Page 58 of Portrait of A Lost Artist
Stepping away from Mina’s ongoing conversation, and double-checking the unheated iron, I move towards the front yard. The intensity of the Californian sun greets my face and arms with a welcome warmth. The wind whispers through my hair, harmonizing with the swaying daisies that define the walkway to my home’s entrance. As I reach down to smell a flower, anticipating the calming scent of petrichor, my gaze suddenly fixes on something unexpected.
Someone.
It could be an illusion.
One of those ghosts that follows every tear that I have dropped in my solitude, aiming to help me heal.
She’s not looking back at me. A curtain of wavy hair falls from her shoulders as she stares at the sky, a silent yearning in her gaze. The sun paints a soft glow on her down-turned, full lips. Her sorrowful eyes shimmer like distant stars in dark water as she blinks upwards, hands pressed against the cold metal of the small gate. It’s a familiar image, reminiscent of our first kiss—the way the strap of her white tank top always seemed to slip, her flowery skirt caught by the wind.
If this is the ghost of Veronica, it’s realer than ever. I must be going insane, but her eyes meeting mine erase all thoughts of asylums and returning to therapy. Initially, shock registers in her widened gaze, her eyebrows arching sharply in surprise, but then a smile gently presses onto her lips.
I want to ask her if she’s real, but I’m scared that I’ll wake up if that’s not the case.
“You’re different, Nathan.”
Upon hearing her words, I know she’s truly there. I feel a pull, a near collapse from the sheer force of her beauty. She’s bridged some of the distance by opening the gate. My mind races, wondering what she sees in my face, knowing how much I’ve changed.
It’s been a challenge to maintain the physique I once worked for in the gym; I’m slightly less lean now, and my hair has grown longer, reaching my earlobes. Usually, I just sweep it away from my face, without any styling. I’ve also chosen to be clean-shaven, wanting to look in the mirror and feel unburdened, with nothing to hide. My wardrobe has shifted to simpler clothes—today, a red t-shirt and jeans. I’ve noticed the hollows of my cheeks are more defined, and I catch her gaze lingering there.
“I—I’m sorry for coming here.” She tells me and I do everything not to jump at her arms and hug her. Instead, I wait for her to explain how this is not a hallucination. “I...It’s quite a fun story, actually. I came here to visit Zeke and...I saw your exhibition.”
“How did you find me?” My voice is hoarse after humming at her words. Perhaps I sound broken, pained by the time that we have spent apart, but I don’t sugarcoat it.
“Zeke has enough connections in the music world now to get in contact with your past manager. I talked to a woman called Renna, and that’s how...how I found you.” She says it with care, not wanting to get anyone in trouble. Typical of her. “Are you mad at me for coming here?”
God, I want her to know that I have been waiting for her silently, in secret, for years to no end. If she had arrived just a day after our last meeting, I would have held her close and never released her. Instead, I remained here, cultivating flowers as long as her hair, clinging to the hope of one last conversation, even while a deep part of me believed that day would never dawn.
I can only bring myself to shake my head, squinting at the harshness of the sun. “No.” Shit, I can’t say much more and I can tell that she’s growing uncomfortable. How can I spit out everything I have wanted to say in just a mere minute? What if she simply leaves? “...What did you think of the exhibition?”
“I wondered when you had the time, honestly.” A half-laugh leaves her lips, her shoulders going up the slightest before she pushes the emotion down. Instead, she looks me straight in the eye.
“I started painting them while I was in Cuba.”
“Oh,” Veronica mumbles, nodding after. “Was it a thought-out thing?”
“It was a personal ode I hoped to give to you once, but the time never came around.” I confessed, silence still blossoming between us. But a realization washes over me. This is Veronica Del Real,my Havana, the woman whose impact was so profound that amidst the turmoil, I rediscovered a sense of inner peace I hadn’t known before.
Before I can fully process it, my arms have instinctively wrapped around her. Her face finds refuge against my chest, while mine rests on the crown of her head, and tears immediately flood my eyes. She folds into the embrace, her own hands shaking slightly, pressing to my stomach and then moving to clutch my back. I feel the strain in her knuckles as she grips my shirt, a tangible sign of her own emotion against my hold.
The fabric of my shirt becomes wet by her tears; the ones that had once haunted me because I caused them. I whisper, then, from a portion of my heart that I had tried to destroy along with the memory of her: “I missed you.God, I thought I wouldneversee you again.”
I still do, even when I have her in my arms. The story that could never unfold. The time that I had missed. Everything passes by my eyes when I pull away and capture her face in between my hands. That’s when I see how different she is. Cheeks rounder. Eyes brighter. She has grown, as well. Older. Wiser. More beautiful, as if that was even possible.
“I’m sorry for all the pain I caused you.” I don’t know if this is the last moment that I will ever have with her, so I let everything out. “You don’t know the hours I’ve spent every single day regretting all I did to you. The hiding. The pictures. The articles. You had it so difficult...”
“Nathan.” She cuts me off, eyes droopy by the tears that continue to leak. “I can’t stand here and say it didn’t hurt me, or that we both aced our first attempt at loving each other. But what we had was real, even when we had our ghosts, our secrets, our...demons coming after our intentions. I can’t promise what is to come, but I can promise I came here because...because...” Her voice thins, closing her eyelids tightly. “BecauseI love you, and it pains me to confess it as much as it killed me not to say it before.”
I love you.
Three words, echoed by online strangers commenting on my work or addressing me directly. Three words my mother spoke to me before fame consumed my youth. Three words I’ve uttered to other women without sincerity, to friends in moments of intoxication, to Renna, to Jun. And finally, three words I direct to the world itself, a thank you for a second chance at life when I stood on the edge of oblivion.
But it means even more when she says it. So with all doubts thrown at the back of my head, I give one step forward, pressing my hand to her nape and replying: “You don’t know how much I love you, too, sunshine.”
I pause.
“I’ve always been yours, sunshine.“
In that moment, my mouth meets hers, an instinctive joining I’ll forever remember—the way our lips move together with an effortless knowing, as if they were destined to meet from birth. Her hands grip my waist, a hum against my mouth as I outline her lower lip, taste it gently, and then deepen the kiss with my tongue. She softens completely against me, and a burning longing takes hold, a desire for our bodies to merge beyond the barrier of our clothing.
