The clickity clack of shoes echoes in the cold night air. A woman walks briskly down the sidewalk. The soft glow of street lamps lights her way. As a rigid wind runs over her, the woman pulls her coat further around her body. Twelve monotonous chimes signals the dead of night. The clap of the woman’s shoes grows quicker as she hurries her pace. Then suddenly, she stops, simply freezes in place. The ambient sounds of the night are so near silent that every unusual noise is prominent. There is a low-pitched rushing, seemingly groping for something. The woman turns towards the sound. Her eyes meet a thin alley. Street lamps illuminate only the first few feet within. Beyond that, it is eerily dark.
The woman’s pursed lips denote her uneasiness. She looks to either side of her. The rushing grows louder, and though she doesn’t know why, the woman finds it impossible to keep from entering the alley. Grabbing tightly to the strap of her purse, she tentatively drifts through the alley. The ground is laden with crumbling cigarette butts. Though the woman tries to avoid stepping upon them, she treads on a few, releasing hints of curling smoke and disintegrating the butts into crumbling ash.
As the light fades from the alley, the woman begins to hear music, playful and uplifting, yet somehow unsettling. It feels as though the song reaches into her subconscious, reminding her of her deepest, most strange fears. Though her heart races in a panic, the woman does not turn back. On the brick walls of the alley’s flanking buildings, splatterings of colors begin coming into sight: pinks, greens, blues, yellows and purples. All pastel, as if the pigmentation of a nursery. The soothing of the gentle shades however, is disrupted by the manner in which they lay upon the wall. It looked like someone had covered their fingers in paint and raked them across the wall.
The song grew louder, this time with the accompaniment of humming. The woman turns towards the sound in an instant. A bare chested man in muddy jeans and a tie-dye headband stands clutching a banjo lazily within his hands. He sways back and forth as he plays. The childish grin on his face has the woman backing up until she presses against the painted wall. Around the man’s feet, empty pill bottles and syringes rest, recently thrown aside. The woman looks over her shoulder, back the way she came into the alley. A crashing, along with an untuned pick of a banjo, is the first alert that something is wrong. Straining, wishing she could simply run, leave the man behind, the woman shuts her eyes from reality, and rotates back to face the man. Then, with agonizing self disdain for her decision, she opens her eyes. The man is no longer standing, he is collapsed on the ground, his banjo by his feet. When she looks closer at him, she notices streams of water running down his face. He is crying. The woman does not know what to do. Her mind is trapped in a whirl of fear, curiosity, and compassion. At last, she gives in to her maternal instincts.
“What’s the matter?”  She walks hesitantly, a few pace towards him.
“It’s all wrong.” The man speaks with the feeling of a small child. The woman bit her lip deciding whether or not she should respond.
“What’s all wrong?” The man looks up at her. His expression is immensely distant and almost blank. Then, he points straight away from himself.  Following the direction of his gesture, the woman turns. Her startled gasp fills the alley as the woman’s eyes land on what the man was mentioning: a large mural, spanning widely across the building wall. The mural depicts a three dimensional fantasy scene. Every square inch of it is intricately detailed, making it impossible to take in the entire painting. The woman sees a floating toaster, an ice cream truck riding up a hill in the far background, multiform creatures with cute little faces, and a colorful lake with an island. The painting is chillingly cheerful, filled with fun and childish creativity. “Is this what you’re talking about?” she asks, not removing her gaze from the painting.
“It’s all wrong.” Says the man. This time with greater frustration. Then, the woman hears heavy footsteps and suddenly, a dripping black paint splotch covers a part of the painting.
“What are you doing!?” Exclaims the woman, the painting was amazing. The black, the dark, the plain, the nothingness shatters it’s beauty with sameness. 
“It’s all wrong. I have to fix it.” With another splash, more black paint sweeps away the imagination that had been so graciously laid upon the wall.
“There is nothing wrong with it.” Another dose of black paint.
“The eye of the watcher. Unbidden to the deep of emotions. What is, is not always what was thought of. Good and bad are nothing compared to wrong and right. No one can decide the wrong and the right for the work of others. Whether something is wrong or right is based off of if it expresses what the creator wished it too. This, is all wrong.”