Halloween Portrait

I had gone all out for Halloween, and I could tell the effort was worth it from the reactions of the guests at my party.

But of all the little touches I had put out, none brought more attention than the large portrait on the living room wall.

It was one of those “double image” things, which usually show either an ordinary picture or something scary, depending on the angle you were at .

But in this case the one image was a shulb looking guy - overweight, balding, and glasses, and the other image was of a fairy tale princess.

And anyone who looked closely enough realized that the princess was me.

The party was fun, but all good things must come to an end, and so eventually it was time for me to say goodbye to my guests. The last of them lingered, looking back at the portrait, and asked, “Who’s the guy?”

“Nobody important. And he’s ... not around anymore anyway.”

She looked again, and shook her head. “Its not a normal halloween thing.”

“Halloween is about ... transformation, isnt it? Is there a rule you have to transform into something bad? Look at all the superhero costumes, and princesses, and so on.”

‘Maybe. It does look very realistic, I’ll give you that. You can almost see the guy flow into the picture of you. Like magic. Good thing magic isn’t real.”

“Isn’t it?” I asked with a smile, and closed the door.

With my guests gone, I could finally kick off my heels and take out a small cake with a couple of candles on it, which I set on the table beside a glass of wine. I sat down, and raised my glass to the portrait, and sighed.

“Made it through another year without turning back into you. So happy birthday to me.”

If the man in the portrait had anything to say to that, he kept it to himself ...

End.