Jeromey Wrenn's Arc

Chapter 2 of 3

Jeromey didn't go back to the studio. They walked the streets for hours, looking for her again. Every dark-haired woman became a possibility. Every passing face made their breath catch. But none of them were right. None of them had that exact arrangement of features, that precise geometry Jeromey had painted forty times without knowing why. By evening, exhausted, they found themselves standing in front of an ornate building they'd never noticed before. The carved facade gleamed with gold and magenta detailing, every surface decorated. A man sat on the front steps, holding a folder across his knees. He looked up as Jeromey approached. "You're the painter," he said. Not a question. "I represent someone who wants to buy the portrait series. All forty pieces. Sight unseen." He opened the folder and showed Jeromey a contract, a number with more zeros than they'd ever seen. Jeromey's hands went cold. They hadn't shown the portraits to anyone. They hadn't even decided if they could. "How do you know about those?" The man smiled and closed the folder. "Does it matter? Yes or no." Jeromey thought of the gallery plan in their pocket, suddenly possible with that money. But selling the portraits meant letting them go before understanding what they were, before knowing why that woman existed. They looked at the contract again, then at the building behind him, all that excessive decoration hiding whatever was inside. "No," Jeromey said. The man shrugged and stood. "Your loss." He walked away, and Jeromey stood alone on the sidewalk, broke as before, but certain now that the portraits weren't for sale. They were evidence of something, and Jeromey needed to know what.