Chloe
It’s late when I get to the studio.
The real studio. The only one I care about.
I like to come here at these late hours. To watch him in his element.
Keller Vaughn.
The entire reason I am even at this school.
My father thinks I came here for the dance program. The sponsorship opportunities and famous
alumni. But it couldn’t be further from the truth.
The only reason I came here is sitting at his desk. Charcoal in hand, blank paper in front of him.
He never fills it in. He never even so much as touches it. But I can see it in his eyes. The way he is
making magic in his mind. The way he studies the paper so intensely, he barely notices when I come
in.
He is a genius. An artist. A professor.
And a damaged soul.
I’ve followed his career since the age of sixteen. When his work was at the height of its popularity.
When everybody wanted a piece of the mysterious ‘Rellek’. It was an explosive movement in the art
world. A revolution. The marriage of street art and fine art in a collaboration so addictive the world
couldn’t help but take notice. The mystery of the man who worked within the shadows only added to
the allure. Speculation was rampant. Code breakers trying to discover the meaning behind the name.
Investigative sleuths and entire online communities of fans and foes.
His work was controversial. Highly visible to the public eye. Murals on the sides of well-known
buildings. Buildings that quadrupled in value simply for being touched by his hands. His signature.
Soon, he was being commissioned through channels of absurd proportions.
Celebrities, universities, galleries… they all wanted a piece of him. And little by little, he caved to
the pressure.
And then one day, it was all gone.
Taken by a crazed fan who set off a bomb in the packed theater he was performing in. The shadows
couldn’t protect him from the shrapnel. And after the death toll had risen, and only the newspaper
articles remained, the world knew him for who he really was.
Rellek was simply Keller. Keller Vaughn. The simplicity of his pseudonym shocked the millions