I do have an audience.
In the motes of dust, in the ancient papers that litter each surface, in the chipped paint, rotting floorboards, fresh concrete, and the nests of ants and roaches and silverfish lies a single, blinking light.
Staring at me from across the way.
A single red dot in a room where a scream would echo, where a footstep could resonate.
Where even a heartbeat can make the wood under my feet pulse.
I move no further in the dark.
The red dot holds its gaze on me, eerily, unblinking, unmoving, unfeeling. Are there a pair of eyes behind it? I no longer know. I've been staring at it for months, days, hours, years. There is no longer a point of time, no rise of the sun or set of the moon, to mark the minutes. The single red dot has bored a hole through my eye, and burst through the back of my skull. I cannot look away.
But I have an audience.
Years ago, I danced. My feet, nimble and quick, could do anything I set them to. They could glide, and pirouette like a dream. They were the unknown second partner to my own companion, whoever they were for the evening. Years ago, I drifted across this ballroom floor, light as a feather, graceful as an otter, and I danced.
Now, I stand.
The one who danced could only get their audience by not dancing- how strange that is. How unfortunate.
My audience has not left my side for the months and years I stand here, in this cage of glass and metal, pointing my direction, burning into my eyes and into my brain and through me, straight through me. Simply watching, but only watching.
How unfortunate.
I have an audience.
You will be magnificent. She had told me, as she bound my arms high above my head to keep them where they were. My feet were pointed downwards so far that they cramped, in a permanent pirouette. I daresay a masterpiece.
I don't remember crying out, or begging for my life, or trying to climb from my skintight prison. I remember the cold and a sound so inhuman I cannot describe it. And when all was said and done she hung me to dry, I opened my eyes, and I saw it. The light. The tiny, red dot that never blinked and never changed. My audience.
I've never looked away from my audience.
I've never looked around this room.
I know what I would do if I could. The only thing is, I don't think I can scream.
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