Chapter 1: A Brief Moment

-CHAPTER ONE-

Standing outside my house, I lit a cigarette. I took my first breath of smoke and as exhaled I found my eyes taking a glance at his house. This was not something I could control. My eyes would always wonder to his house and I would find myself trying to see into his living room window. What was he doing? Who was he with? Was he watching TV? What was he watching? So many questions enter my young mind when stood outside my house for my routine cigarette.

I first saw him five years ago. He had moved into the house across the street with some other males. I never found him attractive. All the other girls on the street would blush as he walked by, and he would just continue as they paid him such wonderful compliments. I just watched as he walked by me with an absent mind, as if he was totally oblivious to the effect he had on the girls. After all, he was not stunning; quite average actually. He was about five feet and nine inches tall. He wore his hair different from one month to the next. Sometimes he would be shaved, or he would let his hair grow. Whatever his style, I did not really care.

Some years later, I found myself working a as a cleaner, for some extra money in between my studies. I would rise early and wonder out for my bus in the dark and cold of the winter morning. I think he started work pretty early too, as I always saw his house lights on at four am. I seem to have noticed all these details about his life, although I was totally convincing myself that I didn’t like or know this guy nor did I wish to. Looking back, I must have been subconsciously falling in love.

I opened my front door and felt the cold air gently brush across my face. I saw the first steam from my mouth as I looked down for door keys. I locked my door and looked up as I turned around. The crisp frosted grass of my garden sparkled as I walked by it. Onto the street I walked down along the road and heard some activity. It was a reassuring that I was not the only person around at that time of morning, and I looked around the street using only my eyes. Walking on the other side of the street was he. He had has dog with him and he called it back as the dog came to me and tried to smell my shoe, and he said “Sorry love”.
I just looked over to him and smiled very quickly before turning my attention to the road in front of me. I proceeded very quickly to the bus stop.

A whole cache of emotions entered my mind as I stood waiting for the bus. I lit up a cigarette and began hearing his voice on loop. “Come here” it said, and "Sorry love." I imagined him calling back his dog, but laughed at myself as I dreamt up that he was calling “come here” to me. In a dream like state I heard the bus and snapped back to reality and threw my cigarette to the floor and began waving my hand to holt the bus while also trying to find my purse at the same time with my other hand.

I boarded the bus and took my seat, I felt the warmth of the material on my bottom as I sat down. I stared out of the window as the bus proceeded towards my work, and I found myself thinking of him again. For the duration of the journey I went over and over that very brief encounter with him and his dog about fifteen minutes prior. His voice still fresh in my mind, I turned my attention to his announcement, “Sorry love”. Love? He called me love. Did he mean that? Was it a sign that he found me attractive? Surely not. He must talk to all women that way.

As I exited the bus, my heels hit the frosty ground. I saw my blonde hair reflecting in the bus shelter’s plastic windows, and I admired my looks. I always dressed very formally and looked somewhat like a vintage film star. My hair platinum blond, my lips as red as an apple, my eyes sky blue with my long eye lashes and my nicely shaped eyebrows. Surely he must find me attractive. Who would not?

I stopped admiring my reflection. It wasn’t something I did very often, but this is what he had done to me. He made me feel very vain and I had check myself out to make sure I had looked my best when he saw me in the street earlier. Why did I feel this way? I didn’t even fancy the guy. Or did I?

As I walked up the road to my work place I soon pushed the thought of him to the back of mind and greeted fellow colleagues who were waiting outside for me to unlock the doors. As I turned the keys, I could hear Cathy, Lillian and Mary laughing behind me, and I laughed along, although I wasn’t really sure what we were laughing at. I was still finding myself drifting into trance like states thinking about him.

I spent my two hours at work thinking about my encounter with him this morning. It was quite annoying but I liked it at the same time. I wanted more. I clocked off after I had completed my tasks and as I walked along the isle I glanced through the large windows and noticed the sun had now fully risen and it was daylight outside. The world had been restored once again, and as people marched through the doors of the supermarket of which I cleaned, all thoughts of him were pushed to the back of my consciousness, as the daily routine kicked in.

At the bus stop, waiting for my ride home, the sound of traffic and children going to school occupied my mind. The memory of my encounter with him was fading more and more and would soon be filed away in my mind as just part of the day’s course of events, nothing more - nothing less.