The $20,000 Chameleons

Tara sipped on her venti mocha swirl perusing the golden, silver and bronze lamp stands at her first stop of the day. She knew she didn’t need any of these items, but the thrill of hunting for a treasure that the tag sale owner didn’t realize they had was exhilarating; the best way to spend a Saturday in Tara’s mind. Sometimes she felt bad, as if she should say something. Something like, “Hey! Lady! You can’t sell this for 2 bucks! This is worth hundreds! It’s a first edition! Are you daft?!” She knew she just didn’t have it in her. Instead she bought whatever item with a slight smirk on her triangular face with the sharp chin her mom always said reminded her of Jay Leno. I know right, way to affect confidence in your young child’s life. As if it wasn’t hard enough to fit in. But that was neither here nor there. She loved her mom and always wished she had her full approval; but then again, who had full parental approval at every moment?

Tara assumed that the lady sitting behind a foldout party table with a handmade sign that shouted, “I AM ALSO FOR SALE FOR 12$,” was the one in charge of the tag sale. Tara waved and smiled politely while in the corner of her eye homed in on a vibrant lime green framed abstract painting. It reminded Tara of a rainforest and once she got closer to it, without garnering any attention from fellow tag salers, she could swear there were chameleon lizards dotted throughout. It was certainly colorful and extremely tacky. For all of these reasons, Tara knew she had to have it. In the bottom right corner, she could make out the small handwritten letters, “W.W.K” and right underneath that in smaller print, “43/267.”

Tara couldn’t believe her luck. And at her first stop of the day no less! She edged closer to the canvas, extended her arm, and placed a hand on the cool frame. She lifted it with a slight tremble and peeked beyond her left shoulder to make sure no one could see her and the prized possession in her grasp. As she edged towards the fold-up table, she made eyes with the owner of the one-of-a-kind painting and briefly debated in her mind whether she should tell this sweet, oblivious woman what this painting could be worth. Casually, she asked the smiling woman how much the painting was since she couldn’t locate a tag on it. “Five dollars, sweetheart!” Tara removed the only 20 she had on her and handed it back for change. She slunk away afterwards paranoid that someone would recognize the painting and snatch it out of her hands.

Tara crept home in her robin’s egg blue 98’ Buick wondering if she should have put the seat belt on the painting. Briefly, she contemplated heading to the other three tag sales she had on her agenda for the day, but then decided against it. She rushed home to google and research everything she possibly could about this painting.

Pulling up to the drive, she saw that her mother and younger brother were at home. She had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She did not want to explain this painting or why she had to tag sale every weekend instead of doing a normal activity for kids her age. What was normal? Gossiping with the girls in her senior class? Sitting around giving each other mani-pedis? Gross. Her mom should just be thankful that she is learning the value of a dollar and that she had hobbies that would secure a great financial future for herself.

When she walked inside, there was no one in the living room. She had a clear shot to the stairs that would land her safely in her room while remaining undetected. She hid the painting in her closet and retrieved the small black notebook attached to the underside of her desk with thick duct tape that had almost lost its stickiness. For years she had been studying liberal arts. Not at her high school, but alone in the confines of her bedroom. She got lost in the nuanced strokes from the likes of Picasso and Donatello, Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Monet. She couldn’t get enough of the greats and was anxiously awaiting the moment she could study abroad in Paris promising herself she would live in the Louvre. Soaking up all the talent she could muster and appreciating the best life had to offer. She flipped to the abstract painters tab. She remembered taking the time to categorize every artist she ever read or heard about. If she had to guess, she had well over 150 artists along with a brief synopsis of their lives and the works they had created and a cut out photo from google of her favorite picture they had created. She was skimming the artists names looking for the initials WWK or just WK. On the sixteenth page of the abstract tab, she gasped as she realized the author must be Wassily Kandinsky. Kandinsky was a Russian painter best known for “The Blue Rider” and the movement regarding the avant-garde exhibiting society that followed. Her heart started beating faster when she comprehended she could in fact be holding onto a significantly expensive piece of art. With unsteady fingers and a racing mind, she typed “chameleon, Wassily Kandinsky, painting” into the google search bar on the laptop on her desk. What she saw next made her fall off her seat with tears streaming down her face. The painting, if it was one of the originals, could be worth up to $650,000. Enough money to send her to MIT with a full ride, enough to buy her a house and set her up for life; and still be able to give most of it to charity. She was so happy she screamed. No one came running, so she did it again. And again.

There was only one issue. She couldn’t alleviate the aching in her brain telling her this wasn’t right. The sweet, kind owner of the house she had gotten the painting from had absolutely no idea what a find she had lurking in her house. Tara realized she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t keep this money as her own. She had to find the woman and give the painting back.

She grabbed the painting from the closet and floated out of the house. For the entire drive, Tara berated herself saying how crazy she was to return the painting. This was a huge sum of money. She needed it. Mom was always saying that she wouldn’t pay for her whole college tuition. Tara had to get a job instead of all this funny business. All sixteen-year old’s had jobs and Tara was just wasting her teenage years. She kept tormenting herself thinking how great it would feel to prove her mom wrong. She went over different scenarios in her head of how she would tell her that she had 650K now; imagine if she had listened to her mom and went to work for minimum wage! But then, each time, her conscience let her know that she would never have that satisfaction; she was going to give the painting back. She drove up the street where the tag sale had been going on. She saw the same lady she had bought the painting from packing up for the day. There was no one else around and Tara realized it was after 4. She walked straight up to the woman and said her practiced monologue with a shaky voice, “I think you ought to keep this. I knew it was worth a lot of money when I bought it for five dollars. I feel ashamed I hoodwinked you like that. I don’t deserve this. You should take it to an art auctioneer. The artist is Wassily Kandinsky.” After, she turned and walked with her head down all the way to her car. She got in and drove back home, mentally applying to Chili’s and Burger King. Her mom was right. It was time to start acting like an adult.

The following week, there was a knock on the door. Her mother was in the kitchen chopping some vegetables for dinner and her brother’s lazy self didn’t even look up from the soccer program he was watching on T.V. Tara came out of her bedroom, walked down the stairs and opened the door. The sweet lady from the tag sale was standing there. She said hello to Tara and asked if her mother could come to the door. Tara reluctantly called for her mom knowing that this woman came all this way to tell her mom what a greedy child she had raised. Instead, Tara heard bits and pieces of the conversation “…amazing child..so generous… you raised her right..I can’t believe…” And then Tara tuned in. The woman said that the reason she was having the tag sale was to sell the house she loved and had lived in for 15 years to be able to pay for a heart surgery for her seven year old son who would likely die without it. Her insurance was refusing to pay and her husband had died earlier that year leaving hefty funeral bills. With the money she received from that painting all her money problems disappeared. She called Tara an angel and then did something extraordinary. She pulled out a wad of hundreds. $20,000 in total. Tara and her mom stood at the doorstep not knowing what to do or say next. Her mother recovered first and invited the woman in for coffee. She accepted.

Tara’s brother looked up from the couch and said “way to go sis.” Her mother pulled her into an embrace and whispered how proud she was of her.

Tara still went to tag sales every weekend. This time with her mom’s full approval and her brother even tagged along some days.

The End