Sharpshooter

Sharpshooter
         It’s my wife’s birthday, but I didn’t get her anything this year. It’s not that I forgot. Martha doesn’t want me to get her anything. She knits. She’s a knitter. But I don’t know anything about knitting, so she’ll just get herself what she needs for knitting. It just isn’t practical for me to get her something. I’m making her breakfast in bed. I mean, sometimes it’s a little hard to eat breakfast in bed, so I’m going to tell her that I made her breakfast and then she can get out of bed and have it. I mean, she could eat it in bed, but then we might get crumbs on the bed and then we’d have to clean it.
I’m making eggs for breakfast, scrambled eggs. I’m not that precise; sometimes my wife jokes to me that I’m not that precise. It’s just a joke though, but it’s kind of true too. But she doesn’t mean it to point out my flaws, it’s just this little thing we do. Joke, that is. I hear her coming down the stairs.
         “What’s all this, Gary?” she says, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.
         “It’s breakfast out of bed,” I reply.
         “Breakfast out of bed?”
         “It’s because I was going to make you breakfast in bed, but then we might get crumbs everywhere, so it’s breakfast out of bed.”
         A broad smile creeps onto my wife’s face. She likes my joke. Martha loves to think things through. I try to make jokes like that sometimes, jokes that have some truth in them. She pulls up a chair and relaxes. I turn off the burner and fix us plates of the scrambled eggs and hickory smoked bacon.
         “Happy birthday,” I say.
         “Thank you, Gary,” she says.
         She takes a strip of bacon and snaps it in half with her teeth. I smile inwardly and out. She’s enjoying her birthday.
         “Have you gotten your knitting supplies?” I ask.
         She pauses briefly. I forget the jargon sometimes, but she should know what I mean. Does that pause mean I should have gotten her something? I look at the bacon with less confidence than before. Maybe it’s not crispy enough. I could throw it back on.
         “Some,” she says.
         “That’s good, but if that bacon isn’t crispy we could throw it back on.”
         “No, it’s fine.”
         “It only takes a moment; the skillet’s still hot.”
         “No, thank you.”
         I wish I were more precise. That way the eggs could be sunny side up.

         I’m an artist. I’ve been an artist since I was born, but it was more recent than that that I really came into it. I finger-painted in kindergarten. I brought home pictures I painted on 8.5 by 11 sheets of paper to put on the refrigerator. My mother boasted about me to her friends too. “My Gary’s going to grow up to be an artist,” she would say. They were miscolored animals a lot of the time, like turquoise lions or crimson dinosaurs. I didn’t think they were good, but she would smile and assure me I would be a great artist, just like her father had been back in the old country.
         I’m a professional artist today. I’m not famous, but I’ve sold art to collectors and coffee-shops. It’s not much money. I’m not ungrateful, though. A lot of people want to be artists but aren’t. I’m very lucky to be an artist.
         I’m painting a sunrise, but it’s not a sunrise. It’s abstract. It’s different than a real sunrise is. My proportions aren’t accurate enough for a realistic sunrise. I like to make them abstract though, that’s what I do, so it’s not that I want to make them accurate even if I could. My colors are better now than in elementary school. My grass is green, and a much better green than that garish jungle green I used to use. I’m brushing orange and red on my canvas as delicately as I can. I can’t stand making a mistake. I can’t fix them. I just have to start over. I hate to buy more canvas.
         The doorknob turns. My wife is checking on her. I smile to greet her.
         “How’s the painting going, Gary?” she asks me.
         “It’s good. I have to be careful though, more careful than I have been, even though I was already being careful. It’s easy to ruin good canvas like this.”
         “You’re brilliant, Gary, you’ll do great.”
         My wife’s flattery is earnest and honest. I try to compliment her back.
         “You’re a great knitter, Martha,” I say. She nods her head, the only indication that she heard my comment. It was an awkward thing for me to say, I think.
         “Is there something else, honey?”
         Martha shifts her weight from foot to foot.
         “Gary, Dennis passed away.”

