Flash Nano 2: "Write a story in which something turns into something else."

 

Flashnano 2: "Write a story in which something turns into something else."

“My grandmother told me that she found old paintings and then painted over them. She couldn’t afford new canvases,” Emily Worth said to Camilla. “Do you think you could find what is under this?”

“I could try.” Camilla was able to imagine Mrs. Worth’s grandmother, an art student in Paris at the end of WWII and not having the money to buy canvases.

“I’ve two of her paintings. This one is, well, less than wonderful. The other I treasure.”

Camile had to agree. The painting Mrs. Worth didn’t like was a cliché of the Eiffel Tower. It had bits and pieces of different styles while not creating one of its own.

Mrs. Worth was Camilla’s neighbor, one floor down. The old lady was what someone would call “a love.” She’d taken Camilla under her wing, often having a dinner ready for her when she returned from her art restoration classes at the Museum of Fine Arts.

Camille took the painting to her art restoration class the next day.

“Be careful, you never know what’s under the paint,” her teacher said.

Little by little, the old, cracked paint was removed. It took a couple of weeks.

“We need to call in an expert,” her teacher said. They weren’t hard to find at the Museum.

Although the experts often disagreed, their fights were legendary among the staff. There was no disagreement on the painting under Mrs. Worth’s grandmother’s painting: a Toulouse-Lautrec of a man and a woman walking in a crowd. It was unfinished.

Sotheby’s valued it between high four and low five figures. Mrs. Worth decided not to sell. “When I die, it’ll be yours. You discovered it.” There was a twinkle in her eye. "Unless I need the money before then."

Camilla was fine with that.