With every stroke, he wiped away a tear. Because he had captured her, for once. He had captured her soul here on gessoed canvas, with pigments and oils and brush. He saw into her and took everything he loved and needed and wanted and transferred that to this flat 2D space, laid bare for the world to see, judged at an art show in the middle of nowhere. She hung on the wall, haunting when compared to the crude paintings of Amish children with their pets. Her eyes stared out back from that flat frame and stared back into everyone else, making their minds wonder who painted her. It'd been thirty years and all he had was that ragtag photo they shot that stolen afternoon. And she knew that this would be all they would ever have. For him, it took years. Decades. In fact, he believes that, even now, someday she will walk back into his life and tell him that she missed him so much that and she worried he'd never take her back and he wants so bad to be tough and hard when that happens and not give in, but he will, he'll cave and she'll probably fade all over again. So that's why he painted this. That's why he takes it from small town to small town. The citizenry walks past and they are as haunted as he is, as trapped as he is, down in the well of unrequited love, with water that never tastes as good as it did the first time. The hangover is a feeling like kissing a ghost. The burning of unreality meeting reality, of the spectre that will never condense into reality, and the feeling of just there and not enough and almost but not quite, trying to find everything you can to mask that feeling. He knew he'd tried. He lost himself in drugs, in drink, in danger, in people who were as dead as he was to minimize the damage to his already heart made of dust. All he had left was this painting. And he had no idea where she lived. He didn't know if she was alive. All he knew was someday, somewhen, if he took this snapshot of paint across the country, someone would know her. Someone would know where she was. He stood, lost, every weekend, a ghost himself, hidden amongst the fresh squeezed lemonade and funnel cakes and fried dough, eyes never leaving the crowds who see his work. He has a glovebox full of blue medals and best in shows. But he'll never have her again.

Photo - N
Words - S