Playful Pierce #1

Conception

An accountant has too much wine. On the way back to her apartment she stumbles into a street photographer. He takes a picture of her sleeping before he vanishes the next morning. She receives the photo in her mail a few months later. She tries to send him a copy of the sonogram, but the mailman returns it the next week.

Kindergarten

The teacher gives them watercolors and asks them to make a clown, so the girl paints her face white and red. She does not understand why everyone else is using paper.

At The Gallery

Her fourth grade class takes a field trip to a local gallery. She is removed for trying to hug a giant heart in a cage. She said it looked lonely.
They make her sit on the bus the rest of the day where she listens to the driver reminisce about Vietnam.

First Fight

Her mother takes away her paints and forces her to do math homework. Instead, she rips out the pages of the math book to make a collage.
Her mother tells her to get a real future. The girl yells that she must have got her artistic instinct from her dad. She is grounded for a month.

10th Grade Biology

The class is to dissect a frog. She listens to the teacher explain how to make the first incision from the bottom of the stomach moving upward slowly so as not to disturb the organs. She grabs the scalpel out of her teacher’s hand and places it at her belly button. She moves upward slowly.

Aftermath

The principal demands that she receive counseling.

Freshman Year

She loses her virginity to a sophomore pre-med student named David who promises to call her the next day.
A month later, she walks in on his biology lecture and, in front of 500 students, writes her name and number on the projector and hands him a pre-paid cell. He calls, along with thirty other boys. And the professor.

Aftermath

The Dean of Arts recommends that she audition for a grant.

The Prize

She shows her mother the check from the institute. Her mother promises to go to her first show.

First Show

The doors open. The people walk into a blank studio with white, sterile walls. They search each room for art but find nothing. The critics call it uninspired.

Mother’s Funeral

She delivers the eulogy naked.

Mark

She tries to do research on suicide for her next project. She meets him while walking bridges at night looking for people standing on the railing. She watches him step over the railing one leg at a time. She strikes up a conversation. They go out for coffee. She pays.

The Bank

She asks to cash her mother’s life insurance check in singles.

Second Show

The doors open. The people walk into the studio and inspect the walls, which are covered with one-dollar bills. The critics call it an improvement.

Fame

An older man writes her a letter claiming to be her father. He includes a photo of her mother. For three weeks she keeps the letter on her bedside table. He agrees to submit to a paternity test.

The Waiting Room

He does not show up on the test date. She gathers every magazine in the hospital and makes a statue of a little girl. She drinks heavily during its construction. The piece, called I Waited All Day and Thirty Years, is currently on display in MOMA.

Abuse

Mark’s luggage is packed and in front of the door. She throws a tequila bottle at him on his way out.

Fortune

She has not produced anything in a year. Her agent advises her to attend rehab. She fires him. A year later she sells her house.

Final Show

The doors open. The people walk in and gape at the splotches of red on the walls. In each room a different organ is on display: her skin, her brain, her stomach, her lungs, her heart. The critics call it brilliant.