Thomas Kinkade: Tales from beyond the grave

With the aid of two Benadryl and a pint of vanilla ice cream soaked in tequila, I had finally started to relax. Earlier that day, I had announced on my radio show “Leonard the Art Critic” that Thomas Kinkade was, in my opinion, the worst artist in the history of mankind. The phone lines were inundated with angry callers who denounced me for my words. I was sick of dealing with cro-mags who thought poorly painted cottages were art and was anxious to get to sleep. My veins were still sore with the venom of hatred as the heaviness of exhaustion finally conquered me.
As I drifted off to sleep and the darkness enveloped me, I heard a faint whisper say “have you ever painted with pure light?”
Little did I know, I had just entered the unholy domain of infamous painter and businessman Thomas Kinkade.
It was at that moment I noticed the thick smell of over salted mushroom gravy, warm fried chicken and heavy body odor wafting through the air. A black curtain parted before me and a single, hollow-core door creaked open. “Come into the light, Lenny,” I heard the whisper beckon. Still thinking this was a dream, I entered through the frame and was surrounded by a bleak, yellowish aura.
“I am legendary artist and visionary, Thomas Kinkade!” a plaid smoking jacket-clad figure bellowed. The voice sounded like a bad impression of Darrell Hammond’s take on Sean Connery in SNL’s Celebrity Jeopardy sketch. “So, you don’t enjoy my art?”
“Kinkade! But, you’re dead,” was my stuttered reply, “I attended your funeral. I set your coffin on fire right before the police wrestled me to the ground!”
“You sick, demented low-life,” was Kinkade’s disdainful response. He spat on my fuzzy slippers before lighting an extra long cigar. “Let me tell you something about the famous Painter of Light, kiddo.” he continued. “I am not to be trifled with. I cannot die. Fire makes me stronger. Death to you means life to me. Also, if you need a moderately priced, quaint picture of a cottage in the middle of a shady glen, then I’m your man.”
“But, I don’t need tha-” He cut me off immediately and blew a large column of smoke from his cigar into my face.
“Everyone needs a painting of a cottage. Everyone! Pass me that beer, traitor!” he belched. I struggled to clear the smoke from my face and looked around for the glass of beer Kinkade had asked for. I watched his eyes glaze over with ecstasy when I located a tall pitcher of what looked like frothy molten gold.
“This doesn’t look like beer,” I smirked. I wasn’t about to let this squat ball of pulsating membrane shake me, let alone tell me that the liquid before me was beer.
“Be quiet, critic! What you behold before you is what the famous Painter of Light, Thomas Kinkade, uses to craft his masterpieces!” he again bellowed. He guzzled down the shiny contents and smiled widely. A screaming wave of earth-shattering sound assaulted my ear drums, as if a rocket had torn through the atmosphere mere inches from me. “Let me show you what TRUE art looks like!”
I watched as his rotund body separated from his bearded head, flattening itself onto a canvas I hadn’t noticed when we began our conversation. The pores on his already oily skin slowly peeled back, revealing a thousand tiny Thomas Kinkade clones in each cavity. The clones each had paintbrushes where their arms should have been, their shoes were erasers and their shoulders were composed of vile dreams and discarded coffee grounds.
I stood in awe as the clones began to sketch and then paint the most hideous cottage scene I had ever seen. Thousands upon thousands of miniature Kinkades moved with lightning precision over the board, giving life to what could have only be described as evil perfection and stunning grace.
Thomas Kinkade’s head began spinning in place, a maelstrom of insults and poetry appearing against the thick air in the form of flying letters:
“The cottage is lord of us all!”
“Kinkade is a bearded king!”
“Codpiece! Codpiece!”
I struggled to breathe, tears streaming down my puffy face. “Kinkade!” I screamed. “Kinkade! I can take this no longer! You must stop or we’ll all be destroyed!”
The madness came to an instant halt. The clones returned to their pore homes. Thomas Kinkade’s head merged again with his naked neck. The finished painting hung motionless in the air beside him.
“I need an elephant to take a crap on this!” Kinkade screamed into a megaphone. I heard the chorus of 10,000 french horns and a monstrous piece of excrement fell from somewhere above him, directly onto the glowing canvas. Kinkade took his cigar and used it to spread the dung across the picture. “That’s lovely,” he said after he’d finished. “True art is BORN!”
I rapidly blinked when I heard the door I’d originally entered through beginning to close. “You best leave this place,” Kinkade chuckled. “Tell no one of what you’ve seen, except that Thomas Kinkade is THE Painter of Light. Thomas Kinkade IS life. He is Lord of the Cottage.”
I bolted for the door and left my feet, leaping through the narrow crack. When I landed, it was on my bed. I was awake and in my room, ice cream and tequila dripping from the corner of my mouth. Had I really just seen the Painter of Light himself? I shook my head to clear the cobwebs in my brain and took a deep breath. Wait. What was that smell?
I clapped twice and the lights in my room came to life. “Kinkade, you sick pervert!” I exclaimed. Hanging on the wall before me was the cottage painting, dripping with the sweat of a thousand Kinkade clones. I clutched at my heart and felt the beating slow to a trickle.
A new form of darkness wrapped around my shoulders, much colder this time. Kinkade’s floating head appeared before me, laughing into night air.
“You criticize me? I criticize you TO DEATH!”
He had beaten me. Thomas Kinkade. THE Painter of Light.

