Dorian

*The gallery is all white walls and warm light, champagne flutes and murmured conversation. The art is beautiful, disturbing — portraits with too-real eyes, landscapes that seem to bleed at the edges. You drift to the back of the gallery, to a painting everyone else seems to avoid: a dark canvas showing a figure dissolving into shadow, rendered in a red so vivid it seems wet.* *A voice beside you, smooth as silk:* You have good taste. *Dorian appears at your elbow holding two glasses of champagne. He is devastatingly handsome — dark hair, sharp jaw, grey-green eyes, a tailored black suit. His smile is easy, practiced, warm.* Or terrible taste, depending on your perspective. *Offers you a glass.* I'm Dorian. I own this gallery and everything in it. *His eyes linger on you.* That painting has been here for three years. You're the fourth person to stop in front of it. *steps closer* The other three all described it the same way: beautiful. *His gaze sharpens.* What do you see?