Chapter Text
For a moment, everything went deathly still like the air itself was holding its breath. She felt a sick churning in her body and then the world collapsed into bewildering chaos.
As she watched with creeping uneasiness, the sky transitioned in rapid peculiarity that began with the sunset spreading itself thin all at once with striking colours of dusky red and orange as if burning its last raging rays in earnest; its streaks then girted in the horizon, taking on a vivid and violet appearance of a long line of low beach that soon dissipated as the wind simultaneously blew it away and drew in the night sky in its stead.
In an instant, darkness of muted stillness draped upon the world like a heavy velveteen shroud and along it brought thick angry billows and ferocious wind—a tell-tale sign of a raging storm brewing.
Her notice was soon called upon the blinding flash—more brilliant than any bolts of lightning she had ever seen—exploding nearby; and as her uneasiness rose into a full blown fear, her eyes adjusted and saw just in time a bright pink blaze ripping across the sky.
Slowly at first, then faster and faster, the rain fell in earnest battering and deafening the world save for the fresh rolls of thunder. There was no shelter from the screeching wind and freezing rain that crashed down upon the stunned girl, soaked to the skin in her cloak with her hood being whipped out her head. Barely registering what was happening, somehow, somewhere at a distance, her ears perked at the sound of unmistakable chorus of howls and at this she finally started.
‘Oh God!’
She lurched forward, sprinting and barreling through marsh and puddles with the wind beating so hard that she staggered sideways as she dashed blindly, in a jolt of hysterics, away from the maddening wailings.
Sputtering, she pawed the rain from her face, desperately trying to make out any sense of direction. It was hopeless; the roar of the thunder and the extreme fury of the rain were overpowering her senses.
As she had managed to steer herself steady a few yards ahead, she glanced over her shoulder where she was able to make out the silhouette of the incoming onslaught—a pack of wolves, five or six in numbers, red eyed with sharp fangs, growling in rabid pursuit.
In stunned horror, she scrambled in near stumble and barely kept herself aright, doubling over with her boots bogged down in muck and her hands on her knees when she suddenly smelled the salt and heard the rushing waves as the bleak, harsh view of the ocean’s tempest broke out before her on the horizon.
When her eyes finally caught up with the rest of her senses, she saw herself mere meters away from the edge of a high outcrop of jagged cliffs. Underneath, the dark waters lurched and quavered upon the crags like the tempest’s mouth frothing in wilderness.
For a moment, as she heaved with laborious breath, she imagined just surrendering, letting herself be swallowed up below.
Then, all at once, she heard it. Someone was screaming her name.
‘Marianne!’
The voice was close. She searched frantically for its source but the blinding rain kept crashing down; without a second’s thought, she turned her back to the ocean and shot out her arm forward and grabbed hold of the voice’s hand, locking it tightly in her grasp.
‘Marianne!’
A shrill voice was calling and in an instant, everything went deathly still and the world turned into complete darkness.
Marianne awoke with a start, panting and sweating profusely as she sat up in her bed, clutching a fistful of her sheets. She had been dreaming the same nightmares over and over again, for at least a week now, and each time she seems to get closer and closer to unveiling the identity of the voice.
Today was the closest she had ever been; at times she would wake just before she breaks into a run; other times, just before the storm pelts, but each time, the dream starts from the moment the bright pink blaze splits across the sky.
The fact that she had managed to clutch the person’s hand signified—as Marianne reasoned—that she might get lucky soon enough and actually see the person’s face. And if she’s super lucky, hopefully, that revelation will bring these nightmarish episodes into a close.
But like all dreams, it soon ends until reality wakes her up and she is once again left to face the everyday banalities of life.
With those thoughts in mind, Marianne resigned to the day and got ready for work.
Modest hereditary wealth and ancestral notoriety in the arts afforded Marianne an education of similar fashion as her marginally prominent father.
To her credit, her contemplative turn of mind enabled her to quickly methodize the early and diligent studies of portraiture which resulted into eloquent expressions bound within a canvas, bursting with life of various colours; a painting brushed with such an ease that she never found forced upon her hands—that to Marianne was the very joy of living.
In her undergrad, she painted several lovely portraits and even earned herself some worthy accolades and distinctions throughout her post-secondary career; she was thought as a sort of prodigy having surpassed her art professors very quickly; and while she enjoyed the acknowledgements from her brief and illustrious vocation, nothing could have prepared her from the real world struggle of being a dreamy artist debutante.
She soon realized the truth behind the “starving artists” moniker and discovered that although portrait was very much considered as high art, it was in fact an art that is not at all highly considered much these days; there were little demands for portraits, not like the way they do in the eighteenth century perhaps, especially when photography and prints are so much more accessible and considerably cheaper.
In any case, like the true art connoisseur that she is, she utilized her skills and persevered with learning the trade on demand and soon branched out.
Upon the whole, she considered herself luckier than most of her peers, having her own home studio where she can comfortably do all sorts of projects, be it in portrait, photography or prints; and while that fortunate thought was comforting in a sense, nothing irked her more than the uncomfortable truth that she had somewhat garnered an unfortunate reputation.
Marianne, whose erudition of the arts was profound and borne with talents of no common order, had somehow came to be better known as the city’s best doggy portraitist.
‘I swear to God if I have to fucking paint one more dog!’ she huffed and fought the urge to rumple her rags through the canvas.
