(He)art theft

A Story by J.M.Kauftheil

Wrote this as kind of a joke. Don't feel like explaining it. Just a 45 minute doodle while getting Thai food in northridge, around the time I was getting sick of school - very good hot and sour soup.

Daisy and Vincent were in love. It's a long story, but here it is in short: She was a museum security guard, he was a thief. She had a fetish for criminals, and he had a thing for women in uniform. They both liked sex in big, open places, like empty art galleries.
The story they told people was shorter than that: they met at the museum.
They held hands as they walked, passing along a cross-walk. Vincent didn't steal too often, and Daisy's paycheck wasn't great, working at an exhibition that lost a masterpiece every few months. They weren't rich, but they were comfortable and they could eat out pretty often. Tonight they were getting Thai food.
"I like how then new piece looks in our kitchen," Daisy said thoughtfully.
"Yeah," said Vincent, gazing ahead as if the crème-colored wall were before him. "I didn't think pastels would work with that room."
"It's the lighting, in part." He nodded in agreement. She grinned to herself. She liked when her observations on art sounded educated.
She wanted to be an art appreciator, and he wanted to be a painter. She had taken classes, and he had spent years with a paintbrush and easel. The acts of producing and understanding art were perhaps a natural thing, but not intrinsic in either of them.
Their failures were their motivations. Longingly, she took the security job so she could spend countless hours searching for meaning in the brushstrokes. Out of spite, he stole and resold other's successful products. In another lifetime, Daisy could have been an expert on the history and styles of art, who fell for Vincent, a brilliant undiscovered expressionist. But that's another reality, another story, and they're happy with what they have.
They live in a small house, without kids " they've got enough trouble as is - and they tell guests, when compliments are given, that the pictures in their home are copies. Daisy is a security guard, Vincent is an art thief, they're in love, and they're on their way to a Thai restaurant with the best Hot and Sour soup in town.