MicroHorror

“Andy, we really need you to come home tonight.”

“Sorry, babe, it’s so close… I can feel it.”

“You’ve been saying that for five months now, Andy,” she says, her voice dangerous. “The kids miss you, I miss you, and you don’t even know that Timothy got suspended from school for fighting and…”

Not listening, Andy Skarnick applies another brush stroke to his unfolding masterpiece.

“Listen, babe, I have to go now.”

“No, Andy, seriously…”

Click

Andy gathers some more crimson paint on his brush and dabs it into the corner of the canvas. It doesn’t matter what Jen thinks; he knows that his work is almost finished. Maybe it will even be done tonight. Then they will thank him, the family will be fabulously rich. It’s important. He knows. He can’t sleep anymore for dreaming of it.

From the corner of his eye, Andy sees movement in the shadows of his studio. He pays it no mind. They have been there for the last few weeks now. He doesn’t know where they come from. All he knows is that they, like him, are waiting for him to finish his work.

One stroke…

Two…

The hours pass…

A splash here…

Done!

Stepping back, Andy starts to cry, to laugh, to scream. Tears stream down his face, turning slowly to blood. His mouth stretches into a silent scream of ecstasy and pain. Falling to the ground, Andy sees nothing but the marvel of horrid beauty he has created.

The shadows converge.

The next day, his agent finds Andy in his studio. He is curled into a posture of worship. His face is frozen in a rictus of rapture. Everything in the room is as it usually was, except for an empty easel in the center of the room, standing before the body.

Andy’s family is notified by the authorities. There is crying, though not much. Life moves on.

Strange headlines start to appear across the country. Odd rumors circulate in the art world. Soon people are afraid to look on any unknown paintings.

No one knows where it came from. No one knows there it goes. All they know is that it is beautiful, dangerous, and the work of some poor wretch, inspired by the Infernal Muses.