The Misfortunes of Lolita

epilogue

THIS IS AN UNEDITED AND SIGNIFICANTLY DIFFERENT VERSION OF THE MISFORTUNES OF LOLITA. I AM PUBLISHING IT IN FALL 2021—PLEASE FOLLOW ME ON IG @/ls.akhter and GOODREADS (L AKHTER) TO STAY UPDATED. I am so excited to share TMoL with you again.

please read the author's note at the end! the next chapter will be a one shot contest for this story, i really hope you'll take part in it! thank you to KashishGakhar for the beautiful painting of lolita above. can you believe how fucking incredible it is? please check her out and give her some love, she truly deserves it. 

the song linked felt really suited to this.

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Frank Novak folded the cuffs of his sleeves, and then straightened his tie. He kept thinking about how similar the tie felt to a noose. His chest was tighter than usual. Fear, like a sinking kind of fear, like the kind that he's felt for the last eleven years sat on his two shoulders, legs folded.

He sat in the center of the room. The gallery. A whole gallery, to himself. His paintings and sketches displaying on every wall, no space anywhere between any of them. When he'd told his manager, Berta, she'd said that was too crowded—too messy, would anyone pay attention to any single work if all of them where smashed beside each other?

Berta had told him with no hesitations that he was no where near an established artist—this was his first opening, and she was all about bold choices, just not stupid ones. The goal, at the end of the night was to get someone to invest in Frank Novak's artistic potential—to buy a painting.

Frank had said, "Yes. They'd notice. It's hard not to pay attention to her."

So now, he sat minutes before the opening, in the middle of the room, in one of the couple of chairs situated here and there between coffee tables.

"You're gonna be like this all night, aren't you?" Berta said, now. "Talk to people when they come. Interact. They don't know you're the next Ulay, just yet."

Frank opened his mouth, but she stopped him.

"I'm joking..." she sighed. "I'm just nervous, Frank, because we have a lot riding on this. Neither of us want to go back to our day jobs." Day jobs. Frank, an accountant, of all things—and Berta, an editor's assistant. They'd met a few years ago, through some colleagues, somehow. "You know, you never tell me anything about her? About Lolita?"

His next words kind of choked at the end, died out. "I loved her, so I painted her." For years and years and years. He didn't know how to stop. How could one person have him so completely? She still had him. She was gone but she kept him.

"That's all you've ever told any of us," Berta said. "You loved Lolita. And it seems to me like you've never loved anyone since."

"Great time to bring that up," Frank laughed. Berta was staring at him, and he could not hold the gaze.

"Well, someone's got to," she said. "You love her, but you don't call her. You don't try to find her. I mean, this entire gallery is full of her, and her only, because you love her."

Frank tapped the armrest of his chair while Berta's heels clicked across the floor. "Look at this one. I've never seen eyes painted like this. This is what made me believe in you, Frank. In your art."

His eyes stayed on the floor. Click, click, click. "And this one. Her hair, like—like, a fucking river, for God's sake."

Her hands, her back, her mouth.

And this one, and this one, and this one.

"Let me be straight with you, Frank, because Cora's told me a little about you and her," Berta continues. "You're scared to find her, because you're scared she's moved on. And you want to sustain this. You want to sustain her, like this."