Painting Darkness

• Madison Vickery, Grade 11
• Short Story
• 2016

Under the glowing stars peppered across the charcoal blackness above on a cold night in August, the sea can easily be mistaken for the sky. The water reflects an inky dark and the small waves pick up the glinting light from the little silver suns flickering overhead. The horizon of the ocean blends seamlessly into the lining of the sky, and it is almost impossible to decipher where the water ends and where the sky begins.
A teenager, Parker Mason, sits crisscrossed on the sand. His eyes are shut; though it doesn't make a difference as to if they were open. The best his blind eyes can see are simply shadowy messes of dancing silhouettes before him, and no matter how hard he tries, he cannot make out what it is that his eyes are trying so desperately hard to focus on.
It does not bother Parker, though. Not anymore.
As he sits there, on the sand, his legs tightly crisscrossed beneath him, his mind paints pictures of things his vision cannot.
He imagines the sea to be soft, like velvet, for when he pushes his hand through the waves the only thing he can feel is the coolness of the water. His little sister, Ella, had told him that the sea was blue. Parker doesn't know what blue is or what it looks like, but he knows that it is beautiful, because Ella had said it was.
He imagines the sky to look like another world. Ella had told him that at night the sky is black and lit up with a million tiny diamonds. She once said to Parker that when he shuts his eyes completely, he sees black. Parker doesn't know what he sees; he just knows that he sees nothing. But he can imagine what the sky looks like now, because Ella had told him that he already can.
He imagines the clouds to be round and fluffy and wonderful. Ella had told him that on rainy days when the sky is filled to the brim with them, the clouds look a lot like sheep. Parker doesn't know what sheep look like, but he had felt one once before. It was round and fluffy and wonderful, and Ella said that if he has touched a sheep, he has already touched a cloud.
He imagines Ella's face to be a pretty one. She often takes his hands in her own tiny pixie ones and places them on her cheeks. When she giggles, he can feel the soft vibrations run up and down his arms. Ella says that it tickles.
Ella sometimes imagines that she is a painter. She says that when she grows up, she wants to create art for those who cannot see the world as she can. And Parker smiles, because if she can paint for him the world he cannot see, Ella can paint a more beautiful one for those who think they can.