Who is Clara G?

A short story.

Photo by Kvnga on Unsplash

It had been three hundred and sixty-four days since Clara moved into the bridge. 

Now the ghosts of Van Gogh, Vermeer and Monet sit with her as she slowly, methodically lifts her hand and picks up her faithful paintbrush. One of her few possessions she was able to cling onto, as she watched the rest of her life crumble away and disappear overnight. 

Her paintbrushes, three in total, held sentimental value but were also the remaining objects that reminded her she belonged somewhere, perhaps in a different time but a small part of evidence of her fragile being on this earth. 

Clara rolls the wooden handle between her bony fingers, finding the familiar groove where it sits between her index finger and thumb, the faint smell of acrylic, dried and hardened over the years mixed with a soft woody smell, trying to lift itself above the stench of unwashed skin, urine and weed. She readies herself to paint.