The Portrait Girl

My friend Rahul was browsing through my paintings kept on the shelf when his gaze glanced on my award winning portrait kept on the top of the shelf. This was the special portrait with which my life s’ biggest secret was associated. Every time Rahul wanted to know about the secret behind the making of this portrait, I would somehow change the topic through the manipulation of words and avoid further probing. But today, Rahul was adamant to get the secret the of the portrait revealed from me. After negotiating with him for a while, I agreed to divulge the secret to him but on the condition that the secret should stay only with him. After that I took a sip from my hot coffee mug and taking a deep breath, began my narration of the story of my ‘prized portrait’.

   

                From my very childhood, I was very passionate about illustrations, animated images and paintings in the true sense. So I was determined to become an artist, a famous and renounced one when I grow up. Hence after passing out from art college with flying colours and having tasted success at many art competitions, it was the time to showcase my talents in front of the world – an art exhibition at Rabindra Sadan . With great hopes and enthusiasm, I submitted some of my best works at the art exhibition but it did not catch the attention of the art critics or the audience. Gradually with more art exhibitions and repeated failures, my hopes were weakening and I was starting to get dejected and demotivated in life. Hence I strengthened my will power and decided to give a final try at the art exhibition of Rabindra Sadan. It was from this exhibition that I found the source of my prized portrait.

              The portrait was that of a young girl. She was the epitome of beauty and had a spark in her eyes that could melt anyone s’ heart. She also possessed a mesmerizingly beautiful smile that had the power to make anyone forget the stress and worries of their lives. I met this girl at that exhibition of Rabindra Sadan  with which some crucial hopes and dreams of my life was pinned. So, on the day of the exhibition I was roaming in the gallery and trying to figure out how the audience at the exhibition rated my artistic creations. It was then that I found a young girl of about the age of 24 years glancing at a painting of mine with rapt attention. When I approached her, she appreciated my work and after that we had a meaningful yet lively chat on the various forms of art and the contribution of great artistes to the world. In the context of our chat, I came to know that she was also an artist but was yet to experience fame in this regard. Then she gave me the special proposal to make her live portrait. I was stunned at first but then took it as a challenge as I was yet to experiment with the concept of live portrait drawing.

                So finally a date was decided on which the girl visited my house for her portrait to be drawn on the paper canvass. I made her sit on the chair and started my creative venture on the painting canvass. With a few strokes of my well sharpened drawing pencil, I was amazed with my creative skills in portrait drawing. Suddenly in the middle of my portrait session, the portrait girl had a phone call and she was in a hurry to go somewhere. However before departing from my place with the unfinished portrait lying on the painting canvass, she made a promise to me. She promised me that the portrait would earn me the praises and recognition among the art critics thereby establishing my fame as a famous artist. Her last words that day had filled me with renewed expectations and reaffirmed the belief on my potentials.

                  However, weeks passed by and even after repeated phone calls, there was no sign of the mysterious portrait girl. Slowly I was starting to lose hope about the incomplete portrait. Somewhere in my mind I had a belief that this portrait of the young girl will be the ticket to my fame as an artist but only if the girl could be found. One night when I was lost in my thoughts and analyzing the ‘ifs and buts’ of my life, there was a sound of ringing bell at my house.

Cautiously as I opened the doors, I found the portrait girl standing at my doorstep. She kindly apologized to me for being so late and said that she was there to fulfill her promise that she had made to me regarding the portrait. However, there was something fishy about her body language as she walked in and in a calm manner perched on the chair. I began my portrait on the canvass and made good quality progress in quick time. Within an hour, my portrait was completed and it looked stunningly true to life as if my pencil had breathed life into the portrait of the girl. As I came forward to thank the girl, suddenly I started losing my nerve senses, lost control over my body and collapsed on the ground. Next morning when I got my senses back, I was lying on my bed and it seemed though as if the girl, the portrait completion -  everything was just a fragment of my dreams. But when I came to check the progress of my portrait on the canvass, to my utter shock I found the beautiful, true to life portrait drawn on the canvass. However, the events of the previous night and the portrait girl missing and then suddenly appearing to complete the portrait and again mysteriously lost made me suspicious and curious to solve the mystery.

On deciphering the mystery through trails and reliable sources, I found that the girl had been suffering from cancer and had died on that very night when she had visited my house for the sake of the portrait completion and to keep her promise intact. By the way, the word “promises” reminded me of another promise that the girl had made, this time to her father.  She had always aspired to be a famous artist and hence she had promised her father that she would leave an invaluable asset to the world of art. Well, that promise had been fulfilled in the sense as I had submitted that portrait at the annual competition of the prestigious “ Academy of Fine Arts” which had fetched me the First Prize at the competition. Finally, after years of waiting and hoping, my dreams of being a recognized and famous artist was fulfilled through the portrait. I remember having cherished the subtle appreciations that the portrait had garnered with time from various people. However, the very sight of my most precious creation, the prized portrait reminded me of the girl whom I had met at that art exhibition and about that fateful night when the beautiful portrait got completed.

                        As I completed narrating my story of the prized portrait, my friend Rahul nodded in an assuring manner. I then delicately caressed the portrait and kept it back on the shelf. As I was in the act of glancing at the portrait after putting it in its rightful place, a sudden rush of cool breeze from the open window of my living room sent a shiver down my throat and reminded me of the fact that how ,”Some Promises were meant to be kept. ”