Every minute I'd think, every moment I'd shrink, to a lesser person who wanted less and less of life.
Today I would meet the Artist again, my one and only obsession outside of dying... Ian Dumisani.
I was at the place I first saw him and it looked rather different. There was a moisture of paint in the air and a scent so marvelous. Art papers scattered on the ground like puzzle pieces to a tale so ominous.
In the center of it all, he stood. Looking more of a rascal tand less of a brute. Looking like a bad decision waiting to be made. On the blink like the last tear waiting to be shed.
"Young African girl, you've returned?" he asked.
He had this deep voice like words coming straight from the heart. It was hard to tell his voice and his Art apart. Such meaning in mere words, such rebellion against the singing birds.
"I don't know how you know I am African" I said.
"Your accent. Not much of eloquence, but I know you are fluent in your thoughts".
I didn't believe he knew my thoughts.
"What is the greatest Art piece ever made? In your opinion".
I didn't know the answer to this question. I only had favorites. So I lied,
"The Aphrodite sculpture".
He didn't say. He just looked me in the eye like he knew I went out of my way, to think of that and say.
"You want to impress me, don't you? So you pick all your words carefully".
I hadn't a clue how he knew, but it was true. I loved the sculpture of Aphrodite but it was nowhere near my favorites.
"Tell me what you are, tell me who you are. Show me your scar, and I'll show you how far you are from all your dreams".
He said this and my heart couldn't wait to skip.
It fiddled in blip and I had to sit when he followed up with,
"Words by Ellen Woven. Good painter and poet. She inscribed it in the greatest Art piece she'd ever created. The coffin of her dead husband"
In that moment, we locked eyes and I could see through his. Behind his perfectly covered dark skin. Behind his hollow talk and shades of whim. Behind his cold posture and sharpness of frost, was a man alone. A man, a ghost.
YOU ARE READING
The Art of Killing You
Mystery / ThrillerNatasha is an African girl in love with Art. She can't take that she is in the last moments of her life because she has cancer. She travels to Paris to live out her dream of becoming a recognized painter before she dies. There, she meets Ian. And ge...
