“No...no… honey no. You need to place the stencil up onto the wall, tape it and then use your spray paint on all the parts you want and then remove the stencil and your done.” S grabbed the other end of the stencil I was now holding up, it was quite grande and was about the size of her tiny frame. We managed to put up the stencil and glue it to the wall. S stepped back and sat on the ground and pointed her head towards the wall as if telling me to just go on and start. She threw the black spray can bottle up at me, it was a miracle that I caught it.
I put up my arms to start at the top of the picture, the black spray paint squirts out of the bottle magically, it goes exactly where I want it. I have never worked with such a flexible material before, it felt liberating. The fumes of the spray paint smelled dreadful so I covered up my mouth with the now rather disgusting suit I had been wearing from the night before. I finished quite quickly, I stepped back and removed the stencil from the wall.
It was perfect, in front of me stood a man, his black suit and hair done up nicely but in his hand he had a bouquet of red roses, they were broken and petals flew into a small pile on the ground. I positioned him so that it looked like he leaned his body against the side of the wall where it turned into another street. S stood up and looked at it, she smiled at my turned back, I could see it out of the corner of my eye. The kind of smile a mother does when her child just came home with a new piece of school made art.
“Is it you?” She asked.
“Yeah…. that is me, but instead of flowers I had a wedding ring.” I responded quietly, slowly finger per finger she tied my hand in hers. We stood there the two of us together, looking at my work and holding hands together. I then had the urge to look at her, so I did, we stood there together staring at each other as the cars swooshed by. I leaned in and kissed her softly.