The Painted Gate

When I was six, I lived with my grandmother in a house that leaned against the edge of a forest. Our nearest neighbor was a mile down a dirt road, and beyond that, nothing but trees and the slow, dark river. I remember the autumn I turned six, the season when the leaves turned the color of dried blood and the air smelled of wood smoke and decay.

One afternoon, I was in the back garden, collecting smooth stones for a game I’d invented, when I heard a man’s voice call out, ‘Elias!’ That was my grandfather’s name. He had died the previous winter, and I’d never heard anyone speak his name in that house since. I froze, my hand hovering over a pebble. The voice came again, closer, a low and rough sound, like gravel scraping against glass. ‘Elias, come see what I’ve brought you.’

I stood up slowly, my heart thudding against my ribs. The garden was enclosed by a tall, rusted fence, and through the slats I could see a figure standing on the other side. He was an old man, but not like any I’d ever seen. He wore a long coat that hung to his knees, stained with dark patches, and his face was hidden by the brim of a felt hat pulled low. He held something in his hand—a small, wrapped bundle, like a gift. I didn’t know him, and I was too shy to speak, but something about the way he stood, patient and still, made me feel that he meant me no harm.

I remember the feeling that I should tell my grandmother, but my feet wouldn’t move. Instead, I took a step closer to the gate. The old man lifted his head, and I saw his eyes—pale, almost colorless, like the sky before a storm. He smiled, but it wasn’t a warm smile. It was the kind of smile you give when you know a secret you’re not supposed to tell. ‘You’re a good girl, aren’t you?’ he said. ‘Tell me, do you like to paint?’

I nodded, because I did. I had a set of watercolors my mother had sent me for my birthday, and I spent hours painting the river and the trees. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘Because I have something for you. A gift. But you must promise not to open it until your grandmother is asleep.’ He pushed the bundle through the gate, and it landed at my feet with a soft thump. It was wrapped in brown paper, tied with a black ribbon. I bent to pick it up, and when I straightened, the man was gone. The gate swung slightly, as if it had just been closed.

I hid the bundle in my closet, under a pile of old blankets. That night, after my grandmother had kissed my forehead and turned off the light, I waited until I heard her snoring from the other room. Then I crept to the closet, my heart racing. The paper felt rough and cold. I untied the ribbon, and the paper fell away to reveal a small wooden box, painted black. On the lid was a strange symbol—a circle with a line through it, like a noose. I opened it, and inside lay a single paintbrush, its handle carved from bone, its bristles dark and stiff. Tucked beside it was a note, the handwriting shaky: ‘Paint what you saw, and it will come true.’

I didn’t understand, but I was a child, and I was curious. The next day, I set up my watercolors and tried to paint the old man. But the brush felt different in my hand—it seemed to move on its own, guiding me to paint something else. It painted my grandmother, standing in the kitchen, but in the picture her face was twisted, her eyes empty, and there was a dark hole in her chest. I was horrified. I tried to throw the brush away, but it kept coming back to me, as if it were alive.

That evening, my grandmother complained of a sharp pain in her side. By midnight, she was dead. The doctor said it was a heart attack, but I knew better. I had painted her death, and it had come true.

Terrified, I tried to destroy the brush. I burned it in the fireplace, but the next morning it was back on my dresser, unmarked. I buried it in the garden, but it returned. I finally wrapped it in cloth and hid it in the attic, but every night I would find it lying on my pillow, waiting.

As the weeks passed, the brush grew more insistent. I would wake up in the middle of the night, my hand stained with paint, and find that I had painted scenes I didn’t remember. One scene showed a neighbor’s dog lying dead. The next day, it happened. Another showed my schoolteacher falling down the stairs. She broke her leg.

I began to realize that the brush was not a toy—it was a curse. It wanted me to paint, and each painting demanded a payment. The old man, I knew now, was not a stranger. He was a reaper, a collector of souls, and he had chosen me to do his bidding.

On the anniversary of my grandmother’s death, the old man returned. He stood at the gate, watching me with those colorless eyes. ‘You’ve been busy,’ he said. ‘But you haven’t painted the most important one yet.’ I asked what he meant, and he pointed a long, crooked finger at the window of my room. ‘Paint yourself,’ he said. ‘Then it will all be over.’

I refused. I screamed and ran into the house, but the brush appeared in my hand, and my arm began to move on its own. I painted myself, standing in the garden, but in the painting, I was lying on the ground, my face pale, my eyes closed. When I finished, I felt a cold hand on my shoulder. The old man was behind me, his breath like dead leaves. ‘Now you understand,’ he whispered. ‘The gift is the curse. And the curse is the gift.’

I painted myself dead, and I died that night. But the brush did not disappear. It stayed in that house, waiting for the next child who liked to paint, who would hear a voice calling through the garden gate, and who would be too curious to refuse.