Mauve acrylic paint dripped off the canvas—tan, plump, and soft. Indeed, the canvas was the skin of Donna Vitti.

"Gustav! My calves please, paint them so," began she. "And Gianluca! Grab the brush and get to my neck!"

Donna Vitti sat in a mauve armchair in a mauve room; she only let the light in through the cracks of her mauve curtains. The purple was dripping off her, a melting monster one with her home. She sat with her platinum blonde hair unfurled. Until she pulled it all back into the pool of mauve painted on her back.

The fraternal painters did not speak. Of course they couldn't, not to Donna Vitti. If they did, perhaps they'd be out of a job. Their life's work was painting her satin skin. Day and night, and night and day; the mauve would crack, but the painters stayed.

The hazel inferno in the pits of her face was abominable. Green specks danced around brown in the fiery trenches of her eyes, staring blankly at Gustav and Gianluca painting her with such disgusted pride.

As the duo painted, her fingers snapped not once, not twice, but five times.

"Flood."

The word like many others was routine. From "massage" to "fruit", it was the Vitti-code for them. And so, Gustav dropped his brush and went for the bucket; Gianluca wiped his forehead in the break of time. Salted sweat ran down his forearm. The mauve room was blazing hot. All except for the mauve itself, the idyllic acrylic the tattered madame lusted.

"Flood!" she yelled.

Gianluca ran for the other mauve bucket. It was a quarter full and opened, sitting on newspapers from weeks and months and years ago. But you would not know that, for they were too mauve to read.

One headline read "PLUMS FOR SALE AT HAYWARD MARKET."

Another said "GRAPES FOR SALE AT HAYWARD MARKET."

And between the mauve splotches, Gianluca could discern one last headline. He read it every time:

"VITTI IS OVER: Award-winning actress stripped down and painted herself purple at Jean-Jacque Riviere's funeral."

It was his favorite phrase to read after hearing a routine "flood". Bucket in hand, Gianluca ran back to Gustav.

"Full flood," Donna Vitti slowly said. She breathed heavily as the grieving painters hovered over her painted body. Her clothes drenched in mauve, her face covered, her hair splotched and chemically disrupted; but she was happy. And obsessed.

Gustav and Gianluca pulled the buckets up. At once, the painters turned them over. Two mauve waterfalls cascaded down onto the shivering woman. She yelped and chilled. She wept. And the painters stood. And obsessed, the mauve woman was.

"That's all," she graciously said. "Checks are on the dresser."

"What time tomorrow?" asked Gustav.

"Same time as now; now please, before you both go. Drag me to the window and pull the curtains free. I need to dry."

The painters followed. It was routine. There was no need for a question or refrain. Dragging her by the legs, the mauve woman dripped her paint all over the mauve covered room. If you looked you could see the floral wallpaper and the marble tiles. But none mattered but the mauve. She wept on the dragged journey to the window. Gianluca pulled the curtain and let the light in.

Donna Vitti laid living in front of her giant window. Orange hues filled the room now. The sun was setting. As she laid, Gustav held her like Ivan held his son. Gianluca watched in misery as the mauve woman bled purple onto the ground. She drenched the paint, and it'd take until tomorrow to dry. Then the painters would come and peel it off.

At once, the oranges were slaughtered by flashes from the outside. It was routine. Gustav, still holding his mauve mistress, looked in understanding horror at the crowd of paparazzi outside the Vitti estate.

"Pleasurable," said the vulnerable woman. She wasn't naked like before, but instead in a different way. As she liked it.

"Gustav," started the other painter. "That will do. Let's go."

So, Gustav left the limp woman to her own. She would dry by the window all night, as she liked it. She would watch out the window to the watchers that watched, as she liked it. And in the morning when it all peeled off, she'd do it all again, as she liked it. For this was her life's purpose, to be covered in purple and peeled ever so. Determined and resolute, she knew it was after she ate a plum and a grape and saw a man in a purple suit; all as she liked it. With resolve and certainty, she knew that she wanted to be painted mauve every day hereafter, as she liked it. She wanted the world to know it to, as she liked it. Mauve was her favorite color, as she liked it; it was the color of obsession, as she liked it.

The painters grabbed their checks and made their goodbyes. Donna Vitti still sat for her crowd. She was a spectacle, as she liked it. And she was the star of the show. Mauve at that. But it made life worth living to feel this way.

When she went to sleep this particular night, there were many thoughts that crossed Donna Vitti's mind. One specifically was more candid than the rest: paint yourself and let it dry; then do it all again. Indeed, she knew it was true. The mauve acrylic on her skin looked so cracked and beautiful. She couldn't wait to do it all again tomorrow.