Perpetually Charmed

The thing I wrote last night about the agreement in the space between heartbeats- the idea that there is a realm where a perpetual dance is being performed at all times in order to avoid the collapse of the shared structure of love- reminded me of another scenario I had pictured some amount of time back. In this realm two great wizards (a joker and the thief, a magician and illusionist, etc. etc.) had each realized that there must be lines along which love is compulsive for much the same reason as the necessity of the lines where love was freely chosen. These complex limit functions held in place this(these) kaleidoscopic, fractal, perhaps endless, structure(s) of love, giving tangibility that would not otherwise be known in experience, life seeming more like sleepwalking or even just sleeping when love is not in the picture.

These wizards each watched time go by in sad seclusion, unwilling to compel love themselves, unwilling to agree that such a step could be required. One day they connected with each other though, falling in love immediately; the next day they each realized something compulsive had been uttered, but neither could say certainly who had spoken it, and it seemed equally unlikely from either perspective that either would have done it intentionally. It was as though they turned to go, and their own voice called from all around "Stay!" Granted, at least in part, it was a request, but either way they were each only looking for an excuse to do precisely that, and so they stayed.

They each calculated separately, realizing that to combine these calculations might cost them something they would not want to lose, even if they never knew what that something was in its absence. So, cautiously, they lingered around each other, realizing now that every tiny detail beat like a drum in the halls of love. Step by step they approached, a common language revealed itself, and they were able to watch love bloom and cultivate it from these delicate positions. 

Then a day came where he felt her eyes narrow on him, and she muttered something his way, a most unusual experience of her, for him, so far. Her look grew more ravenous and primal until suddenly his reaction- or lack thereof- snapped her out of her trance. After a moment of regret, she looked confused and then frustrated and then too deeply frustrated to resist- she muttered the same phrase as her eyes started returning to their primal stare, looking as if they might erupt. This time he caught what was happening, or at least he thought he had: she had tried to charm him! Straight up, scooch the line and then hop over it, charm magic. It seemed pretty clear that she had resisted trying this for as long as she could, and was now fighting a kind of inner beast to retain control of herself. Blushing now, he found himself daydreaming that she could charm him, at least to some degree, but it did not seem like this was or would be the case, given his effortless rebuttal.

Then he started considering the foreign thread of wanting to be compelled, and how without that thread it felt like things would end up hollow, unraveling from within somehow. While he would never dream of doing this to her, looking into her eyes now he wondered if that was more a matter of the emphasis of their unique corners, than that there was something strictly evil in requiring something of someone, at its core. In this consideration he also realized she might be hoping for him to make precisely the same move. He carefully laid out his response, still generally clear headed, though his heart was certainly pounding now. It was worded in such a way that if she were to succumb, the path to being charmed would take her right back along the path of clarity, at which point she could refuse in full awareness and good faith. He also intentionally threaded a weakness into that phrase- in her clarify she would now know how to actually charm him back. Each effect was subtle, certainly things that can be blossomed on their own at a later point, the key here was: can love persist and thrive in an environment where both free will and predestination have been preserved? As she snapped out of her trance and then calculated his verse her eyes softened. It seemed she had agreed to be compelled on this subtlest of levels, and he could not blame her for wanting that, for either of them really.

Once she had conveyed consent and appreciation, letting even love spill from her gaze in this time, she gave him what seemed to be a wink, but one that she maintained. She had heard his heart within these lines, for it beat like hers but dissimilarly, and she knew that with one eye open, one eye closed, one eye locked on his form, one eye locked with him in a daydream, those hearts could be aligned here and now, once and for all. She had not turned down his advance, but even as she was being charmed he could sense that she had not missed his seeded weakness either, and all at once she was letting her threads stitch along, knotting the two of them together. This was a knot they had glimpsed well enough to realize neither of them could truly ask for, but neither could deny forever either and, regardless, it was on the table now that they both longed for this phase to be finished, though without diminishing the promises pairs would certainly bring. 

Had all this actually happened in one blink of the eye? It felt like time now folded within, condensing and the daydream yielding the stage, but without losing any of its validity, nor any of its shared context and lessons learned. She could feel her eyes narrowing again, and she seemed to hasten to pull down a veil but his grin stopped her in her tracks. Both of them, having now confirmed what they had seen in the vision, said in their own personalized mischievous tone "charm person!' It was no longer some magic spell as such, though one could certainly say that the words and tongue influenced the listener. It was now deeply buried, not viewed directly, but echoing off darkened corridors within the pair. In this darkness each day was new, for each day's echo possessed something to be revealed. All the while, the slightest glance would this vow renew, in joy. So the soulmates adventured, in some way or another 

every. single. day.