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Elan had just walked into one of the biggest yard sales in her neighborhood. It was one of its kind considering the small size of her community. Except for the building itself, the entire property was on sale. 

Elan loved yard sales just like she loved life. In her words “you never what inestimable valuables you can find in a yard sale. And for almost next to nothing”. She'd smile afterward. The kind that reached her eyes and heart. She had the brightest smile that could light up any room. **“Your eyes are the color of sunshine. They are picture-perfect and should be framed for the whole world to see”.** Her father would always tease her.

As she strolled cheerfully around the yard, Elan quickly gathered some details about the house from the whispers around her. It was a small town and gossip traveled very quickly. 

“Oh, I heard the owner just disappeared years ago.”

“Poor beautiful lady. Only a coffee mug was found lying on the floor. Just beside that lovely portrait”. 

Elan followed the gesture of the old lady speaking. She came to a very striking and mysterious painting of a young woman drinking coffee. The woman had no eyes but Elan felt as though the eyes fell upon her. She shuddered. The artist had only revealed the lips of the woman in the portrait. In the description, it read that the painting had had nine previous owners. 

The rest of the face was a complete blur. Elan could not help but imagine what the face was like. “She had to be very beautiful,” she thought. Elan spent the rest of her time occasionally glancing at the painting until she purchased it at the end of the day. The lure was magnetic and too strong to resist. She had become the tenth owner of the mysterious portrait.

When Elan got home that evening carrying the weighty painting in her hands. She had mixed feelings and a shiver ran down her spine. Out of breath, she placed the painting on her living room table. Then with her eyes, she scanned for the perfect spot for the painting. “There!” she exclaimed pointing at the wall beside her window.

As she scurried through piles of collectibles toward the wall, she tripped and fell face down on the portrait. Elan winced in pain. She had bruised her forehead. Then she noticed a paper had fallen from behind the frame. It was a letter. The paper looked like an antique and the handwriting was beautiful like calligraphy.

Elan’s curiosity pricked. She opened the letter and started to read it.

“Dear reader,

I hope this meets you well. If you are reading this, then I still haven't found the perfect face and the others have been lost to oblivion. Before you continue, I want you to grab a hot cup of coffee and drink with me. My story is very short but you'll need it for the journey”.

Elan paused for a moment. “How interesting,” she thought. She got up, brewed herself a hot cup of black coffee, then settled on her living room table in front of the painting. She continued reading.

“Now that you are back reader, I have something to tell you. It took me ten decades and ten very strong dark cups of coffee to complete this portrait. Magnificent as it is, I could not find the perfect face for it. So I poured some of my coffee into the painting, in hopes that the perfect face would drink it. I needed ten faces for every cup of coffee I drank in the name of this portrait. Many have drunk my coffee but only the tenth would suffice”.

Elan began to choke on her drink. Then she began to notice something very strange. As she drank her coffee, the color of the coffee in the portrait diminished. When she took in the very last sip, the color vanished completely. Elan held her breath and a knot formed in her throat. She began to feel light in her body and soul. It was like she had lost control of herself. The painting emanated a dark light before her. Her eyes widened. Involuntarily, she felt her body moving towards the light until it consumed her whole. 

There sat Elan’s empty cup of coffee facing the painting of a woman drinking coffee. This time, it wasn't faceless. **Elan sat pretty and framed in the portrait, with her eyes the color of sunshine. Picture perfect.**