We'll Let The Fires Just Bathe Us

“What exactly am I supposed to be painting?” He asked, staring at a huge blank canvas.
“What’s in your head. Whatever image or feeling comes to mind, paint it, or what you would think it would look like.” I said.

He and I had gone to the store and gotten pretty much every color you could imagine along with every brush they had. Jack had a pallet of mainly red and black as he put a brush in the paint and drew a line on the canvas. I watched something change in him and suddenly he was furiously drawing lines, blending them together. It looked like he was painting something in particular but I couldn’t identify it. His movements were fast and controlled, he seemed to know exactly what he was doing. Then a picture became more and more visible. He placed one more line and then the whole thing made sense. He stepped back, paint on his hands and arms and examined it.

“Like that?” He asked. I was breathless.

The canvas was covered in black paint. On the ground, people were laying, kneeling, or running and they all looked to be in anguish. The sky was black with red rips in it, as if the sky had been torn and was bleeding. It looked like…Hell.

“Jack.” I whispered, moving closer.
“That only shows you what it looks like” He explained.

The detail on the people’s face sent chills to my bones, only someone who’d seen that much agony on many occasions could replicate it so accurately.

“It feels so much worse. Besides the insane-driving excruciation, you feel so alone. Like no one cares about you, like you don’t matter, like everyone wants to see you in pain. If you ask me, that’s the worst. The pain you can get used to, if anything, it sort of becomes your friend because it’s the only thing that’s always there for you but the true agony is being all by yourself in a universe which has cast you aside, never meaning to look at you again.” Jack explained, not taking his eyes off of it.
“How long were you in there?” I asked.
“Four centuries in earth years. In Hell, time works differently. A decade here is equivalent to fifteen years there. So four centuries would be six thousand years.” Jack replied, staring unblinkingly at the painting.

I couldn’t imagine myself being in the First Quarter for six thousand years, never mind the Fourth.

“Jack?” I whispered.
“Hmm?”
“How did you do it?” I asked.

He blinked and looked at me, the look in his eye told me that…He didn’t. He opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. I reached forward and locked our fingers together.

“You didn’t did you?” I murmured. He shook his head before letting out a laugh.
“Why do you think I always need to be the center of attention and why do you think I’m so angry all the time? Because I was alone and in agony for six thousand years. I hear everyone in my quarter because I spent so long in it, it haunts me. I’m not sane anymore, Alex.”

Sometimes I forgot how much he’d been through and how awful he could be. I knew that most of the impact Hell had left was stored inside Jack’s shadow, but that didn’t stop what was in Jack from nearly ruining him. I shuddered to think of the thoughts and feelings the shadow had.

“You aren’t crazy.” I replied, “You’re not a bad person. You’re a good person who bad things have happened to.”
“That's a Harry Potter reference you know honestly I’m kind of regretting watching those movies with you.” Jack laughed.
“Hey J.K. Rowling made some good points! You’re a good person!”
“Don’t kid yourself, Lex. I am a bad person, how do you think I got to Hell in the first place?” He scoffed.
“That was your shadow. He’s gone now. Jack, he can’t manipulate you anymore.” I pressed.

He shook his head and looked down.

“He doesn’t manipulate me, he just tells me my darkest wishes.”
“Nevertheless, he isn’t here anymore and ever since, you’ve been better.” I stepped closer to him and took his hand and placed it over his heart, “This is you. This is your heartbeat. Not his. He was cancerous and you’ve gone into remission. Jack, I know how difficult it is for you to retain control of your rage. I know it must be so hard for you to not beat me to death sometimes. I can see you trying.”

He had fixed his gaze on me and it didn’t look like he’d be breaking it soon so I stood on my tip toes and gave him a gentle kiss. It took him a second but he responded, slotting his lips against mine and bringing his arms around me. I pulled back, still in his arms, and looked back up at him. There was something in his eyes that I’d never seen before. It wasn't lonelyness, or sadness, or anger, or rage...

It was a spark.

Notes

Titel Cred: Read All About It by Emeli Sandè