The Girl Across the Room

This little game has been going on for weeks. I go into the coffee shop for a cappuccino and I sit in the arm chair in the corner, and every day she comes in, she orders a chai tea latte and she sits at the table across from me. Every day, I catch her glare, and she knows I only notice because I'm looking at her too. I just can't stop staring at the girl across the room.

There's no way to tell which of us started staring first, no particular reason why she always seems to catch my eye and I always catch hers. It could be how her toes never stop tapping, or how she always needs to tousle her artificially red hair. Maybe she looked at me first, and I got curious.

Maybe she likes the way I dress, maybe she likes my concentrated expression. Maybe it's because I looked first, and she got curious. 

The girl across the room, she wears black rimmed glasses, and I've never seen her in pants. She loves to chew the end of her pen and check to make sure it hasn't messed up her lipstick. She loves to read, and she always steals a glance above its paperback horizon while turning a page. I always look directly at the counter when she does. 

Sometimes I'll bring my laptop, and I'll check my e-mail or update my blog and remember the hazel eyes sitting pretty behind those black rimmed glasses. I'll look up, and she always looks at the painting on the wall when I do. 

We never speak, never acknowledge our little game, we just keep playing, always stealing little bits of information that slip from our daily routine. I know she loves war fiction, and shoes. 

I couldn't tell you what she knows about me.

Sometimes, I imagine one of us, one day, approaching the other, with a witty comment that breaks the thick wall of ice. Other times I feel silly, with my movie-style imaginings of meeting a stranger and forming something real, something close.

I remember once, while I eyed her ever-tapping feet, I looked up, and her shiny brown eyes shone through those black rimmed glasses and hit my green ones dead center. Her expression didn't change, while I must have yielded a look of utter idiocy. We looked into each other's eyes for what could only have  been three seconds, and then she smiled with the back of her pen between her teeth. I smiled too, and she ducked back behind her paperback horizons to read about wars that never happened. 

I went back to staring blankly at my blog.

But the girl across the room, she never came in today.

Reviews

[wonderful_wishes]

I love it. But i wonder what happened to the girl sitting aross the room? she sould have died or got bored with your game. Maybe she had a family emergency. Or maybe....... the girl was a figmant or your imaginaitio! Dun Dun Dunnnnnn! just kidding, I really do love it :)

[Maria Do]

Engaging. I could easily picture the girl and imagine this little game going on. I think anyone who regularly visits coffee shops to work can relate to some degree.

The only weakness for me was the line: while I must have yielded a look of utter idiocy

It's hard to imagine something that must have or almost is...

nice icy last line too...