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Sunday, July 24, 2016

Today's #flashfiction The Addition To The Portrait

“Video games are getting too realistic.”
Neo* #quote


I went to the bookstore again today. What papery fun! Anyway onto the flash fiction!


The Addition To The Portrait

         An old man painted alone in his studio. He lived an isolationist his life. Some artists mingled with people throughout their life with the world outside their studio, he spent minimal time outside of it. The only time he spent outside his studio was to shop, sell his work, and get reference. He could have signed his work Allen but the man usually remained nameless. A machine of an artist he would pump out paintings for sale of any subject matter quickly.
        Though in the past three years arthritis began to creep into his hands. He figured that this might be his last good painting. So he was making a portrait. The best he could. Allen made thousands of paintings over his eighty year life, and this might be the last one that wasn't a scrawl.
        The self portrait did look amazing, almost perfectly life like, but also had an addition to it. An old woman sitting next to him in a chair he also added. This woman didn't exist. She lived as the manifestations of his regrets of the past few years, for she was what he imagined would have been the woman he would have grown old with had he married. Had he done more than shut himself alone. Only in his old age did he understand why other artists did more than their craft, and for his lack of understanding in his youth now all he has is a portrait with a figment of his imagination.

        He never made another painting after that portrait and felt sadness in his soul as he passed a few years later.  

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