Tell A Story 2023 fiction contest: The painter | Teen Ink

Tell A Story 2023 fiction contest: The painter

May 28, 2023
By ElaM ELITE, Surrey, Columbia
ElaM ELITE, Surrey, Columbia
319 articles 27 photos 119 comments

Favorite Quote:
“I was ashamed of myself when I realized life was a costume party; and I attended with my real face.” ~Franz Kafka


The quiet rustling of the leaves and trickling droplets of water spun together a calming melody that danced with the swirling breeze. The sweltering heat was quenched by waves of sea foam sorcery. Once the first colour starts to hit the canvas, the picture slowly starts to trickle into a lifeless grey wash. A girl stood in front of the canvas, the woven fabric, now in the delusional mind of light fluffy clouds. Her strokes started to create shapes, shapes began to create objects and the yin-yang shades began to create a black-white perspective. Strokes, shapes and shades is all what different ideas needed to create an imaginative landscape, where hills elapsed into white elephants and where coffee coloured finches breaded their babies in white fields of daisies. An acid fragrance overwhelmed the sea breeze as she tenderly twisted off the caps of fresh gouache paint. Sitting by the seashore, she squinted her ocean blue eyes, tilting her prim oriental face so that strands of strawberry blonde hair slipped onto her face. She stretched her porcelain hands, as the sleeves of her cotton dress bled into the pink designs of peony blossoms. Using her elongated fingers, she picked up the brush and began to boldly wash away her introduction of grey, replacing it with shades of pacific, cerulean, sapphire and periwinkle blue to create a doppelgänger, of the very same sea foam sorcery beholding her naked eyes. Forming ripples in her dilation of the sea, her pearl shades of white represent Lord Vishnu‘s conch shell as it illuminated the nightly atmosphere of the canvas with scattered stars and constellations. Yet again, stroke by stroke came to life, with fluttering remains of a golden veil and a young girl wedging her asymmetrical toes in the sand as denim waves wash her feet. It wasn’t perfect like her mam‘s sweet apple pie or granny‘s yellow rose garden, yet the girl smiled as the sun kissed moon, as the starry night sky dazzled upon her, realizing it’s just the pelicans and the sea‘s soul breathing in and out. She lied down on the sand, as the night sky exhaled. Whispering the remaining words of her painting to the sand, “never have I ever….”


The author's comments:

This piece reminded me of romance because the main characters love of the ocean was nothing but love at first sight.


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