The Man With the Painted Smile

“I like it,” Ben said, the estate agent nodding vigorously as they looked at it. Kate didn’t answer. Something about it made her stomach clench. Instead, she just nodded stiffly.

Six months later, and Kate still didn’t like it. The house was theirs now, finally. Unfortunately, that meant this was too. She wasn’t sure how long she had been standing there, transfixed. The chaotic noises of Sophie being chased by her father had become background noises to her. Only when Sophie knocked past her did Kate become aware of her surroundings again.

“Happy man,” Sophie said, coming to a halt in front of the painting. She pointed to it, still trying to get her breath back. Kate’s eyes finally left the painted ones as they darted down to her daughter. A tight smile tugged at her face as she looked at Sophie’s beaming face.

“Come on, Kate,” Ben said, sidling into the room and wrapping an arm around his wife’s shoulder. “You’ve got to admit; a hand-painted mural is a pretty cool thing for Sophie’s room and look how much she loves it.”

It was true, Sophie seemed enamoured with it. But there was something that didn’t sit right with Kate. The entire wall had been painted to depict a colourful circus tent, complete with dangling lightbulbs, though none were lit. They hung above a pathway that had been drawn to look as though it led directly from the entrance into the bedroom. But none of that was what bothered Kate. What bothered her was the figure that had been painted into the scene.

Standing in the pathway was a clown, dressed in a comically overlarge and colourful costume, complete with giant red shoes and gloves. Its face was white with an impossibly large, painted smile. Its eyes were framed by two brilliantly blue diamonds, and there was a blue bowler hat in the middle of its bushy red wig.

Kate had never been scared of clowns, but this one was different. The eyes showed no emotion, yet seemed to follow Kate wherever she went. Ben had told her that it was just a clever trick by the artist, but it didn’t feel like it.

“You’re right,” she sighed, turning away from the waving clown before heading off to explore the rest of the house.

That night, Kate woke to a crackle from the baby monitor. She turned to look at the screen and screamed. Sophie was standing, gazing at the clown, whose hand no longer waved, but now looked like it was resting on the bar of Sophie’s cot.

***

“You were tired,” Ben said, yawning. “It’s as simple as that.”

“I know what I saw,” Kate snapped, holding Sophie close to her and giving the clown a quick glance. Its hand had returned to its waving position. “That thing moved and Sophie was talking to it.”

“Come on, what’s more likely? A painting moving or your sleep-deprived brain seeing things?”

Kate didn’t answer. Instead, she lay on the floor in Sophie’s room for the rest of the night, clutching her daughter’s hand tight until she fell into oblivion.

The following morning, Kate waved Ben off as he left to take Sophie to nursery before going to work.

His car had barely left their street by the time she had moved Sophie’s cot and put down towels on the carpet.

There was a manic energy in Kate as the paint hit the wall. She had expected to feel some kind of satisfaction as she rolled the ivory paint over that evil smile, but it did not come. Her jaw was set as the red mouth became covered, but she recoiled as she looked into its eyes. Without its smile, the clown looked angry. No, not angry. Angry wasn’t strong enough. It was more like a cold fury. Kate paused, her stomach turning, before rolling over them as well.

“You’ve painted,” Ben said simply when he returned.

“Sorry,” Kate replied. “Are you annoyed?”

“No,” he replied, though the weary sigh gave him away. “Whatever makes you feel better.”

“Funny man?” Sophie asked, walking into the room and stopping at the sight of her now blank wall.

“How do you know he’s funny?” Kate asked her. “You said he was happy last time, not funny.”

“She’s a toddler, Kate,” replied Ben, as though that answered the question.

“He said I can see the lights,” Sophie said in an excited whisper.

“What lights?” Kate replied, looking at the unlit bulbs that had been painted above the path.

“She’s a toddler,” Ben repeated. “She has a pretty wild imagination.”

***

Sleep came quickly that night. Kate hadn’t realised how tired she was in her painting frenzy, but she fell into its arms with ease when she went to bed.

It wasn’t the baby monitor this time that woke her. It was a faint scraping sound.

Kate jumped out of bed and burst into Sophie’s room, the door ricocheting off the wall and closing again as she did. Sophie was awake again. She gazed up at the clown once more as Kate’s eyes fell to the strips of ivory paint that lay on the floor. But that wasn’t what made her scream. It was the sight of the clown who now had one gloved hand on its nose, fingers splayed and tongue poking out, clearly mocking her, its eyes filled with rage.

