The Top Floor by John Gladstone

On the top floor, in a small apartment, in front of a rainy window he painted. Pitter patter, went the rain beating against the window; swish swish, went the brush against the blobs of paint; scratch scratch, went the bristles on the paper. Pitter patter, swish swish, scratch scratch, pitter patter pitter patter. Flashes of neon lights exploded amid the concrete buildings and the dull gray sky. So it was outside the window, and so it was on the artist’s canvas.

He painted building by building, window by window, room by room, one by one: a small sparsely decorated apartment with dirty dishes piled high in the sink, an elderly couple enjoying brunch on their veranda, an empty apartment with a dog sleeping by the front door, a dark room filled with dimly lit candles. There was, on the wall, something resembling an taxidermied animal, though the painter could not be sure what creature it was. It was mostly without fur, had a long snout, large bulging inky black eyes, and one broken horn protruding from its left temple. Its muscles twitched in horrid spasms as though recently deceased. The painter painted: swish swish, scratch scratch, pitter patter pitter patter, twitch twitch.

A bedraggled looking man opened the door carrying a small plastic bag, he walked towards the creature, gently rubbed the side of its face, and continued on to what looked like a small kitchen dining area, though the dim light of the room made it quite hard to see. He sat in a small chair, there was only one, at a small one-person table. He hunched over the table reached in the bag, and greedily shoveled some sort of food in his mouth. His black hair hung over his face. Drip drip went globs of food from behind the hair onto the floor and table. The painter painted; swish swish, scratch scratch, pitter patter pitter patter, twitch twitch, drip drip.

The man stopped eating, stood up, and took the bag still heavy with food over to the creature, and raised the bag around its snout. The creature ate, ravenously twisting about in the bag, its tongue writhing against the sides. The man dropped his arms to his sides, leaving the bag to fall gently to the ground. Something slimy, dripped from the creature’s mouth, to the painter it looked like blood, but somehow darker, thicker, and with large dense bubbles running down it. The man stopped moving. The creature panted heavily. The man didn’t move, apparently paying no mind to the creature on the wall. Swish swish, scratch scratch, pitter patter pitter patter, twitch twitch, drip drip, pant pant. Still, no movement—he just stood there, motionless as a deer on the highway.

Suddenly, he spun about and faced the window. Then the creature, and the elderly couple, and the dog. Window by window, room by room, and one by one: they were watching, staring, at a small apartment on the top floor where a man had just stopped painting.