The Girl Who Cries Colors, page 1
The Girl Who Cries Colors
Raven Kennedy
Contents
Author’s Note
Preface
I. The Painter
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
II. The Storm
Prologue
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Epilogue
Thank You For Reading
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright © 2018 by Raven Kennedy
All Rights Reserved. This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This work, or any portion thereof, may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Cover Design by Nichole Witholder at Rainy Day Artwork
Author’s Note
This story includes scenes of violence and non-consensual sex. Intended for mature audiences only.
PLAYLIST
Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head by B.J. Thomas
Fade Into You by Sam Palladio & Clare Bowen
Always Remember Me by Ry Cuming
Bruises by Lewis Capaldi
The Longer I Run by Peter Bradley Adams
Willow by Jasmine Thompson
Show And Tell by Al Wilson
Bright Lights and Cityscapes by Sara Bareilles
Colors by Halsey
You’re No Good by Linda Ronstadt
When We’re Fire by Lo Fang
Storm by Ruelle
Hurricane by Fleurie
Ashes and Wine by A Fine Frenzy
Preface
Some books feed your soul when you’re writing them. Others strip you bare and bleed you dry. This book was the latter. So much of me went into this story that I should be able to bottle it up and drink it down to restore myself. I joked that I traded my soul to this book and it became my little soul-baby; that it demanded to be sung soul-lullabies while it sucked out my essence. That joke wasn’t far off from the truth.
This story demanded to be written, and I hope that I have done it justice. I tried to make each line a love story, a poem, a song; all of it penned in the hopes that it might quench that all-encompassing thirst you don’t even know is there until you start drinking in the words.
It is my hope that with this story, you will see the spark, hear the storm, and feel the colors.
—Raven Kennedy
To my family.
Part I
The Painter
DAVID
Prologue
When I first saw him, I could sense the spark inside of him. His hair was messy and his clothes were rumpled. His shoes were worn almost all the way through the soles. People might have thought he slept on the streets if it weren’t for his hands. His hands were always what set him apart.
He sat on the ground with a canvas in his lap and a worn paintbrush in his hand. He had a bowl beside him that was as black as night. I could smell smoke as he crushed black embers into the thick water and dipped his brush into it.
He painted, even as ash rained down on him and landed in his hair. The only parts of him that were clean were the lines going down his face from the tears.
He painted in a trance-like state, hunched over like a praying monk as his hand flew over the canvas. Nothing else existed for him. All of life had faded into the background, burned down to nothing. He’d lost all color and warmth.
He was burning out.
There was charred mourning in his eyes. There was a chill that came off his fingertips. After everything that had happened to him, after all that he’d lost, there was nothing left for the fire of his gift to cling to. His spark was stifled. The very thing that made him special was choking out of him.
And it was my fault.
That didn’t stop me from watching him, as a ghost spies the living. There was something bewitching about the way he painted. They’d say he was a prodigy, a genius, an angel. Everyone—men, women, old, young, kind, cruel—they all saw that he had something extra inside of his hands. A talent. A gift. A spark.
Every painting he made was distinctive; all of them made in their own language. Some just spoke to you. The exclusivity of his work astounded me. That you could look at one and think, this one. This one, he painted for me.
When I saw him work, it was like watching someone who’d been painting for far longer than the years that showed on his face. Maybe he had. Maybe he’d lived a thousand times over, possessing a different body each time. Maybe he’d painted since the dawning of time, using feathers for brushes and mud for paints. Maybe he’d been doing this before man learned to make fire, before Eve bit the apple. Maybe God made him to create the sunsets that filled the sky and the mountains at the horizon.
I wouldn’t doubt it.
Because whenever his brush dipped into deep oils, or subdued watercolors, or even the harshness of wetted embers on the ashy ground, something took hold of him and ran away with the strokes of his wrists.
When he held the brushes, he wasn’t a boy anymore. He wasn’t even human. He was a painter.
I don’t know why, but to this day when I picture him in my mind, he still has ash in his hair. I suppose I’ll always think of him that way—left behind to paint a world scorched gray.
And I? I was the muse.
But I was also the villain.
Chapter One
It was 1965 in Windrip, New Hampshire, and the Beck family was in their living room huddled around the black & white television set. David was on the floor beside his sister, while his three older brothers crammed together on the couch. Pop was in his favorite chair, and their ma was in the kitchen washing up after dinner.