“What is it?” Ben asked, sprinting into the room at the sound.

“Look!” Kate shouted, looking at her husband and pointing to the clown. “I told you!”

“Oh,” he replied, his tone dripping with sympathy. “You probably just didn’t prep it right.”

“What?” Kate snapped, turning back to the wall. The clown was waving once more.

“God knows how old it is, maybe you should have primed it first or something?”

“But…” Kate’s voice trailed off. “It moved, Ben, I swear it wasn’t waving a second ago.”

There was a little too much understanding in the look Ben gave his wife for Kate’s liking.

“You think I’m lying?” she asked.

“I think,” he said slowly, apparently picking his words with enormous care. “That you need some sleep.”

***

Over the following days, Kate tried everything she could think of to cover the painting. She moved Sophie’s room around so that the cot was against the opposite wall and the wardrobe covered the clown.

The whole family had been sitting downstairs when they heard the bang.

Rushing upstairs, they saw the wardrobe lying on the floor, having apparently fallen over.

“We’re moving the cot back,” Ben had said in an agitated tone. “That could have killed Soph. The floors must not be completely level.”

Kate then tried to hang a picture of the family over the clown’s face. The following morning, she went in to greet Sophie and looked at it. Had Sophie always been looking out of frame? A few hours later, she walked into the room to collect laundry and found the picture on the floor. A crack ran through the glass, apparently separating Sophie from her parents.

Kate was relieved when she draped curtains across it and they stayed up. She enjoyed three nights of peaceful sleep, uninterrupted by any noises from Sophie’s room. It was only as she entered Sophie’s room following that third night that she noticed something. The curtains still covered the painting, but she was sure that they had been drawn the opposite way to how they now hung. The following morning, it didn’t matter. They lay scrunched on the floor.

Throughout these attempts to cover the clown, Ben had been sympathetic, although it was clear that he was gradually becoming more concerned. But it was when Kate taped bin bags across it that he finally snapped. They had both been woken by the sounds of Sophie laughing. Kate had gone to investigate and had screamed again. Five fingers protruded from behind the bags, warping them tightly around a hand that Kate could tell, even in the dark, was gloved. She had turned to call for Ben to hurry, before turning back and seeing the bags lying limply in the cot. The clown waved at her once more.

Ben rushed in seconds later and let out an exasperated sound.

“You need to get a grip,” he said, reaching into Sophie’s cot and lifting her up. Kate saw his eyes glance to the clown before he turned to her. “You’re scaring her.”

“It’s not me,” Kate began before Ben cut her off.

“It is, Kate. It’s you. It’s not the painting. You’re scared of that, not her. You could have killed her with the wardrobe, and now you could have suffocated her with these bloody bin bags.”

“But–”

“No. No buts. This is getting out of hand.”

Kate said nothing as she watched him leave the room, whispering to Sophie about sleeping in their bed that night. She took one last look at the clown, its hand still waving, as she turned off the light and followed her husband back to bed. As the door closed behind her, she thought she heard a faint laugh.

***

Ben and Kate barely spoke the following day. They climbed into bed in silence and turned away from each other.

Eventually, Ben’s breathing slowed and Kate could tell that he had drifted off to sleep. She, however, stared at the baby monitor. Sophie was sleeping in her purple pyjamas; the back of her hand pressed against her cheek. Kate watched her daughter’s chest rise and fall and tried to convince herself that Ben was right. It was just a painting. She had to get a grip. She could see its legs on the screen; its torso was out of shot. It didn’t move. All was well.

It was as she decided to finally close her eyes that she heard it. A squeaking noise coming through the monitor. Kate opened her eyes and froze. There, behind the bars to Sophie’s cot, was the clown. It was crouched down, staring at Kate through the screen. It’s not real. Ben is right. It’s not real. Kate closed her eyes tight, willing these words to be true. When she opened them again, she saw a finger raised to the clown’s lips, telling her to be quiet. But what caused Kate to finally snap back into action was not the shushing motion. It was the clown’s other hand, which had reached down towards Sophie, who was reaching up to it, trying to grab it.

Kate bolted upright and flung herself out of bed. She tore down the hallway and into Sophie’s room, flicking the light on as she did.

The first thing she noticed was the empty cot in front of her. And then she looked at the clown. It was no longer facing her and waving. Instead, it had turned away, facing towards the open circus tent. One gloved hand hung loosely by its side, the other clasping the hand of a young girl in purple pyjamas who was looking up at the lights which now illuminated the path.