He spent the last three nights painting, cursing, and yelling at himself, the universe, and the slow loss of his artistic abilities. Eventually, however, the painting is ready. The hands that created it aren't as talented as they used to be, but its eerieness is the same as the one of Johnny's old creations. Black swirls, eyes staring into the real world, spyrals threatening to drag anyone to the abyss. This is what he's now handing to Salice, after wrapping it in old wrapping paper. (1)
happy birthday, salice! — @thmaniac.
He offers her a crooked smile - slightly unwillingly menacing even when trying to be completely friendly. “Happy birthday. Sorry if it’s a bit late, but… uhm.” He looks slightly confused. “I think I lost track of time. What day is today?”
“Uh… ah? Wh…” at first, Salice’s no less than baffled. She’s surprised to see that Johnny is gifting her something—but before she can ask what this present is for, as she hesitantly grabs it by the edges, she finds herself frozen, with her eyes widened in pure, sheer shock. For… her birthday? What exactly is going on? What the fuck? With a couple of blink, Salice snaps out of her silent trance: but even with the best and most convinced of efforts, she finds herself unable to properly understand the situation at hand. Her eyes fall on the gift she had been handed—which, despite having a familiar weight, is of overall mysterious nature. Her head turns to Johnny, then at the package again. What is it? What is it? Sudden, violent curiosity assaults her instincts like it never did before. Saying she’s dying to know is not only correct, but also an euphemism, not accurate enough to truly describe the almost animalistic instinct that prompts nails to roughly scrape against the wrapping paper. Despite wearing her usual, neutral expression, it’s clear that something is happening in Salice’s mind: it slightly shows in the way she pulls at her lips, frowns, and the way her eyes threaten to start sparkling of that brilliant teal—an indicator of something dangerous.
“Well, I’m…” she loses her words before she can continue, but she can’t just stop there. So, she attempts again after violently shaking her head; to the left, to the right, and then: “… I’m just gonna open this.” and so she does. Impatient claws cut across the paper, which easily strips away—the rash movements and tugs cause loud, scratchy sounds, the flapping of paper resounding in the air as it’s thrown into the air, revealing something that literally steals her breath away. Eyes widen, even more than before. It’s a painting. It’s a painting made by Johnny himself, she immediately catches sight of the signature. At first, she assumes it’s from his old stash of canvases and, for a moment, she lingers on the pleasant possibility of that being the case. (If it were true, that’d mean he remembered her telling him about wanting more of his work… and it would be flattering, sure. It’d mean he does listen to her, even between his own distraught moods.) Her grip on the canvas’ wooden skeleton tightens, ever so slightly. (It’s comfortable, Salice thinks, because that means he doesn’t see me as a complete asshole—he somewhat tolerates me, at least.) In that thought, she finds some sort of solace. However… Her nose seems to be of a different opinion. It unexpectedly scrunches and her nostrils flare, sniffing what seems to be the odor of something fresh. This doesn’t match that usual smell, she muses, puzzled, that smell of rotten and old, unkempt things. This is… new. And with a bit of analysis, scanning through the surface of the picture, admiring the lack of dust and the unusually tight pull of the canvas (which is not at all similar to the one of the painting she’s hung in her bedroom: she had to ask the framer to fix the loosened sheet), Salice eventually comes to a very concise conclusion, which her stomach quickly greets with a few churning turns, and the ever-so-unwelcome sensation of dread.
So he painted this for me. This is a gift made for me. In this moment, Salice does everything in her power not to scream. She wishes the black swirls of the painting would just absorb her into another dimension entirely, so she wouldn’t have to deal with this—unexpected bout of kindness, out of Johnny, of all people. Not only does she find herself wordless out of complete shock, but it seems all the opinions and calculations and analysis she’d ruminated over and over and over on were wrong. Horrendously so. Salice had thought Johnny was simply (so to speak) a homicidal maniac too busy trying to figure out his shit amidst violent impulses, a messed up, unknown past, and his own demons. She didn’t doubt the chance of there being other sides to him—after all, even if quite the odd kind, he is still human. No human’s merely two-dimensional. But until today, she would’ve never thought that she would be able to witness herself one of those aforementioned “other sides”. If Johnny ought to be kind to someone, in his own way, she was firmly convinced that she wouldn’t be there to see it, much more that she wasn’t to be that someone. This gift’s proving her wrong, wrong, wrong. And honestly? She does not know how to react. Hence why she’s standing there, stiff as a codfish. It’s an almost comical scene, if considering the completely out-of-place expression that’s pulling her features. How… should she emote? Should she emote? What should she say? Should she say anything? These questions are running through her head as gradually, her brows begin furrowing, and her mouth begins turning into a frown, tugging at her cheek muscles with enough tension to almost hurt. Then she blinks, one, two times, realizes that she is still looking at the spirals and the strokes that fill the canvas…
… And snaps back to reality as soon as a loud thump resounds in her ears. She’s not sure whether or not that was an actual noise she heard—but in any case, it’s enough for her to jump on her feet and turn her head away from the painting in her hands. “Ah…” she mutters, almost as if disappointed to find out that, after all her mental spiels, she will have to actually do something instead of mulling over it. There’s something that’s crawling through her ribs, trying to get out and spread across her body—it makes her eyes flicker an iridescent teal, and, soon enough, without fully realizing it, her lips curl up in a tentative, small smirk. “Well…” what is going on? Salice does not understand the unexpected feeling that is grotesquely snaking inside of her stomach, causing it to twitch and twist, she doesn’t get why she so suddenly feels content. It’s not new, but it’s rare. Rare and little to not at all explored. An unknown land. One she doesn’t know she wants to walk through further… “I don’t mind it’s late. That’s fine. I guess I’m… touched you even bothered in first place.” her words come out slowly and with a bit of a lag to them—she feels like a fawn trying stumbling in its first steps. But at this point, backing off is not a viable option. “I already know where I’ll put this.” and it’s true: she can already see it hanging along the walls of her bedroom, just right above her bed. Perfectly placed, situated, for mornings reminded that the world’s full of shit, and filled, made of many horrible things—but not only. There’s also good things. Like this. And it’s easy to get lost in society’s awfulness. It’s important to have something, even if small, to hang on to, that will help you remember that not everything is shitty, you don’t have to be constantly cynical. Salice’s reality is desperately needy of that tiny, yet essential beacon of hope. Perhaps that’s why her smile lacks its typical viciousness.
“Thank you, Johnny.” She’ll have to treat him with the most disgustingly sweet drink ever, in order to make it an even deal.
