He sat slumped in his seat, knees apart, elbows up. It was if gravity had focussed its energy on keeping him in that exact position, or some otherworldly thing had deprived him of the strength to support his own bodily weight.
It was a brisk, bright morning. The sort that it would seem impossible to be unhappy while surrounded by such a joyful exultaion of life. Even the sun seemed to feel it, shedding his winter coat to shine down with unusual intensity for the August morning. As the sunlight danced with the breeze in and out of the trees, he retreated more into himself. He was a young, pale man, his skin so translucent you could see the veins pulse underneath it. It was almost a relief to see him in the sun, he seemed to be on the verge of becoming invisible, of fading past translucency away into nothingness.
Silently he glared into the space in front of him, shooting poison darts with his eyes at some unknown. He seemed so young to be so angry, so bitter, so alone. The soft, brisk footstep of the passing waitress awoke him from his solemn revierie. He stared at her retreating back with blank eyes, as if silently entreating her to return.
It wasn't her, the soft, doe-eyed waitress that he wanted. He wasn't even entirely sure that the girl on his mind was who he wanted. All he knew was a desire to feel something. Anything. It was the numbness that killed him above everything else. He could handle the silence, being alone wasn't so bad. He had come into this world alone, he needed to other to help him breathe, to assist with the beating of his heart. But those were all natural. Being senseless wasn't.
He lit a ciggarette and drew in. The cheap smoke burned in his throat, and he let it linger until his head began to spin. Enveloping himself in a haze of smoke, he realised that even death, though in such a small dose, didn't feel as bad as he thought it should.
Inside his head, he was trying not to think of the one thing that was on his mind. He analysed the faces of the strangers sitting at the tables around him, trying to glean a moment of their stories in their eyes. None of them had her face, but he still saw it everywhere. In passing absent gazes, in the slight nuances of expressions, in the shape of a girls mouth as she pronounced a certain vowel.
He thought about writing, perhaps. Even then, few would be able to understand it. Spelling was never his forte. He wondered if it signified anything - the fact that he always struggled spelling definately and absolutely. Was it symbolic of his personality? He could't really tell. Not that his personality was all that great to start with. Everyone has their flaws. She had trouble telling her lefts from her rights, and her rights from her wrongs.
Every single time he tried to focus on something else, it always came back to it. To her.
He looked at her quizzically some time before he spoke. She was reading, and hadn't noticed him analysing her features.
'Why do you do this?'
'Do what?' She replied, absent mindedly, still not looking up from her book. She wasn't reading though, they both knew that. Something else was on her mind, a darker thought that sometimes caught her off guard.
'Everytime I even try to get close to you, to get to know what's going on in that mind of yours, you push away. Contrary to what you might think, I actually do want to know you and all of your parts.'
She looked up, stunned. She knew it had been coming for a while, this talk, but she was suprised all the same. It always came up, in every single one of her relationships. They all wanted to know why she wasn't so clingy, why she locked part of herself up and wouldn't let anyone near it. She knew it confused them after a while. They wanted to know why she wasn't like every other girl they'd met, why she didn't talk about things, why she never fully could accept love.
'I'm like Matilda, I guess. I know Moby Dick, but I don't know love. I'm not even sure I know what it's supposed to look like.'
He looked down at the book she was holding. 'But you read about these things, don't you? Doesn't that give you an idea of what it's supposed to look like?'
'You read about science, does that mean you understand the universe? We both know it's not like that.' She became thoughtful, touching her lips with the back of her fingertips. Slowly she spoke again, 'I guess I can see to an extent... what love is supposed to look like. I can guess. I can guess what it's supposed to feel like. But I don't really know. No one taught me any of this, you know.'
He could see what she meant, but he still blazed with impassioned fervour. 'No one taught any one any of this! We're all just guessing, really. That's why we fall. That's why we make mistakes. You just have to try, because sometimes, when you fall, the right person comes along and picks you up.'
She stared at him with wide eyes. She had loved how articulate he became when he was passionate about something. It filled her with an admiration she didn't know how to express. Dumbstruck, she simply mumbled, 'Well, then. What do you want from me?'
'I want to you show me you feel, I guess. I want you to tell me what's on your mind.'
'But what if you don't like what's on my mind?'
'I don't have to take on your opinions as my own! I just want to know what they are!'
'You know my opinions.' She was getting nervous. She had never gotten this far into this conversation before. The other men usually had given up at the mention of Moby Dick, deeming the case unfixable and resolving to move on.
'I know that you don't like celery, that you'd rather see an art film rather than a thriller, that you like rainy days. But I don't know past that. I'm trying here. Give me something.'
'Like what? What do you want to know?'
'It's not about what I want to know, it doesn't matter what I want. I have you, you're what I want. Now tell me something you wouldn't usually tell me. Tell me how you feel. What you want.'
She was silent. He wondered if he had pushed her too far. He was on the verge of caving in and dropping the conversation when she began to speak.
'There... are... times. Times when I want to be the girl that...' She spoke slowly through her fingers, uncertainty dimming her usually clear voice. 'The sort of girl that people write stories about. The sort of beautiful tales that make you want to laugh and to cry at the same time, the sort that are so beautiful that you have no choice but to believe in the good in the world.'
He was entranced by this honesty. It was if every word she spoke revealed a beautiful vulnerability that was without neediness, that was without expectation of action on his part.
'Sometimes I wish I was that sort of girl.' She continued briskly, as if her briskness would disregard the weakness she was showing through her honesty. 'You know, the sort that just, exudes inspiration. That you just have to write a song about, a poem about, just to try and capture any aspect of her, no matter how small. I wish I was incredible. The type of person that just... blows your mind because of how effortlessly amazing they are, the sort you just... admire for no other reason than just who they are.
'And sometimes...' She stuttered, 'I wish that I was the most beautiful person you've ever seen, but I think that's just naive foolishness.' She faltered and stopped. Looking up from her palms at him.
He kissed her. Said nothing, and just kissed her. He didn't know what to say.
