“He asked again where I got it. When I told him my mother’s name, he sat back in his chair and said, ‘Then your family has had this hanging in a closet without realizing what it was.'”
I honestly thought he was joking.
I told him the painting had spent years behind winter coats and old umbrellas. My sister had practically thrown it at me because she didn’t want it taking up space.
The appraiser didn’t laugh.
He explained that the artist wasn’t famous to the average person, but collectors knew the name. The signature was real. The painting had been cleaned before, restored at some point, and had probably been in my family for decades.
Then he told me what it was worth.
I made him repeat the number.
Twice.
The first person I called was my sister.
She answered on the second ring. The second I mentioned the painting, she said, “What about it?”
I told her what the appraiser had said.
Silence.
Not the kind where someone is thinking of a response. The kind where someone is trying very hard not to say the wrong thing.
Finally she asked, “Are you serious?”
“That’s what I asked him.”
A few days later she came by to see it herself. The same painting she’d laughed at was suddenly sitting in the middle of my dining room under proper lighting. She walked around it three times.
Then she said something I’ll give her credit for.
“I guess Mom knew me better than I thought.”
Mom had labeled every piece of jewelry. She’d left notes about the china and the savings accounts.
She’d never labeled the painting.
She knew exactly which one of us would take the obvious valuables and which one would carry home the thing nobody wanted.
The painting still hangs in my house.
My sister got the jewelry.
I got the one thing she never bothered to look at twice.