They were all glued to the evening news, getting the latest updates about the space race. That night, the news anchor was talking about the Gemini spacecraft orbiting around the Earth. It was a ritual for the Becks to all sit together like that after dinner, their Beck blonde hair and blue eyes glowing from the television screen.
There was Archie, Ballard, (whom everyone except their ma lovingly called, “Balls,”) Coen, David, and Elsie. David’s ma would joke that she named them alphabetically because it was the only way to remember their ages in correct order. His pop would joke that they still had twenty-one children to go if they were going to complete the entire alphabet. Their ma always gave an emphatic no to that.
Archie, the oldest at seventeen, was a prince in David’s eyes. He had thoughtful blue eyes and serious ideas. If Archie was the prince, then sixteen-year-old Balls was the court jester. He liked cars, girls, and making people laugh. He was outgoing and impossibly opposite from Archie, despite being only one year younger. Their conflicting personalities either put them into shouting matches against one another, or helped to balance each other out.
Coen, at fourteen, was the most like Pop. Quiet, gentle, and warm. Their ma always called him the real baker of the family because he’d always been good at it. He could mimic their pop’s recipes by taste. David was the youngest boy at ten-years-old, and Elsie, the baby of the family, was eight. Since she was the youngest and the only girl, they all doted on her.
It was no secret that Mr. and Mrs. Beck constantly struggled to keep seven plates of food on the table. They hunted, they gardened, they baked, and they made do. But anytime they came up short, it was Mr. and Mrs. Beck who went without.
David’s house was a tiny, four-roomed space, with one bathroom, two bedrooms, and a small living space that had the kitchen and dining area stuffed together. It was the life-hub of the house, since they were either crowded around the small iron stove to keep warm, or in front of the television.
Their parents owned the bakery downstairs that was attached to the house. Mr. Beck lived and breathed baking, but only Coen seemed to share the knack for it. And although they didn’t have a fancy shop or expensive pastries, Beck’s Bakery was lovely. When people came in, they were greeted with warmth that came first from the ovens and secondly from Mr. Beck himself who was always elbow-deep in dough and flour. The aroma made mouths salivate and stomachs turn over with somersaulting hunger.
Sometimes, David was allowed to help in the bakery when they were busy, but that didn’t happen often. So instead, he was usually forced into helping his ma, because she was always busy. With five children, David wasn’t sure he’d ever seen her not doing something. Even when she was sitting, she was mending socks, or sewing on buttons, or helping with schoolwork, or canning fruit from their garden
After the news was over, David’s siblings broke off to do their own thing before bed. Archie, Balls, and Coen went to their shared room, while Elsie read a book with Pop. David wandered into the kitchen with his ma and sat down at the table. Almost as soon as he settled in, she placed a cinnamon cookie in front of him, which he devoured with glee.
“Can I go downstairs tomorrow?” he asked around a mouthful.
His ma’s expression wasn’t a positive one.
“I could help,” he argued.
She shook her head as she settled in to mend some of Elsie’s clothes. “Your father doesn’t need you in the bakery. Besides, you don’t help when you go down there,” she said, giving him a look. “Don’t think it’s skipped my notice that you sneak food while you’re down there and play in the kitchen.”
David had the good sense to look guilty. “I get bored,” he mumbled.
“Well if you get bored again, there are plenty of things I can keep you busy with.”
“That’s not what I meant,” he muttered.
“You don’t need to be running amok in the bakery. Coen is helping your father tomorrow after school. Stop feeling sorry for yourself.”
Mrs. Beck abhorred self-pity. Once, when Archie’s old girlfriend had told him she didn’t like him anymore, he’d refused dinner for three nights and wouldn’t talk to anybody. Mrs. Beck finally got so mad at him that she marched up to their room, pulled him out of his bed by his ear, (even though he towered over her) and threatened to drag him over to the girl’s house to show her what a baby he was being unless he knocked it off. He was so afraid that she’d go through with it and mortify him forever, that from that point on, he stopped moping, started eating again, and soon enough he was back to normal. Sometimes it takes a mother’s love.
She wasn’t hard-as-nails all the time, though. Mrs. Beck could be quite soft when she wanted to be. She loved her children, she loved her husband, and she took pride in everything they did. She was strict, but that was the way she knew how to keep their hectic household in order. Still, everyone in the house, Mr. Beck included, wouldn’t dare cross her when she was angry. If they did, they’d have her biting words, rough cleaning, and fuming dinners to contend with. No one was happy when Mrs. Beck was cross. You could taste it in every meal.