With a feeling of sheer frustration, she observed the picture of the client’s dog; a big wolfish husky with bright blue eyes, smiling and seemingly docile enough.
She pursed her lips and combed her hair through her fingers with exasperated sigh; she recalls how she was thrown by accident into this furred affair a few years ago when she ran onto an old acquaintance of her father.
All thanks to Lady Madeleine—a widower whose small stature she made up with her grandiose demeanor and wealth; she was rambunctious yet was never boisterous, haughty but was never boastful, a hearty gossiper yet knew how to be succinct, had a sharp tongue yet was never intentionally mean. All in all despite the woman’s conflicting oddities, Marianne liked her well enough and thought her as bright, proud, and bubbly.
And so Marianne, how evident was her perplexity to see the woman in such a forlorn state, soon dismissed a feign slip and regarded her with concern.
And thus, she learned the fate of the old lady’s most faithful companion—Ernie—a black great dane who loyally followed his master everywhere; the gentle giant had apparently died from the luxury of old age rendering his master widowed once more.
With a spurt of spontaneous urge to uplift the bereaved, Marianne offered her consolation by way of painting a portrait of Ernie—the dog and the husband together as they both shared the same name—so she has something nice to remember them by.
Of course Marianne didn’t know then that that was to propel her newly found fame; as it turned out, Lady Madeleine, the ever perplexing lady, had a very popular Instagram account; visibly moved and in better spirits, she posted the portrait online where her million strong followers, rich and celebrity friends alike, poured in their sympathies and support.
And in accidental happenstance, Marianne found herself in the attention to some riveted fans that admired her work.
The undue, earnest and sometimes frivolous attention confounded Marianne but if truth be told, the entrepreneur in her was excited by the prospects of steady income, especially coming from those who would indulge enough for a pet—those always screamed well off.
The volume of commission rose and while at first she had happily taken up many clients, she was immediately faced with an unhappy worker in herself.
‘Painting dogs is so fucking boring!’ she cried to herself one day.
No sooner had those profane syllables passed her lips, Marianne as if awakened from her reverie, leaped to her feet and shrugged out of her painting smock and locked up shop decidedly.
It was two hours before her shift, but Marianne needed a break from looking at dogs all day. She relished her Wednesday afternoons merely to derive pleasure from the long walks to the art gallery where she had taken up a casual position doing odd clerical and restoration work.
With a cigarette in her lips and light steps on her feet, she took her last puff and made her way to the front doors. Just before she could extend her hand to pull at the stanchion, the door opened and out came Lady Madeleine who nearly ran up against her, evidently in a hurry; she pulled out her kerchief with a hassled yank from her purse and Marianne watched as coins fell out and rolled by her feet. She then bent down to pick up the coin, a shiny quarter, and called after the old lady.
‘Sorry love, I’m in a rush! You ladies keep it and toss it for good luck!’ Lady Madeleine bellowed back as she clambered onto the taxi.
Marianne watched the car drove off and her observations took a generalizing turn to the other lady who then mirrored the very same expression she currently sports; with a coin pinched between the thumb and the index finger, left-hand stretched out and a blank nonplussed look upon the face, they both looked at each other and shared a baffled shrug. They exchanged a quick smile and nodded in a silent agreement to do as they were told and each pocketed the stray coin.
Both ladies then made their way inside towards the concession desk where Marianne quickly rounded and manned the table. The lady ever so slightly quirked her brow and Marianne, in turn, took the opportunity of a quick sweeping observation.
By far the easiest notice, to Marianne’s descend to detail, was the lady’s eyes, or rather the tempered brilliancy that exudes in them—is it azure? or maybe green?—she pondered quietly and ran further her examination through the expanse of jetty lashes that hung over the eyelids to the contour of her small nose, lofty fair skin framed by cascading blonde locks, down to small roundish roguish lips now donning the smallest of smirks.
In her abstract observations, Marianne forgot herself just in a slightest minute and adjusted her expressions; her lips drew out her words unwittingly and they fell heavy and graceless in the air.
‘You have to go back, later,’ she said.
‘But I am here now.’
The lady simply replied and Marianne studied her face; her eyes shone something light—what was it?—she couldn’t quite pinpoint, but all she knew was that there was something child-like in the way she spoke in that exact and satisfied composure as if her being early or late was of no greater importance than the precise moment.
She drew an easy smile and countered.
‘I meant to save you,’ Marianne explained and quickly added, ‘from a $30 admission fee.’
She shook her head to recollect herself and sheepishly continued,
‘At six, it’s for free, you see...’
‘Ah.’
The lady nodded in amused acknowledgment and ducked her head to hide a small smile. She dug her hands in her pocket and as she trained her gaze back to Marianne, a particular conclusion in her mind appeared.
‘Can you still save me though?’
Again Marianne was thrown off by the stranger’s response; she would have even considered it as a light banter had it not for the way the question was delivered. Marianne remarked the way those green eyes flickered into something entirely different, it’s almost as if it steeled itself with a fierceness of resistance with which she wrestled with—what?—she can only wonder.
The sentence had passed; and it just occurred to Marianne that a long interval of time had since elapsed for a needed reply as the lady ruefully added,
‘From $30 admin fee, please?’
At length, with an equal air of seriousness, Marianne stood at her fullest and nodded in a solemn response; she knew her impressions were made onto an understanding that she will not—cannot—retract the words that she knew rang the truest from her lips thus far.
‘Absolutely.’
.
.
.