The Two Women
The two women were both heavily aware and also completely unaware of each other’s presence inside of the dimly lit theater. It was a pretty typical theater, with red plush seats and a protruding stage that had a blank backdrop. The crowd was full of shifting coats and contorting bodies. People flipped through programs and chairs folded upwards as people allowed others to go through the row to find their seats. A heating orange light colored the crowd warmly, and the stage drowned in monochromatic grayness. Hushed tones rippled through the crowd once the woman onstage pulled the curtain to the side, and began her performance.
Kathryn remained standing, at the edge of the theater. She leaned against the wall, consciously dirtying her elegant dress but preferring the relief of the lean to the sanctity of her outfit. The woman onstage straightened her back and allowed the bunched dress to fall around her.
The woman onstage and Kathryn were the only two in the room that were standing.
Kathryn had slipped in on a whim before the doors closed. She wasn’t sure what had compelled her to do so, not knowing what was happening until her sandaled heels pushed her through the door and down the stars. From her angle now, she experienced the crowd as a sea of particles. The backs of their heads rendered them completely anonymous, shadows occupying the red theater seats. The only face that she could see clearly, completely in focus, was the woman onstage.
The woman onstage breathed in deeply. The crowd’s presence worked their way into her very soul. Every individual’s being was a kiss on the cheek. Each wet kiss melted into her, disintegrated her, as if their saliva was coming into contact with paper. A gift.
It was a routine performance. Nothing too creative, nothing too boring. One of the many performances that a patron could opt to see in the city. Perhaps this performance remained in business because of the woman onstage’s beauty and charisma. Perhaps it was luck. Perhaps it was completely random. Perhaps the theater was simply well located. Whatever the reason, the crowd was full and the theater hummed silently. If you asked one of the patrons about the performance, they would probably give a noncommittal shrug, and say that they had a good time.
But for Kathryn, it was a life changing performance. Kathryn found herself arrested in time, forced to stay and watch. There was something about the dreariness coupled with the ostentatiousness of the woman performing. The woman onstage bore her eyes into the crowd, begging them to watch her. It took Kathryn a second to realize that the begging was actually desperation. There was a loneliness in the attention that she sought, and Kathryn saw herself in it.
The scattered hues of Kathryn’s emotion deepened the theater into more warmth, as coolness spread through her body. The woman onstage’s darkness drenched the scene in melancholy and contrast. As the performance reached the climatic scene, the two locked eyes with each other.
Kathryn stood completely still while the audience jumped to their feet in raucous applause. She felt her heartbeat in her ears. There was a sliver of an angle in between the crowd’s heads where the two could keep eye contact with each other. They remained there until they couldn’t anymore.
The woman onstage’s presence crumbled into a ball, shredded her existence, and left.
Kathryn walked up the stairs and onto the busy city street. She almost expected to see the woman materialize in front of her. But when she didn’t, she let her sandaled heels take her home.