Genre: #2 - Thriller
Archetypes:
#20 – Protagonist: The Tomboy
#22 – Antagonist: The Wrathful Father
Theme: #9 – Pursuit
Keywords/Elements:
#19 – Body Painting
#20 - Blood
#22 - Mirror
***
I felt a rush of panic when I noticed that the noise had stopped. All that's left now is the sound of my own breathing and the pounding on my chest. This wasn't good. I'm more scared of this silence than the horrible ticking she makes.
Kneeling by my father's body, I reached for the knife buried deep on the center of his chest. Oh God, it won't come out. Tears started to gather at the corner of my eyes.
"Enough," I muttered, hugging my legs and burying my face in between my knees. "I've had enough of this madness."
I noticed the blood running down my hands, slow and sticky, painting my body. I started to rock backward and forward on my heels as the tears began to fall. For paint is my blood, and my works are the mirrors of my soul. I let out a small hysterical giggle as memories flooded my mind like a film on fast forward.
"No lights," I frowned and flicked the switch again. Nothing happened. "How the hell do you live without electricity?"
My father, the great self-centered painter Scott De Leon, glared at me like I'm some kind of a disobedient puppy. "Watch your words, young lady," he scowled and carried my bags into the room. "It's a nuisance. A distraction."
I raised an eyebrow at him. I see no candles. "And how do you see in the dark?"
"I don't," he said and walked out of the door.
I stood in the middle of the room with my mouth hanging open. Un-fucking-believable. So, what am I, a nuisance too? No wonder mom dumped him. I slammed the door shut and made a thorough 360 of the room.
I inhaled the smell of fresh paint. I stopped and grinned to myself. God, I missed this place. My childhood bedroom. Placed away at the back of the house just above the basement, far enough away from my parent's so that they didn't have to sing along and jump with every rock song I play on the radio. I discovered my love for rock 'n roll early. My mother used to joke that maybe we ought to put some kind of a doorbell on my room so that I could hear them knock each day for dinner. The thought of her made me smile, but it also left a tinge of sadness on my heart. Mom. Mom and her terrible love for pink and purple.
She was a model before their marriage. She made one brief stint of posing with nothing but paint on her body in support of an environmental movement. The model and the painter. It was a small wonder how I came into the picture several months after that pictorial. The tomboy.
"My cute little princess," I remember her saying every time she brushes my hair. "My princess with the long regal brown hair."
Standing here, with my hair cut short, I could feel the ghost of that girl staring at me. Wondering who and what the hell am I doing in her world.
That was when I first heard it. A faint ticking that seem to echo on my tiny bedroom. I frowned. There were no clocks in here. No machineries (it's a distraction, you see). Slowly, I got down to my knees and placed my ear against the wooden floor.
