Conditional Reality

Gravestone Coldfront painted miniatures of famous paintings on people’s fingernails. Her customers loved seeing tiny replicas of Starry Night, American Gothic, Whistler’s Mother, or The Scream on the canvas above their lunules. Gravestone was busy most hours of most days doing her harmless forgeries. I could do my own pictures, she would tell her customers, but trust me, you wouldn’t want that. My pictures are too new. You would become ill just to look at them. These images you’ve seen a thousand times are much safer for everyone. It’s like seeing an old friend. A comforting scratch behind the ears.