Perfect Enemy
...Third Part: Krad...
When will I see Dark again? I wondered often. Where did he go?
But Hikari never answered me, always steering me away from the subject or ignoring me altogether. He was painfully evasive about Dark, and I began to worry.
A violinist played on the street corner, a soft, content sound that sweltered out into the air. It calmed me a little, but any chance that I had of forgetting my concern completely was crushed by Hikari walking over to the window and closing it with a loud bang. I watched the musician look up at the interruption with contempt before resuming his playing with more clipped movements than before.
I sighed as Hikari walked away from the window, taking up a blank canvas from a small array leaning against the wall and setting it on the easel, first upright and then turning it on its side before he shuffled around the room in search of his paintbrushes.
In the odd little realm within our minds, I sat cross-legged, propping my elbow on my thigh and my chin on the heel of my hand. What are you doing? I asked. I wasn't really as curious as I normally would be, but it was a shortly-developed habit to ask anyway.
"I'm going to paint," Hikari said simply.
He found his brushes and picked through his paint assortment, looking for inspirational colors. He didn't know exactly what he aimed to make, yet.
Taking one of the larger brushes, Hikari mixed together a sort of dusky green color and proceeded to swipe the color across the white of the canvas in what looked to be no pattern or shape in particular. I watched the movement the color made as it appeared, imagining what it would feel like to create something like it. The strokes reminded me of the fluid, consistent movements of the violinist. The colors made a kind of music or feeling on the canvas, just as the notes of an instrument could create pictures in my mind.
Hikari?
"Yes?"
Is music an art, too? Like painting? If anyone would know such things, I supposed it would be the Hikari.
Blue was being added to the picture. Then he paused for a moment to think. "It can be," he considered. "If you can do it right, music is an art form."
And writing? Is that art, too? I wondered. The same movements were included in text, as well as painting or playing the violin. That swishing motion of a person's arm. It seemed a reasonable connection.
"Art can be just about anything, if you view it as such," he told me. "Now stop bothering me with silly questions, please," he added, blending in some pale orange here and there. "I'm trying to concentrate."
I closed my mouth and ran a hand back through my hair. Then I pulled a section of it over my shoulder to examine it. 'Blond'. Light and smooth, like crystallized honey.
I sighed again. What would it feel like to have Dark comb his fingers through my hair? What did his hair feel like? Was it just as silky as it had looked?
Hikari... I whispered.
No response.
I want to see Dark, I told him. I didn't have the complete concept of time where I was, but the sun had gone down, and the sky had gotten dark. Then it was light again, dark again, over and over. I didn't remember how many times the cycle had occurred, but it felt like a long time. Too long, I thought. Much too long.
But when I did get a response from Hikari, the answer to all I wanted was a short and decisive 'No'.
... No?