They’d had a rocky relationship, Samantha and Colin. But it wasn’t always like that.
He’d been so charming when they met. That rainy afternoon when she’d lifted her gaze from her phone, stepped forward and literally bumped into him in line, at the front counter of that cute little café next to the modern art gallery. Little could she have guessed the charming, handsome stranger had a rollercoaster of moods, that he must have been bipolar or borderline. Maybe both...
When she met him, though, he was so cute and fun. He was a joker, a clown, a lovable goofball. Witty and full of laughs.
Cancel Culture | Kim Cancer A professional artist by trade, he was a protean painter, spending most of his time in his home studio, painting these immaculate murals of mountains, the sea.
Oh, and he’d paint her too. As an angel. He’d summon a numinous force, a touch of God in his brush. Seriously. It was almost as if, at least to her, he was better than Di Vinci.
He’d be so enraptured in his art. The way he’d stand, wide-eyed at his easel, mesmerized, moving his whole body in concert with his brush, producing such jaw-dropping, lifelike portraits of her - usually portraits of her in the nude-renderings of her as a Greek goddess with fluttering, silky white wings and wavy black hair bouncing over her shoulders. Her feminine curves and contours, her creamy skin, the hourglass shape of her body portrayed to a heavenly perfection; in a way she’d never imagined possible.
Sweeping the brush, with rhythmic grace, he seemingly had a power as strong as the ocean. She’d blush red, posing and turning for him, smiling coyly, herself feeling as if she really was an angel, if only for that moment... Her heart melting, knees weakening when he’d whisper, repeatedly, from behind the easel, just how
“exquisite, beautiful she is…”
If he wasn’t painting, he’d be adorably eccentric, a lovable madman, dancing in his bedroom, playing air guitar, cranking classic rock (often AC/DC). Or he’d be shuffling feverishly about the house, a million miles an hour, cooking piles of pancakes, quoting Hemingway, and writing lists on his phone, planning daring trips to every part of the globe. Planning to try extreme sports, wild activities.
African safaris, skydiving, lion taming, scuba-diving, parasailing, paragliding, bungee jumping. He’d even mentioned wanting to wrestle alligators! It was as if there was nothing he wouldn’t try…
But then there was his other extreme, which, horrifically, she’d soon discover. His crash. His plummet. When he’d be down. And when he was down, it was rock bottom. He’d be irritable. Aloof. Hiding in bed, under a bubble of covers, catatonic, talking to no one, doing nothing. Going for days not touching his phone or even leaving the house. Pissing in empty Gatorade bottles he’d keep next to his bed.
And that was the best she could hope for when he was down. Often, he’d be worse. Like when he’d start fights, arguments over nothing.
He’d get so angry. One minute he’d be fine, everything going swimmingly. And then, POW! He’d explode. Like a bomb. Over nothing she’d done intentionally. It could be just how she crossed her legs in a restaurant. The tone of a text message.
The choice of a song or brand of milk.
Really, any perceived slight he might regard as a mortal wound. Anything could make him flip out and start explosive arguments that she always feared would become physical. But they never did. He’d never lay a hand on her, never resort to violence.
Still, though, in her mind, the possibility existed that he could. It was the serial killer look that’d flicker in his sharp blue eyes. The way he’d scream at the top of his lungs, the guttural sound of his straining voice, his curly red fascist haircut flopping and moving like flames atop his skull as his lanky body jolted with rage.
Following a friendly joke she’d cracked about him liking Ed Sheeran, he’d blown his lid, jumped up from the couch and threw a glass at the wall, shattering it.
Aghast, her expression twisted to one of fixed terror. And she sat curling to the corner of the couch, fearing that next time it’d be her thrown at the wall, her
Cancel Culture | Kim Cancer spine splintering and cracking into pieces like the poor Picasso painting glass he’d just jumped up and flung with the fucking power of a baseball pitcher.
(The whole incident, too, really made her hate that “Shape of You” song even more, and in a whole new way…)