Mr. Beck, on the other hand, was quite different. For every thirty words that Mrs. Beck spoke, he said one. He was quiet and calm, never one to yell or lecture, but one that all his kids were loath to disappoint. As long as David did his chores and did his homework, he usually stayed out of trouble.
He was in fifth grade, but he hated school. He was too embarrassed to admit it out loud, but he didn’t have any friends. His siblings always had people hanging around them, and David yearned for the day when he could have a best friend of his own, someone that wouldn’t make fun of him, someone who would play games with him and laugh at his jokes. But he was too quiet to make friends, so he was mostly ignored or bullied.
When David went to bed that night, it was with dread pooling in his stomach. He’d have to face yet another day at school where he’d be teased for the holes in his shoes and for the patches on his sweater. There was nothing to look forward to. He wanted a friend, but more than that, he wanted to feel like he fit.
David was waiting. Waiting for something that he had no name for. Little did he know that the name of the something he waited for was fate, and that it would blow into Windrip, New Hampshire the very next day.
Chapter Two
In the morning, David walked to school with Elsie, Coen, and Balls, but they went their separate ways at the gate. David’s nose was running like a faucet, so he had to wipe it with the handkerchief his ma had sent him to school with. He was starting to get a bit of a headache, too, and wished that he were back in his bed. When he got to his classroom and sat down at his desk, he wiped his nose quickly, stowing the handkerchief in his pocket, only to have to dig it out again a few seconds later. David’s stomach dropped when he saw Peter Murron point and laugh at him, drawing the attention of his friends.
“Look, Baker Boy’s got a doll blanket to wipe his wittle nose!” Peter teased.
They all laughed, and the group of five boys walked over and crowded around his desk. David felt his entire face grow red to match his sore nose.
“It’s not a doll blanket,” he said, scrunching the fabric in his sweaty palms. “It’s a handkerchief.”
“Aww, does wittle David have a cold?” Peter said, making everyone snicker.
David wished that their teacher, Mrs. Smith, would come in and make everyone sit down, but she was nowhere in sight.
Peter scrunched his face up dramatically, and then faked a huge sneeze, sending spit all over David’s face. All of Peter’s friends laughed, but David didn’t dare use the handkerchief to wipe the spit off. Instead, he used his hand.
“Come on, before he infects us with his disease,” Peter said, and everyone sauntered off, laughing.
David buried the handkerchief into the bottom of his shoe, disgusted with himself for using it and angry with his ma for giving it to him. After that, every time he felt a sneeze coming on, he squeezed the bridge of his nose as hard as he could and held his breath until the urge left, swallowing whatever dripped down the back of his throat. To sneeze or cough, or make any noise at all that would draw attention to him, was something that must be avoided at all costs. That’s how he survived every day at school. And sometimes even then, Peter Murron still sought him out.
By the time the lunch bell rang, David was perfectly miserable. He so badly needed to blow his nose that he ran to the bathroom and locked himself in, his ears straining to hear any sign of Peter or his group of goons. Luckily, no one bothered him, but when he was finished blowing and wiping, his nose was red and raw. He couldn’t stand the idea of sitting at the lunch table, let alone going back into the classroom. So instead, he went in search of his teacher.
“Umm, Mrs. Smith?” he said quietly. She was talking to another teacher and looked surprised at seeing him there, as if it were the first time she’d noticed him all day.
“Yes?”
“I’m sick. I need to go home.”
“Oh. Well...all right. Go tell the school nurse and then you may be excused.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The school nurse was somewhat of a joke. The only thing she was qualified to do was put a bandage on a scrape, and even then she usually botched it somehow. She seemed more interested in keeping her manicure pristine than doing anything that remotely resembled nursing. She took one look at his nose and decided she wanted nothing to do with his boogers or his germs, and sent him on his way.
David took his time to walk home. He tried to forget about Peter Murron. He knew his parents always said it was bad to hate people, but David felt like he hated Peter Murron anyway. He was always making fun of him, calling him poor, shoving him around. David never did anything to provoke him, so he didn’t understand it. All he wanted was to be left alone.
After a while, David made himself stop thinking about Peter Murron. Instead, he looked forward to getting home. He knew his pop would give him something warm and fresh to eat and his ma would bring him tea and let him rest in bed and not have to do a single chore. There were some perks to being sick.
