Well, the fact of the matter is that if the auction goes well, I am certain I will die. 

Allow me to explain. I am a collector by nature – not one of those ghastly hoarders, mind you, collectors of tat, Bakelite knick-knacks and the like. I collect Francesco Baptiste landscapes. Yes, that Francesco Baptiste. I have all bar one of his in my personal collection – as if Baptiste devised these solely for my delight. The first one – a stunning vista of a pre-industrial American plateau – I actually found at a house clearance, sat among philistine portraits and tasteless cross-stitched cats. It spoke to me and since then I have been obsessed (I don’t like to use that word, but one has to be honest) about finding them all. 

The issue arose when I hanged – not hung – my most recent Baptiste. ’Tis one of the most gorgeous in my collection, a panorama par excellence. Slashing strokes of crimson daggering the azure skyline, a veritable orchestra of ferocity as rocky mountain paths lead up, up and over the tip of the hill that sits below the dancing reds and blues. One ends up craning one’s neck over the top of the frame in futility as if to snatch a final peek of what golden Arcadia may lie beyond the summit. 

You see, the strangest thing happened when the picture was hanged – not hung. The string took a trio of attempts to affix itself to the nail, and as soon as it hung – not hanged… no wait… Anyhow, I awoke inside the painting. More peculiar, still, was the fact I could see me – the ‘outside’ me, the tangible, earthly me – looking back at the painting. Yet the ‘outside’ me didn’t notice the ‘me’ that is talking to you now. 'Twas as if I were invisible to myself. I screamed at the ‘outside’ me, sure that I must be hallucinating. Alas, after six or seven years stuck inside this vista, I am certain I am real. A real, alternative me frozen in the belly of the Baptiste, forever isolated among the beauty and solace of Francesco’s imagination. I tried for months to leave, skirting the edge of the painting, climbing to the brow of the hill and jumping, but there was no escape. 

I have theorised that I must be an anthropomorphised manifestation of the act (and the art) of collection. These paintings are essential to the ‘outside’ me’s existence, the environment they create among the cream-coloured walls and rosewood benches of my private gallery is vital. They form an escape into a different dimension, a dimension I now truly inhabit. There was such joy in the continuous collection of the Baptistes, watching as the walls filled up, each painting a new voice whispering. In my solitude, the whisperings increase in their volume. 

I have also had time to confirm that there are other me’s trapped within the other Baptiste landscapes; that each painting spawned a doppelganger. One does wonder whether all collectors experience this phenomenon, this division of the self into each item in their collection. Does a mimic appear in an old-fashioned teapot after display on a mantlepiece, or inside a moth-eaten leather case stuffed with stamps? 

Anyway, my certainty arose when I heard a scream from one of the Baptistes, an especially gorgeous icy winter landscape. 'Twas around two years since my incanation and the ‘outside’ me had donated the painting to a local gallery for a few months. When the vista was stripped from the wall an awful screech rang through the room so macabre, so impossible not to hear, and yet the movers and the 'outside' me acted as good as deaf. Only I heard the sound of that ‘me’ in that Baptiste being torn from existence.  

For the first few years, I at least found solace in the fact there were worse paradises to be isolated within. Now, among these brush-stroked trees and flowing golden-tinged rivers, I am terrified of the day my landscape is donated or removed. The whispers over the hill murmur patiently. 

Which brings me to the current issue: the ‘outside’ me has sourced the final Baptiste landscape at an auction. The reason I’m fearful is, what is the ‘outside’ me, if not the promise of another landscape to hang? The only true territory the ‘outside’ me holds is the abstract promise of another Baptiste to inculcate themselves into, to slice themselves thinner within. If the ‘outside’ me were to complete the collection it would be tantamount to launching the final slither of themselves, of ourselves, into oblivion. What void lies beyond a completed existence? 

The temporary donation of a single Baptiste disintegrated one of our souls – I can only envision what should happen were the collection to be completed. At the start of my existence, I wished for freedom, yet now I fear nothing more. The whispers are growing. I pray the auction goes poorly and that I have a few more years of this frozen solitude.