Back then, Nathaniel was nobody—a nameless "folk artist" working in the dirt.
Talented enough to look impressive here, sure, among people who didn't know the first thing about art. Big fish, tiny pond.
But outside this county?
Nathaniel's work wasn't worth a damn.
That's not me talking. I heard it myself, years later, pressed against the other side of a wall.
The man speaking was a collector—the kind who lived to acquire pieces.
He'd just paid a steep price for Nathaniel's *Shepherd Boy with Ox*, then turned right around and told someone beside him that Nathaniel didn't understand art at all.
"Then why'd you buy his painting?"
The collector leaned in and dropped his voice. "Because the man knows how to market himself. Once he's dead, those paintings will triple in price."
Hearing that left me torn in half. It hurt—Nathaniel's life's work, in the hands of someone who saw it as nothing but an investment. But part of me was satisfied, too, because in a way, the man had just confirmed what I'd done.
That's right. Every bit of Nathaniel's marketing was my doing.
The gallery visits, the curator meetings, the networking with people in the art world. Nathaniel hated crowds, hated putting himself out there for a few extra dollars. He couldn't lower himself. It would compromise the dignity of being an artist, he said.
He couldn't afford a real agent. He just painted all day, staring at the pile of canvases growing taller and taller, waiting for me to bring him something to eat.
Looking after him meant I never held a steady job. The whole household survived on my thin dowry and whatever my family scraped together. Some days we ate; some days we didn't.
So I started trying to sell Nathaniel's paintings myself.
Little by little, I taught myself how to pitch artwork, how to get his pieces in front of people. Enthusiasts started calling his simple, unschooled style a kind of back-to-basics pastoral art, and slowly his name picked up traction in the market.
But the sneers and ridicule I swallowed along the way—I never told him about any of it.
He basked in the flowers and applause, soaked up the spotlight, and seeing him happy was enough to make me happy.
Back then I thought: as long as Nathaniel is happy, that's enough.
He didn't owe me anything. The bitterness I ate was my own willing choice.
Now, I was done being his silent, invisible workhorse.