, what have I told you about creeping up on me like that?”
She pointed to the overgrown fence behind the church.
“So?”
She tugged his shirt again, leading him over.
“Oh, I gotcha. Little thief, eh?”
She frowned and stomped her foot.
“Betcha no one’s using this paint anyway.”
The cans were rusted over and probably full of shit. She tapped his arm and pointed forcefully toward one can in particular.
“Yellow. Ok. I can dig it.”
He lugged the cans into his hatchback.
He was seven when the covered wagon appeared in the backyard. She wasn’t around yet. They had just gotten a computer, Oregon Trail was his new obsession. He played until his eyes were red and raw and “falling out of his head.” His dad built him the wagon, asking him to exercise his imagination instead of his keyboard.
He grew out of it eventually–by the time she came around anyway. He would still sneak down and read at night. He kept comic books in a locked toolbox under the bench seat.
When dad got sick, he sat there more and more. It was easier than watching him die in the living room; easier than holding his mother while she screamed with anger.
The canvas was rotting away. One Saturday when things were decently calm and dad was still busy living he asked his mom to borrow the station wagon. She came with him, of course–down to the hardware store where they bought a whole roll of canvas.
She held the hammer in her tiny hands while he fixed up whatever wood had melted away. She held the staple gun while he reverse peeled the fresh canvas back onto the wagon-bones. She sat and watched and asked questions, but mostly was willing to be quiet.
He worked patiently, and he worked frantically–willing himself to finish the wagon before the end. So he could have the chance to show dad just how much he meant–
“Dad’s dead.”
He didn’t go back to the wagon after the funeral. Months passed–in and out of school, in and out of a daze he couldn’t shake. Nothing seemed to be real. Nothing felt right.
Their mom was drunk inside, yelling at their aunt. He couldn’t listen to her blame him anymore.
He walked to the back of the house, grabbing his setup and handling the brushes, making sure they were still pliable and clean.
She followed him, way past her bedtime–silently, like a tiny ghost.
We’re both ghosts, now–he thought.
He put an electric lamp inside, for her. He left one outside, for him.
He went at the covered wagon like Jackson Pollack must have attacked his canvases, like Yves Klein must have felt when he invented Blue all over again. His mind was inflamed, his hand was moving faster than light, hotter than fire–
He felt a tug.
“Not now.”
A stronger tug, now–his brush slipped.
“Goddamnit, Ash–what do you want?”
She looked up at the canvas, hand on his arm, willing him to see what she saw.
“Don’t paint anymore.” He took a careful breath, not wanting to disturb the spell of speech.
“The light shines through it.”
They fell asleep in front of the wagon that night, watching moths dance around the wildly painted figures of their childhoods.
© 2017 by Sarah Farnham
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Sarah Farnham is a freelance writer living in Portland. She likes odd habits and new words.
Filed under: Mini Sledgehammers | Tagged: Blackbird Wine, covered wagon, Indigo Editing, little sister, paintbrush, Sarah Farnham, Sledgehammer, the light shines through it, Tolya, writing contest | Leave a comment »
Sledgehammer Writing Contest 