Scratching, scratching, scratching. In front of him and all around him. The shuffling and rustling of cloth on skin, a faint odour of perfume for reasons he knew not. It couldn’t help in any way with thought but then, it’s always nice to look your best when facing a challenge. The heat of the day was gathering its little storms around his head as he waited for ideas to form and march down his veins into the canvas he held before him. It had been a long day and more than ever, he wanted to just stare into space, looking for a small sign of what he once was and could have become before the infinite blackness and sludge of the everyday put him down, grabbed his creativity and smothered it like chocolate sauce on a piece of brownie cake. He knew there was more to do, more to see and more to describe but he couldn’t, he just couldn’t. Life was pulling him into a cycle only it knew how to break. A fickle master or mistress or everything in between. He couldn’t help but smile at his turn of a phrase. It had been what had got him so far in life, made him different from the world around him. A spirit in chains that broke free only to return to the shackles. Keys lost to the winds long ago with locks made of similar sands. It didn’t matter anymore what he felt, because he had learnt he couldn’t control it, couldn’t make himself feel something he had never learnt to. The world in flux had seen him and nurtured him and cut him in so many ways, his wounds looked like the very map he thought he would need to make himself. Maybe it wasn’t the signs he was supposed to look for but the ideas that made him think of those signs.

In all this, the light dimmed and outside, he saw freedom. In its freedom, he saw the drops of glory, of everything he had ever dreamed of pouring down in torrents, the rains of his ruin and his ecstacy. He couldn’t help but think of her and how much she would have loved it. He loved her, knowing he shouldn’t, knowing he couldn’t. They could never be and never would. Stolen kisses and hugs meant only so much now. More so that the things he could think of. It was a fact of life, a lesson he had to learn, tears he had to shed like the heavy clouds that eased their burdens like a pregnant woman on a countertop. He couldn’t think or speak. He knew he had to stay away. He knew he’d break her without meaning to, simply because of his love. The power he put in could never be matched by anyone ever. And that was exactly why he could never love fully. Because if he did, he would shine so bright, love so deep, that the world would be rent in two, along with his own heart and and the one who had the honour of having stolen it. It would be the end of life as we know it, more dangerous to love than to hate, that to even imagine. The doors of the Department of Mysteries could only imagine what lay behind his heart. The power of love could easily be underestimated, taken advantage of. But he could not help it, he could help but love the world in his innocence and depth. She was his world and he could not show her that. He dare not for that would break her beyond repair. Power does strange things to the world and his infinite control was needed beyond anything else.

Suddenly, the bell rang. Papers were strewn and the wood reverberated for minutes before the room was empty again. In his place, he slowly opened his eyes and stared out at the sun, his liquid black eyes simply looking, looking beyond…