They met in autumn, under a maple tree where the leaves burned crimson like the heat in their glances. Ava was painting alone, her canvas half-finished, her thoughts far away. Daniel was passing by, camera in hand, chasing the dying light of the golden hour.
He asked if he could take a picture of her painting. She said only if he stayed and talked.
He stayed.
That was the beginning.
They spent the months that followed wrapped in each other — winter was cold, but never lonely. He took pictures of everything she painted. She painted everything he captured. Their love was art, alive and growing, filling every blank space in their hearts.
But Ava’s heart was also hiding something.
She had known since the beginning. The doctor’s words had echoed in her ears for months before she ever met Daniel:
“It’s terminal. You have a year, maybe less.”
She hadn’t told him. She didn’t want their love to be tainted by grief. She wanted to feel what it was like to be loved without pity. So she smiled through the pain, held his hand tighter when it trembled, and painted like she was racing time — because she was.
Spring came, and she grew weaker.
One morning, Daniel found her in the studio, sitting in front of a half-finished canvas, her head resting gently against the easel, like she had just dozed off.
But she wasn’t asleep.
Beside her, she had left a note. No tears, just ink:
“You made my last months feel like forever.
Please finish this painting. It’s us, under the tree.
I’ll be waiting there.”
Daniel did finish the painting.
He kept it in the room where the light always hit just right — where her memory never faded.
He never painted again.
