Ceramic Sin

The dim light flickers. The sculptor uses the back of his hand to rub away the sweat coating his brow. Lumps of clay line a shelf in the far corner of the room. Somewhere a clock ticks, a dog barks, a child cries. The sculptor sighs, working the malleable clay with his calloused thumbs. He slumps back in his chair. Glaring at a chip in the floorboard, he chews at his lip. Counting the stains in the ceiling, he bites his fist. Inevitably, his eyes wander back to the work before him. The nose sticks out too far, the eyes are too close together, and the freckle under the lip is off center.

* * *

A woman lies in a field. Faded greens and yellows adorn the sloping hills. Two wisping clouds linger in the background of a soft, baby blue sky. She breathes in, the smell of the freshly-picked flowers in her hair fading in and out. The slender blades of grass part for her body. Later, when her limp corpse is dragged away, the grass will keep the imprint of her figure. She turns her head at a shift in the wind,so subtle she barely notices it. The hair on the back of her neck rises, slightly. She blinks. A cricket hops by. Her name is whispered into the field.

She sits up, partially disoriented as the blood rushes back down. She cocks her head, listening for a voice, a sound, a presence. The wind passes through the grass again, only this time she does not inhale. In fact, no air enters through her nose as she is pressed against the dirt. No oxygen passes through the trachea, entering the bronchus, heading to the bronchioli. No gas exchange occurs in the capillaries, and certainly no scream is heard as she is suffocated in the lush field.

When she faces the sky again, her eyes are empty, the flowers in her hair have withered, and the freckle under her lip has paled.

* * *

The sculptor throws the disfigured lump of clay on the floor. He starts again, trying to recreate the feel of her flesh under his fingers. He takes a sip of water, ignoring the dust that has collected on the surface, ignoring the twinge in his stomach. Again, he rubs at his face, irritating the bags under his eyes and smearing his cheek with clay.

Metal scraper in hand, he carves a jawline, an eyebrow, focusing on the small details. He grunts when the tool slips out of his grasp, the picture in his mind not quite reflected in the clay before him. He shoves his palm into the nose, sinking until his hand meets the surface of the table. He watches as its features shift and warp at the action. Sinuses crushing into nasal cavity, eyes seeping up frontalis muscle, chin descending into thyroid. He curses at the mound staring back at him. Curses his inability to recreate the light in her eye. Curses at that damn freckle.

He slams his forehead against the wall.

The pounding in his temples, the ringing in his ears, the stinging in his forehead—all of it subsides when he looks at the sculptures of her lining the wall. Two, ten, twenty faces peering down at him. Each a bit different than the last, none a perfect reflection of her. The faces distort, twisting and sneering as he tries to pull himself up. Eyes bulging, lips quivering, brows creasing. Just as hers did that spring afternoon when the pain hit and those black spots clouded her vision. Their mouths move but nothing comes out.

The sculptor heaves.

He lunges at the disfigurations, knocking over casts, colliding into shelves, hurling his tools. He grabs the nearest fettling knife and stabs into an eye, a nose, an ear. Anything to get the mangled version of her out of his head.

When he finally slumps over, his chest rising and falling, there is only one face left. Crouched in the corner of the room, he feels his cheek begin to mold into the wall, soft and supple. His fingertips leave prints in his forehead. When he closes his eyes, all he can see is her face. He claws at his eyelids, digging his fingers into the clay, allowing the bits to cling under his nails. Ripping into his cheekbones, molding and reshaping and mauling the worthless, guilty, violent lump that he is.

When the room goes silent, a moment before the candle snuffs out, all that remains of his melted face is a speck under the lip. Almost like a freckle.