Dark Swan
by
Erin Paul

She was warm and safe, surrounded by darkness. She wanted to stay for eternity but eternity had passed. She was forced to leave and enter a place closer to where she was supposed to be. 

Even before waking, she could feel the thick blankets like heavy weights on her body. She knew something was in her dreams, something she was being told to grasp but when she did, she held only air. From beneath her, she pulled out the beautiful novel, which had lulled her to sleep. It was crinkled and bent. On the cover, a black swan glided along a rippled surface. Willows danced in the wind, their branches pricking the water with delicate leaves and a pale young girl sat on the bank wearing a blue dress and twinkling eyes. 

Sitting up in bed, the slender figure wondered what the day would bring. Her apartment was her favourite place in the world. She had her art everywhere and instead of appearing cluttered, it was like another world of dragons and castles and forests and jungles. Her bathroom was the sky and bedroom the ocean. The kitchen had beautiful flowers of vibrant purples and intense reds. She favoured tulips for their elegance and they starred in the bouquets that were her walls. The artist’s studio was the only room with walls as white as an untouched canvas.

Today she was working at a fashion runway; ensuring all the models had the correct dress and makeup. Amelia dived into her wardrobe with painted sea turtles. She managed to pull out a flowery blouse and a black high-waisted skirt. From her dolphin lamp, she pulled a turquoise pendant with a thick twisted black string hanging from a fin. Finally, she removed her red beret covering a model ship and adjusted it on her mahogany hair. On the way out, Amelia looked in the mirror and saw no reflection. Surprisingly her emotion was disappointment rather than fear or disbelief. It made her feel insignificant, as if she, at this moment, did not entirely exist. Something was wrong and at this moment, she was compelled to remember, “This is not normal”.

Her keychain was like a charm bracelet. There was a swan for her favourite novel, a silver tulip hanging by its stem, an Eiffel tower from an insistent vender in Paris and a little wooden pigeon carved by her neighbour Jacques. Pulling out the heavy key chain from her bag, Amelia did not realise his presence until they had collided.
“Jacques!”
She smiled a smile reserved for him and patted down her long wavy hair. Today he wore casual faded jeans and a white shirt. His blonde curly hair was perfect as was his warm smile and chestnut eyes.
“Hey Em, can you come over after work today? I’ve written a new song and I need my best critic to tell me what she thinks,” he asked teasingly.
“Sure.”
“Five thirty?”
“Okay.” 
Amelia turned with a smile and glided down the stairs, Jacque’s eyes following her until they no longer could.



They were all so at ease in their beauty.  She envied the effortless facade even more once she watched the real hectic rush unseen by the audience. The artist sat in a corner, painting the models and their ostentatious clothes. Among the clothes, she noticed flowing skirts, thin belts with gold buckles and colourful summer jackets. They were the clothes she had dreamt a woman to be wearing, a woman who seemed to be her mother.

“Once you do one more check, you can leave, Miss…”
“Amelia.”
She rose, folded her book and began to check the models. They all fluttered around the room, preparing for the show except one who stood conversing with a handsome photographer. Amelia politely interrupted their speech, reminding the model to get ready. The arrogant girl turned, delivered a horrible glare of contempt and strode to the clothes rack.

Amelia sat on a stool, brush in one hand and her art book resting on her knee. Besides her, she had placed a small wooden table for her paints. She watched the models lining up and she painted their jitteriness transform to the ultimate calm as they took their first confident step onto the runway. The same haughty model stumbled, knocking the precious paints into a stand of clothes.
“I am so sorry,” she said, her voice lathered with condescension, already disappearing into the frantic crowds.
The artist regarded the scene in horror, watching the paint trickle onto the floor and stain one dress fallen from its hanger. 

It was a gown of coarse white material. From the neckline to the bust, buttons and beads of emerald decorated the surface. From the bust to hem, blotches of paint now covered the dress. 
“Oh no,” panicked Amelia.
Then she did the only thing she could think to do.

