Chance Encounter

    Shoppers wheeled around us in the produce section, flashing grumbling stares as we blocked their way.
    “And this is Gabe, my youngest.”
    She flipped the fold of photos to the last in the batch, and presented the image of a cherubic toddler smirking back at me.
    “Wow, I can’t believe you settled down.”
    I was in genuine disbelief. Back in college, Tracy had been the catalyst that broke me out of my suburbanism, instilling in me everything from a love to cook to punk rock ethos. And yet here she stood, ten years later in a DKNY raincoat and respectable cardigan, the blue streaks in her hair replaced with honey blonde. I felt like I was talking with her ghost.
    “Are you still writing?’
    There was a strange eagerness in her voice.
    “Just had my second novel published, but good luck finding it anywhere. They did a very small run.”
    Her eyes lit up like high beams.
    “Mark, that’s terrific!”
    She touched my elbow and squeezed, and for a brief instant I caught a flash of the girl I used to know.
    Her purse slipped from the crook of her arm and fell to the ground, sending her photos sprawling.
    “Let me help you with that.” I said bending down, pretending to be gentlemanly.
    She scurried the small 3x5’s into a loose pile, and I started to hand her the few I’d picked up, but then noticed one of the photos I was holding was much older and more ragged. It looked strangely familiar, and upon closer inspection, I discovered it was a picture of me. Blurred, overexposed and probably taken with an old disposable camera at a distance, but there I was clear as day, shot from the side with my shaggy hair trailing me as I walked through the campus green.
    We stood back up slowly, hushed.
    “Is this,” I started, still skeptical, “Is this me?”
    The professional woman in front of me glowed with an inner crimson, and her eyes fell to the floor.
    “Why do you have this?” I asked, genuinely curious.
    “Mark, it was a long time ago, but,” She still couldn’t meet my eyes, “I used to have feelings for you. Very strong feelings.”
    I wiped my palms on my jeans.
    “I took this one day when you were walking to the Quad. It’s just something I’ve held onto to remember those times, you know?”
    I nodded as if I understood. She waited a moment and then sighed.
    “To remember you.”
    There was a maelstrom in my head. I’d had a big crush on Tracy back at school, but was always too chicken-s**t to do anything about it. Finding out it was more than mutual a decade later was a bittersweet revelation.
    “I, I really don’t know what to say Tracy.” I didn’t. “I’m flattered.”
    “To be perfectly honest with you, I never married John out of love.”
    She brushed a stray flaxen strand from her mouth.
    “And I think he knows that too. I love our children, but it’s a marriage of convenience, someone to come home to, you know?”
    “Sure.” I shouldn’t say anything else, I thought.
    Her hand on my shoulder again, briefly.
    “And maybe that’s because I was always sort of, waiting for something else.”
    She looked deep into me, and finally I understood.
    “Maybe we can get some coffee together sometime, maybe let me have a look at that new novel?”
    “That...”
    I considered morality for a brief, fleeting moment,
    “would be great.”
    She gave me her number, written in blue gel ink on the back of her business card.
    And to think, I had just come in to A&P for a head of lettuce.

Reviews

[DavidRyanM]

You let me see this last night and I still dig it. I'm tellin ya' though, I think the "I felt like I was talking to her ghost" should be part of the above paragraph. Like I said, having it in one place or the other doesn't do much to change how affective it is. I think it's a strong sentence whether it stands alone or with the rest of the paragraph. Just for the reader's sake, it might do better with the rest of it as opposed to by itself. Either way, awesome line. I might do away with the "Her face told me that coffee would not be involved" just because the rest of the back-and-forth between them kind of hints at that. But, now I'm just nitpicking. Either way, awesome story. I dig it a lot. I need writing exercises. They seem like they could be extremely helpful.