There are places in this city that seem like they come alive when no one is watching. Like, you can walk past them everyday and swear they’re nothing more than brick, pain and dust, but you’d be wrong.
The Sel Gallery is located at the corner of Green and Ash, between an empty bookstore and a tailor shop that only opens twice a week. It has tall and narrow windows, and is painted and decorated to give an ancient appearance. During the day, the gallery is often calm, sometimes excessively so. Tourists visits, stay for ten minutes and leave with polite nods, occasionally muttering that they had hoped for something more impressive. But those who knew better, those who truly understood the gallery, came at night.
Of course, no one ever admitted it.
I only found out because of my uncle. He had been the gallery’s night guard for almost twenty years, though “guard” wasn’t the right word. “caretaker” came closer. He would never tell me much about his job, just that it was “special” and a “little strange”. I thought he was exaggerating, until the night he fell sick and asked me to fill in for him.
It was a rainy Tuesday, the streets were slick with reflected lamplight and the gallery key’s felt cold in my palm as I turned the lock and stepped inside. Everything looked ordinary at first. The main hall had high ceiling, polished floor and the portraits were hung in solemn rows. I walked the usual patrol path, flashlight in hand and for a while, it felt like nothing more than an old building settling into itself. Then, just after midnight, it happened.
I paused before a large oil painting of a forest clearing. I remember it looking almost dull in the morning, but now, under the dim golden glow of the nightlight, the painting shimmered and the leaves rustled. Like, really rustled. I could hear them. My heart kicked hard in my chest as the stag in the portrait lifted its head, steam coming from its nostrils in the sudden cold air between us. I stumbled back.
The painting’s frame no longer kept my world apart from its own. The stag stared at me without blinking. Then, it turned and walked deeper into the trees until it disappeared completely. Then the painting was once again flat.
“I see you’ve met him” a deep but soft voice murmured.
I turned around sharply but there was no one in the hall. All along the walls, other painting moved. A woman wearing a crimson gown in a painting at the corner of the hall, stepped down from a balcony scene. She looked around the gallery as if searching for someone. On the opposite wall, two sailors in a storm-tossed boat shouted, it was faint but clear.
I was anything but scared, in fact I was deeply amazed and in awe. I loved and enjoyed what I was seeing. It wasn’t chaotic and that’s what surprised me most. There was no frenzy or riot of colors spilling out into reality. Each painting seemed to know its place. They moved, breathed and lived, but only within their frame edges, like actors bound to their stage.
Hours passes, but I can’t say how many. I moved from hall to hall looking at all the 'now alive' paintings. I saw a shepherd lead his flock across a hillside. A knight polishing his sword beside a ruined castle. A little boy in a faded portrait even invited me to play marbles. His laughter faded before he returned to his spot on the canvas. The strangest of all was the painting in the East wing. It was of a woman with blue eyes and hair as black as wet ink. She had a silver key on a ribbon around her throat. And unlike the others, she did not move. She just sat and watched. It gave me this unsettling feeling that she was watching me. I was about to walk away when she said “Don’t come back alone next time” her voice was low and clear.
By morning, I hadn’t sat down at all but I didn’t feel tired. I just felt sad at the thought of leaving. The movement in the paintings slowed, and the sounds disappeared. One by one, the figures went back to their place. I locked the doors and stepped outside. I was unsure if what I had seen was something magical or if I had simply lost my mind. But it was one of kind experience for me.
I hadn’t told anyone. But tomorrow night, I think I’ll go back.
Image was generated using MetaAI