She grabbed the dress off the hanger, rushed to an empty dressing table and began to paint. She painted a forest, a forest within dreams. There were leaves of every dimension. Autumn had begun and they fell like layers of light rain. She could hardly see through the pinks, oranges and browns of the dead leaves but when they ceased drifting to the soil, she saw all. The few remaining clung to enormous tree trunks that stood upright like the legs of giants. She walked along the tree top path and Jacques was behind her.
“Isn’t it beautiful?” he whispered.
Amelia nodded.
“This is where you can come if you’re scared. This is our special place. I will always be here for you.”
The girl turned to reach for him so he could pull her back but she only saw trees.

The dress had become the forest, the white material was now alive with golden sunlight shining through regal trees and their sunset leaves. With a blow dryer she dried the paint and returned the dress to the rack, gathered her things and left.



He gazed at her nervously. 
“Do you like it?”
“I love it,” she replied earnestly, “I love it.”
Amelia no longer wore her stylish clothes. Hanging loosely off her body was a grey sweatshirt and blue jeans. She ruffled her hair and surveyed the room with a mocking smile.
“How can you live in this mess?”
“I know where every thing is,” he stated seriously.
She believed him.
“You really like the song?”
Jacques had written a new song. A soft melody with texture and tone. It was not his usual mainstream sound, it was something else, something with depth and she truly loved it. The lyrics were the land for the ocean tune and Amelia liked to think of him as her little poet.

The pair lay together on his mattress, gazing at a blank ceiling. They ate the bite size chocolate muffins she had brought. Outside the sky had become the shadow of the day. Jacques was staring at the specks of flickering light.
“You like looking at the stars don’t you?”
“They are my mystery.”
Her lip curled as an idea approached.
“What is it?” Jacques demanded.
“I want to paint the sky on your ceiling.”
“It would mean the world to me.”

Before she left Jacques gave her a wooden statue he had carved for her.
“A seashell for your ocean,” he revealed.
“Thank you, it’s beautiful.”
Amelia hugged him goodbye and entered her apartment, cradling a shell twelve inches tall in her arms.



A man with curly blonde hair and deep brown eyes held the shell he had carved for her. He placed it on the only table in the room and put the orange tulips in a simple vase.
“They are saying you won’t wake up Em. They are saying that even if you wake up you won’t remember who you are, that you would have brain damage.”
Tears formed in his eyes.
“I wish it was me, not you, not you. Oh Em, the driver was so drunk. He is in jail now but he is still stealing you from me. You cannot leave; I do not know what I would do without you. You mean the world to me.” 

He moved to sit on a chair besides her bed, an album resting on his knees. He opened the book delicately to reveal a collection of memories.

A little black haired boy, a brother, held a baby tight in his small arms.
An infant held by a kind woman wearing a red flowing skirt.
In another photo, a different woman was kneeling by a toddler and watching her rip sea turtle wrapping paper from a dolphin lamp.
Amelia wore a little blue dress with yellow ducks as she swung on a swing, smiling happily in a garden.
She sat in a sandpit with the black haired boy, surrounded by little blue flowers that bowed to the ground.
In the photos, the girl grew older. 
She went to school and came home with damp cheeks.
She came home from art class and begged to return.
The girl played netball and rode to the beach every summer day.
She walked in the treetops with her mother and brother in the forest painted on a dress.
Amelia went to high school and met a boy called Jacques.
They both went to the same university and moved in together.
They smiled at a café and danced at a party.
Amelia visited her mother and took a photo of this ageing woman leafing through her library.

There was a photo of the beautiful girl staring at herself in the mirror, her reflection staring back.

Jacques showed the sleeping beauty her life yet she did not wake to greet it. 
Her mind was trying to stretch for this dream but it escaped and dissolved within her mind. 

Lost.

“Jacques,” she mumbled, waking to an apartment with painted walls.