The sun was just beginning to come overhead though it wasn’t quite noticeable with the darkened clouds spreading everywhere. Ophelia glanced out the window to the lake, back at the blank canvas then out the window again. She couldn’t remember the last time she had actually felt warmth on her skin. Her hair was dark and disheveled; she had been torturing it all morning with her empty thoughts. Her complexion was fair and her eyes a golden toffee. They shone radiantly in the sun, or at least they would if they ever met the sun.
She looked at her soul carrier lying at her feet, dipped her brush in a funny beige then proceeded to paint the outline of a face. Again she dipped the brush and filled in the spaces then stared at the canvas with a puzzled face. Who was this person staring back at her? What color should his hair be? His eyes? Where did he grow up? What was his story? She went to dip her smaller brush in to a sandy blonde color and felt a tug at her leg. She looked down to see her soul carrier staring up at her with a look of disagreement. Black then? Again, a tug. How about brown? Not just any brown but the color of coffee on a cold winter morning and all the comfort, a smile.
Alexi wasn’t just a part of her, Alexi was all of her. Everything she felt that she was afraid to feel, everything she thought that was afraid to think, everything she already was but was afraid to be, Alexi was everywhere. Ophelia wasn’t good at showing her true feelings and she didn’t always want to, her soul carrier didn’t leave much choice. Even if something was bothering her and she wanted to hide it, Alexi would always give her away, worse yet if she was happy about something she shouldn’t be. Even though Alexi was Ophelia in her purest form, they didn’t always get along.
Ophelia finished the stranger’s hair and washed out her brush studying his face searching for answers. He was trying to tell her who he was but it wasn’t quite coming through. It was all here, his eyes, his nose and his jaw. Even the forehead was a masterpiece.
She had been painting since she was a child but it was more than that to her now. Ophelia liked to imagine that she was creating real people with real lives and real stories. Every brush stroke meant more to her than perhaps it should. Even when it came to landscapes these places were real, at least to her, and she wanted everything to be perfect. This at least Alexi understood.
Again she stared out the window searching for answers. There was something about the way the waves softly kissed the shore that allowed her mind to be at ease. Truthfully the lake was not so much a lake as it was a large pond, but in this quaint little town it was perfect.
Now her attention was on a peculiar young man in a white collared shirt and funny looking vest. His hair was just as short and disheveled as hers. He was carrying a trunk up the front porch of what looked like an empty house, though she couldn’t figure out for the life of her where he came from.
Sometimes Ophelia didn’t know how to deal with this; sometimes she ignored her true desires and wants. It’s not that she wanted to but what other choice did she have?
