Work Text:
Deanna has been preparing for this installation for weeks. She has been preparing herself mentally, sitting still for long periods of time, and eating at long intervals so that she will be able to sit and fast all day. She’s put together some frankly outrageous exhibits in her time, but this will be a test of will and of endurance. It was in the introspection itself that she found her answer: she would simply be present .
On her opening night, she is told by the curator that there is a line. This is more than he had expected, but Deanna is somewhat unemotional at that news. It’s a relief this won’t be an embarrassment, but she had not been too worried about that outcome. She checks her makeup and braid in the mirror one last time before sweeping her skirt around her and walking out to the chair. The fact that this is a half mirror of another piece, one that she did with someone , is a fact she has tried to ignore throughout the whole process. However, neither has she ignored it. The things that have shaped her have led her here, and it would be impossible to leave that out of our her psyche.
Taking her seat is easy. She’s been practicing. The first few participants sit nervously opposite her, their eyes darting. She gazes at them and gives them her full attention. She is present . One by one these people come before her to be seen. Some seem angry, some seem to be trying to figure her out, some people seem impassive, and some people begin crying, helpless silent tears running down their faces. She can feel the pain from some of these audience members, and she lets it all wash over her.
Part way through the night, Deanna is between participants. She sits silently, eyes closed and head bowed. She hears someone walk up to the table, and the participants around the edge of the stage have gone strangely quiet. She looks up, briefly catching the blood red of her dress as she looks past the edge of the table. Nothing she thought about could have prepared her for the person she sees on the other side: Will.
It’s been twenty-two years since she last saw him, atop the Great Wall of China. A thousand thoughts begin to chase each other through her head, but she determinedly clears them away and breathes out. The rhythm of her breathing is the one constant tonight, and she has prepared for this. Well, not this precisely, but the act of sitting and breathing and observing. She looks at Will, really looks at him . She can feel her eyes beginning to fill with tears, and he is looking at her with that soft look he has. The look that hasn’t really changed over time, but the hard edges from the last time they were together have softened out.
She can’t help herself. The one rule for participants, after silence, was that they were not to touch her. But she can’t help herself, and she’s reaching out to him. He meets her half way, and he clasps her hands. She’s lost in the feelings, her own this time, not someone else’s, and she doesn’t really hear what he says. His eyes say everything she needs to know, and she wants to stay in this moment forever. Too soon though, she feels compelled to draw her hands back and release him from this moment. She needs to release herself so that she can regain her composure.
Even with all the miles between them, with all the water under the bridge, perhaps because of those miles, they are simply there . He lingers, hands flat out on the table, for a moment, before he withdraws and stands, moving away to rejoin the crowd. Deanna becomes aware then that the audience around the edge of the stage has, in the time they gazed at one another, burst into applause and quieted again. The swell of energy that accompanied her and Will’s recognition of one another has mellowed again, although she still feels as tumultuous as a stormy sea. She breathes deeply again, smoothing out the edges within herself. She allows herself the time to sweep the tears from her eyes and pat her face. She resettles herself and readies herself for her next participant.