…a folded piece of thick parchment and a smaller, tightly rolled canvas, sealed in a waterproof archival sleeve.
My heart hammered against my ribs as I carefully pulled the items free. For a moment, I just sat there on the floor of my tiny apartment, surrounded by the splintered remains of the ugly painting, staring at the hidden cache.
First, I unrolled the inner canvas. The moment it flattened out, the breath left my lungs. Gone were the dull, cracked browns and greys of the creepy house. Instead, my living room was illuminated by breathtaking, vibrant swirls of midnight blue, gold, and violent yellow. The brushstrokes were thick, chaotic, yet perfectly deliberate. Even to my entirely untrained eye, it was unmistakable. It looked exactly like a lost Van Gogh.
Hands shaking, I opened the heavy parchment. It was a letter, penned in Aunt Clara’s elegant, albeit shaky, cursive.
My Dearest Lily,
If you are reading this, it means you didn’t just toss my parting gift aside. Or, at the very least, you tried to save the antique frame. Either way, you looked closer. You always did. >
You were the only one who sat with me in that sterile room. You were the only one who listened to an old woman ramble about her youth in Paris, about the secret your great-grandfather brought back from the war. Your cousin, Richard, couldn’t be bothered to give me five minutes of his precious time, let alone listen to my “fictional delusions,” as he so loudly called them.
Richard inherited the public collection. The appraisers value it at $2 million. Let him have his flashy, cataloged pieces to show off at his dinner parties. But what I gave you is the heart of our family’s history. It is an undocumented, original Vincent van Gogh, gifted to your great-grandfather by a frightened gallery owner in 1941 to keep it out of Nazi hands.
It is worth more than Richard’s entire inheritance ten times over. I hid it behind that dreadful painting of the old estate to keep it safe from greedy eyes. >
Sell it. Travel the world. Buy a house that isn’t creepy. Thank you for holding my hand when it mattered.
With all my love,
Aunt Clara
I read the letter three times, the ink blurring as tears finally spilled over my eyelashes. They weren’t tears of devastation anymore, but of overwhelming gratitude. Aunt Clara hadn’t lost her mind, and she certainly hadn’t forgotten who showed up for her.
Two weeks later, an authentication team from Sotheby’s sat in a secure bank vault with me, practically weeping over the canvas. When the news hit the art world that a pristine, lost masterpiece had been discovered, the auction house estimated its opening bid at a staggering $25 million.
My phone rang incessantly for the next three days. The caller ID flashed Richard over and over again. After years of ignoring Aunt Clara’s calls, and weeks of gloating over his $2 million windfall, he suddenly had a lot to say to me.
I smiled, silenced the ringer, and went back to packing my bags for Paris.
