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There’s greasepaint on Will’s doublet, white around the edges of his hairline. There’s always that bit you miss, no matter how hard you try.
“You are not much of an actor, boy,” says a voice, a voice smooth in the chest of a man with curling brown hair and an eyebrow raised in a mocking curve.
“Are you lost, sir?” says Will, his tone made to cut and snipe and tear, and the man throws back his head, laughs, says, “That, my friend, depends very much on who you are asking.”
The city is grey, grey and black and stinking, and the man’s name is Kit, and Kit comes with a smile and a laugh and a heart as grey as a London skyline, with a dagger at his belt and a lie on his lips. The city is brown and green and white, in turn, and when you walk with Kit it is all, none, the streets as like to run red as any other colour, as like to be his own blood as any other man’s. The city is grey and black and stinking, and Will walks beside Kit, watches him own it, watches it posses him, does not wonder what else is grey.
There’s ink smeared through Will’s eyebrow, on the lobe of his ear.
“Do you not posses a looking glass?” says Kit, boots kicking at the edge of the bed, anxious to go carousing, as usual.
“It would appear I am not the only one,” says Will, flicking a glance over his shoulder at Kit’s doublet, peacock blue-and-green.
“”Perhaps we should not go abroad to cause mischief,” says Kit, trying for lascivious, the way he always does, every once in a while, “this bed could do with some better company than you in it, Will.”
“Wouldn’t be you, then, would it, man?” says Will, and oh, there’s that laugh, that smile, that brief glimpse of a heart that beats hot, hidden in Kit’s chest like the voice that’s bought him a dozen noblemen’s sons.
“I would hazard not,” says Kit, and Will pulls his boots on, does not turn his head, swallows hard, mouth still burning from the lie he keeps telling, keeps telling, has never truly told at all.
They write of kings, but do not be fooled. They are not kings; there are no monarchs here. A company of players has no king but ale and parchment, and, every once in a while, the purse of an earl or two. They write of kings, play their own games. There’s politics in theatre, much like in any court. They pull themselves up by their bootstraps, mouths full of taunts and fingers hollowed out, plots flowing from them like water. They write speeches, make them, lean back against the pillars on the stage beneath London rain and wait for the crown to slip, for the fanfare to sound, for the fire to go out.
“A comedy? Whyever would I write that?” says Kit, that damned eyebrow raised, “Does it end in a marriage?”
“You are as like to marry as the Queen herself,” says Will, and Kit shrugs, fluid, his hand resting gently on Will’s collarbone.
“Aye, ‘tis true,” says Kit, “but should that mean I am barred from writing what I cannot have?”
“Cannot?” says Will, and Kit downs his ale, nods agreement, does not meet his gaze.
Will does not hope for something more than grey. He does not. He does not.
He does.
So, they fuck, because there’s such a thing as destiny, even under a London skyline, even under London stars. Kit kisses like he fucks, and fucks like he kisses, a desperate slide that’s indulgent and slick and with a hellfire edge. Will holds on, breathes words he shall never write into the only ear who will ever hear them, holds on, holds on, holds on. Kit leaves teeth in Will’s shoulder, Will puts his hand over Kit’s heart and presses down. They fuck, because there’s such a thing as destiny, but they’re playwrights, and destiny, you see, works both ways.
“They shall call this the Golden Age,” says Ben Jonson, leaning into Will’s shoulder, smug, and Will watches Kit stride onto the stage, feels a fist clench around his heart at that smile, knows, even though he does not wish to, because playwright is as playwright does, knows because he can do naught else but know, it is who he is, how he was made, knows even gold turns grey, in time.