         Dennis and I were close friends. We first met in kindergarten. I always admired Dennis; he could color inside the lines. We would always joke about how he could have been our teacher. I mean, not literally always, it was only a couple times, but sometimes it seemed like always. In reality, he was too young to be our teacher.
         His skin is pale now. Dennis was a well tanned man when he was alive. They’ve dressed his corpse up in a suit. The display is very pleasant to look at. The coffin is a rich mahogany, and his sleek black suit looks stunning against it. The colors remind me of a painting I’m working on. It’s abstract, but some people like abstract. I like these colors, but his tie is this awful jungle green. Dennis always used dark forest green. He never had any white spots and used forest green for grass and goldenrod for the sun. It doesn’t make any sense why they would put such an awful green tie on Dennis. It looks new, in fact I think I saw that neon green at Kohl’s just a day or so ago. I don’t think that tie was one of his personal possessions. Maybe his wife…
         “Are you ok, Gary?” My wife asks.
         “Oh, yeah, of course,” I reply. I think it was only two or three dollars.
         “It’s ok, it’s all ok,” she says, rubbing my shoulder.
         “I’m fine,” I tell her again. They didn’t seem to spare any expense on the rest of the funeral though.
         “You can cry, it’s ok Gary,” she says.
         But if something got spilled on it before the funeral then maybe they had to replace it on short notice.
         “Gary?” My wife says again.
         “Goddamn it. I’m trying to concentrate.”
         “Concentrate on what?”
         “Concentrate on Dennis,” I say. And especially concentrate on Dennis’s tie. It looks like one of my paintings, but it’s out of place. So I have to find out why the tie is there. I can’t cry because of the tie, because this is a very, very stupid tie. Not that Dennis would care, because Dennis didn’t really appreciate art, or much of anything at all. Not that my wife will care, because knitting is not art; knitting is a hobby. Da Vinci didn’t knit, just like he didn’t build model ships or collect baseball cards.
         I meander around the viewing. I see Theresa, Dennis’s sister. Theresa is precise, just like Dennis was. She’s looks elegant crying.
         “Garret, it’s so good to see you,” she says.
         “It’s a pleasure, Theresa.”
         “Denny always admired you Garret, he really did. He always wished he could have been an artist like you.”
         Theresa’s oh-so perfectly heartbreaking sobs decorate her grieving.
         “Dennis was quite the artist himself; he always appreciated the artistic, whether it was in paintings or in fashion.”
         “It means so much to hear you say that, Garret.”
         “He was color coordinated too.”
         Theresa smiles at me. She nods her head just like Martha does sometimes. We’re silent now.
         “I’m going to go find my husband; it was great seeing you Garret.” Theresa says.

         I’m driving me and Martha home from the wake. Her hand is lying atop mine. Dennis was a talented and likeable man. He was a great artist; he could have painted landscapes if he wanted to. I don’t want to, but I couldn’t paint them if I did. Dennis reminded me of Monet, but Monet would never wear a tie like that.
         I glance over at Martha. She’s looking at me as if she expects something from me. What does she expect? I’m driving. Should I cry? It isn’t like we were at Monet’s viewing; that much is clear. I’m not sure that my own viewing will be much more important.
         We pull up into the driveway. I open the door to the garage, my workroom. My wife follows me in. The sunset I’m working on is made of overlapping squares of orange and red. Monet did not need to paint in squares. Even Dennis and his hideous jungle green tie didn’t paint in fucking squares. Dennis could have at least tried to be Monet.
         I hate this painting. I grab an open gallon of paint and throw it, splattering the wall. I grab another. And another. It’s getting on my canvas. I throw another.
“Gary, stop that, why are you doing that, what’s wrong?”
         My wife’s eyes are wide and innocent. I hate knitters. I’m breathing heavily, and violet drips down my forearms. I’m screaming.
         “This painting is not art,” I say. “This is a waste of canvas.”
         “Gary you can get a new one,” she says. “Just please stop; you’re scaring me.”
         “Martha, this is all a waste of canvas,” I begin, gesturing to the room we are standing in. “This is all one waste of fucking canvas.”
         “I’m sorry Gary, but I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
         My thoughts can’t keep pace with my body. I’m ripping the paintings to pieces; smaller bits of garbage. Martha is crying. She’s crying because she thinks I’ve worked too hard to destroy it. I wish I could explain to her that there’s no reason to worry. These pieces were nothing but bad imitations. My hands are soaked with this purple dye, my dear. When I have the canvas, I will finger-paint you a masterpiece. I will finger-paint you an elephant.