The chair has been dragged to a corner of the room, and he sits where he can see the entire range in one eyeful. He is alone in the empty gallery, surrounded by his life’s work. No visitors have come.
It’s only ten or eleven yet, they usually start coming closer to four or five.
He stares at the faces in the crowd. Animated moments, frozen in time as his gaze settles on each of them. Everything good he has ever felt in his life is captured there, in the faces of others reflected back at him. It is what he has to show for all the days he didn’t leave home, and all the meetings he didn’t take. All his bad decisions are simmering in front of him, in vivid strokes of paint.
It’s only Wednesday or Thursday yet, they usually come closer to the weekend.
His wife returns from the lobby, she had gone hoping to usher in some untimely people. She was unsuccessful, but will try again. She stands so close that her leg touches his arm. It is not on purpose, and nor is it accidental. That’s just how they are together.
It’s only Fall yet, they usually come closer to Spring.
Nothing more to see in a room with no visitors, so he turns to his charming and relentlessly hopeful wife. Nobody is there to hear him lean over and say, “If all that my life’s work has brought me is a good woman like you, it’s been entirely worth it.”
It’s only days of living yet, they usually come after you’re gone.