Spiraled

Ellie and Will stand in silence, taking in the row of canvassed paintings hung neatly on the small studio wall. Countering the alignment, an art desk is stationed solitarily on the other side of the room, full to the brim of supplies. Pieces of unfinished art are scattered all over the surrounding area. Poster tubes and paint-ridden boards are stacked in a messy pile.

‘I never really understood it,' says Ellie regretfully. 'I wish I paid more interest though, I know how much dad enjoyed it.’

‘He didn’t exactly let us, Ellie. He never opened up, especially at the end,’ replies Will. ‘Don’t feel guilty.’

Ellie takes a deep breath. She tries her best to study the painting directly in front of her, but she becomes overwhelmed. The mismatched colours, the conflicting patterns, it doesn’t make sense.

Will checks his phone, followed by a panicked gasp. ‘Crap, can I leave you? I was meant to pick Jonny up five minutes ago.’

‘Yeah, of course,’ she says. ‘Do you want to pick anything out before I call the removal guys?’

‘No, it’s all junk, just get rid of it.’

Ellie watches him leave, rolling her eyes at his ignorance. Given a moment to breathe by herself, she walks around the open space. She runs her fingers along the hypnotising white walls, jumping in between the artwork. Making her way to the edge of the room, the painting station blocks her path. She looks down, tittering at the scrambled mess. She picks up a piece of paper sitting atop the mound. It’s a pencil sketch, seemingly meaningless. A spiral, circled within itself, looping round and round. She sighs, sending it to the bottom of the pile, inspecting the next. Another spiral. 'Strange,' she thinks. Next. Another spiral. She skims through them all to find nothing but the same shape and direction as the rest. She drops them back onto the desk. ‘I must be tired,’ she thinks.

She takes a step back and glances over to the walled canvasses again. Unbeknownst to her before, the first thing she notices is a circle on the far left painting. She laughs to herself, but to clear her paranoia, she creeps closer. Each step reveals another break in the line, bending round, forming another spiral. She rubs her eyes to make sure she isn’t hallucinating. She learns to find that she is not, as when she checks several other sections of the art, there is nothing but coiled paint. She steps back. Each piece is simply the same, looped and weaved to form an abstract design. Although unfamiliar with any form of art, something doesn’t sit right with her. She’s seen these paintings a hundred times before, but never noticed the one detail that brings it all together.

After a deep breath, she takes out her phone. ‘Whatever,’ she thinks, dialling the removal service's number. As it rings, she glances at the wall again. All of a sudden, she hangs up the phone, shoving it back into her pocket. Running over to the desk, she scurries through the heap of paper, unsure of what exactly she’s searching for. She clears it all and opens the desk to find dozens of half-used paint bottles. She inspects a few before deeming them worthless. Moments away from giving up, something catches her eye beneath the paint. A little black book with a large white spiral on the cover, filling up the entire space. Concerned, she picks it up, scanning through each page. Once more, there’s nothing but spirals. She sighs frustratedly, ready to give up again. Then, on the very last page, there’s a message. Her eyes widen, shocked by the change. The writing is so small that she has to hold the book up to her face.

Don’t trust them. Take the money and leave. They won’t find you.

Ellie’s breath shortens as she struggles to comprehend the text. She reads it again, but it still doesn’t make sense. She zones in on the middle sentence. ‘Money?’ she thinks. ‘What money?’

Finding her breath again, she places the book down, taking a step back. Despite having rummaged through the sheets of paper, and searched through the desk drawer, she can’t knock the feeling that there's something she’s missed. Her eyes dart to the post tubes and the incomplete wooden boards, stained with dry paint. She hurries over, scanning through them. Throwing each piece of birch to one side, she finds no luck with the boards. She then launches over to the tubes, emptying them one by one. Making her way through the first five, nothing but unstretched canvasses fly out, sprawling across the floor. Then, as she heedlessly rips the top off the final tube, tipping it upside down, a bunch of stacked notes spills everywhere.

Silence. Ellie stares in awe, her vision softens. Her arms become weak, dropping the tube by her side. The sound of its cardboard echoes against the wooden floor. Moments later, her eyes regain focus, revealing the sheer amount of cash before her. She drops to her knees and begins to frantically collect it. Each stack appears to hold twenty one-hundred-dollar bills. She points to each pile, fingers shaking, counting in her head while flicking through each note. ‘Ten stacks, with twenty hundreds, that’s- that’s twenty-thousand.’ She can’t believe it. She counts again.

Ten minutes later, after checking the total sum eight more times, she realises that she’s not hallucinating, and the money she’s holding is in fact real. Needing an explanation, she pulls out her phone, dialling her mother’s number.

‘Hello?’ says Dianne.

‘Mum? It’s Ellie.’

‘Oh hello dear, is everything all right?’

‘No- No, I’m at dad’s studio.’

‘Have you managed to clear it all out?’

Ellie skips over her question, unable to delay the reason she's called any longer. Her eyes switch between the money and the canvasses on the wall. ‘Mum, what are these spirals? The spirals, on dad’s art, I’ve never seen them before?’

Dianne takes a moment to reply. ‘I’m not sure what you mean, dear?’

‘Every single piece, it’s the same thing. It must mean something, no?’ asks Ellie.

Again, Dianne is suspiciously slow to answer. ‘I- I’m not sure, dear. This must be hard for you, I shouldn’t have asked you to do this, I’ll call the removal company myself.’

Ellie pauses, upset at her mother’s lack of acknowledgement. She then looks back to the money, spread across the floor. ‘Mum, there’s twenty thousand dollars here. Twenty thousand, stashed in a tube. What aren’t you telling me?’

Dianne gasps. Her breath fastens down the line. ‘Oh my,’ she mutters. ‘It’s there?’

‘You know, don’t you? You know about the money?’ replies Ellie, desperate for an answer.

After a long, solemn wait, Dianne builds up her courage. ‘Darling, two years ago, your father withdrew twenty thousand dollars from our account. He wouldn't tell me why. Whenever I’d confront him about it, he’d shut down and head straight to his studio. So with regards to why, I’m afraid I don’t know, but I’m glad you’ve found it.’

‘What about the shapes? The spirals? It has to mean something, surely? I- I found a book, filled with them. It had a message in, scrambled, as if he was scared?’ says Ellie, dissatisfied.

‘Darling, your father had dementia.’

Ellie halts, unable to process her mother’s words. ‘What?’ she asks puzzledly.

‘I’m so sorry I never told you. I wanted to spare you the pain. The shapes, the money, the paranoia, I’m afraid it’s nothing more than the madness of a man on his last breath,’ replies Dianne, fearful, regretting her secrecy.

'But, he seemed fine?'

'Dear, you and your brother would only visit on the holidays. You saw a glimpse of what was left of him.'

Ellie begins to quietly weep with resent. Not only at her mother for keeping it from her, but at herself for not seeing them as much as she should have. 'I would have come! I would have been there! I- I didn't know. You should have told me.'

'Ellie, you have to understand-'

Ellie hangs up the phone, cutting off her mother, dropping it to the floor. She stumbles over to the middle canvas, supporting herself on the wall. She runs her finger down the side, following the edge of the paint. Tears begin to cloud her vision, dripping down her cheeks, one by one. ‘I’m so sorry, dad. I wish I knew.’

Written by Ben Saunders