AN- I think...I really think...this is almost a prologue to Much Ado About Nothing. I'll let you decide who the speaker is. Not sure where this came from but...here it is damn it.
XXXX
In the shadow of something greater, do you have the strength to shine a light in the dark?
I see nothing in your eyes. Nothing at all, and I am forced to wonder if you are even human. There are hundreds of muscles in the human face, designed and refined specifically for the expression of emotion and internal thought processes. Yet, as I look upon your countenance, I see nothing more than a blank page…and empty expanse of canvas capable of yielding the most beautiful and intensely painted emotions I have ever seen. You take your brush, and the stark nothing becomes whatever twisted motif you wish to express yourself with, meaningless interpretations of the same words, the same lies.
I know you. I know your kind, and your creed, and your lies…your beautiful beautiful lies are meaningless to me. Nothing more than blank canvas that will eventually rot, colors that will eventually fade in the sunlight and fall to dust, to come away on my fingers when I dare to touch you. You cannot hide forever, though I find your attempts to run from me quite thrilling, and there is nothing you can do to stay so immortal. I see nothing in your eyes, and I know that it is a lie.
I know.
Which begs the question, why, if I am so very aware of the fact that you will give nothing to me in your eyes and expression, in stillness and gesticulation…why do I continue to turn my questioning eyes to yours? Nothing more than blank looks, brief meetings of the soul, but it is more, it is so, much, more.
I find myself drawn to the shadows I find where nothing exists. Even in the lack of substance, there is something to said for shadow…for darkness. One cannot exist without the other, and if you will deny me substance, then I will take nothing.
I will take nothing from you.
In return, I offer the only thing I am capable of giving you with a clean conscience. Nothing at all. I suppose it isn't a matter of what I want to give you, because in this relationship, we can only give what we are offered, the push and pull of the current raging between our shores. I cannot offer what you have not, and I cannot take what you have not first yielded. I'd take everything from you, everything you would dare to lay before me, and if, in the process, I were to break you, I would build you up again. We cannot help but mirror each other, in soul, in mind, in action, in word, in nothing. Nothing.
Because where there is nothing, there is shadow, and I will take your shadows and play them against my Light, if that is what you offer. I will offer up my own that you may compare, the darker desires and trusts and the very soul of me, that you may decide if I am of worthy of your time.
Because you are certainly worthy of mine, my artist… my stark, beautiful liar.
And when you crumble to dust, when your legacy fades away, seared into the flesh of humankind like a brand, I will catch you.
When you glance at me again, I will yield suspicion, frank honesty, cold calculation and the promise that I will break you, one day. One day, I will take everything from you, in the name of what is right, and your paintings will fade away into nothing.
What will you give me in return?
Have you the strength, in the shadow of something greater, to shine a light in the dark?