Mystery Girl

“She looked at me!”

“No way! Not you!”

“No really! I swear I saw her looking at me when I walked by her today. And that smile…”

“You got one of her smiles?”

“Yeah. But I have no chance. You know she’s with that mysterious guy that no one knows about.”

“I bet you she’s just making that guy up! I mean no one has seen him.”

“I know but hey, man, you never know. I mean she’s pretty mysterious herself.”

“True”

Their voices, brash and young, drifted off to a murmur and the man looked up, distracted by his thoughts, thoughts put into his mind by the two young men striding across the courtyard.

He was curious.

That, in and of itself, was not unique. He was a curious man and he did not shy away from this quality of himself. What was different this time was that he was curious about a woman.

He was not asexual. He enjoyed women. He even thought about enjoying men but so far had never had the chance or the interest to indulge that line of thought. However, he had never been curious of a woman. Women flocked to him and he was truthful in admitting that somehow they were drawn to him. He was not sure what drew them to him at the moment but it did not bother him. He just accepted it and filed away that knotty question in the back of his mind for when he had time to examine the problem.

However, the uniqueness of his being curious over a woman intrigued him and so he quickly stood up and quickly figuring out the quickest path to intercept the two young men, he began hurrying across the courtyard himself.

“Excuse me!” It came out as more of a long drawn out breath. He was a bit out of breath and he envied their youthful vigor.

“Excuse me!” he called again, his voice stronger, his lungs recovering. The two young me turned, uncertain looks mirrored in both their faces. Hesitant, they retraced some of their steps until they stopped in front of him. They looked at each other and one of them prodded the other in side with an elbow, surreptitiously. But the man had caught that small gesture and smiled inwardly to himself. He liked noticing the little things.

One of the young men opened his mouth to speak, closed it abruptly, and then opened it again equally abruptly. “Can we help you?” The other young man nodded in agreement; relieved he hadn’t had to say anything yet.

“You were talking about a woman.” It was stated like a fact.

“Yea?” Then a startled look flashed across the young man’s face. “Wait, is she your girl? We didn’t mean anything by it. We were just, you know man, discussing…” The babbling came to a quick halt when the man put up a hand to stem the flow of words coming at him needlessly.

“I was just intrigued by this woman. Who is she?”

An incredulous look crossed both young men’s faces. “Who is she? You don’t know who we’re talking about? You don’t know her?” Her came out sounding as if it should be obvious.

“No” the man stated simply. A silence fell. The young men looked at each other again. Then a waterfall of words crashed down on him, each young man drowning the other one out.

“She’s amazing!”

“She’s beautiful!”

“Her smile…”

“The way she looks at you…”

“…makes my heart falter in my chest!”

“She smells heavenly”

“well, let’s just say it’s sinful”

“She’s…”

“She’s…”

“…mysterious”

“…like no one you’ve ever met in your whole entire life!”

Their words stopped abruptly again when the man put up a hand to stem their flow. “Who is she?’ he again asked, the words simple and unadorned.

“Oh.” The two young men exchanged looks again. The man noted this in his mind. They seemed to have a habit of looking at each other. It was interesting. This time, they grinned to each other and each of them grabbed the arm closest to him and started half-dragging him.

For a moment, he was startled and so let them manhandle him, his shoes throwing puffs of dust into the air. Then he snatched both arms back and came to a standstill. “What are you doing?”

One of the young man, the quieter one, spoke up. “We’re taking you to see her of course!”

“Oh.” This time it was the man. He thought about it a bit and then, because he was still intrigued, smiled a bit and gestured for them to lead the way. When they made as if to grab his arms again, he warned them with his frown. He didn’t like being touched unless it was strictly necessary. The two men shrugged their shoulders and led the way.

As they entered the shaded walkways linking the old buildings together, the cool air brushed against them and tiny goosebumps dotted the man’s arm. Soon, they burst out again into a grassy area not unlike the courtyard they had just left. The sun’s rays did little to relieve the man’s arm of his goosebumps and he realized that they weren’t from cold but from anticipation. The two young men slowed and finally came to a stop near a bench next to a slightly overgrown bush.

“Sit!” One of them said.

“What…”

The louder young man made a shushing sound. “Just wait. She always comes by this way around now”.

So the man sat on the hard wooden bench, feeling slightly uncomfortable. As he looked around him, he was startled to discover that slowly, the benches were filling up around them, small chattering groups of men and slightly disgruntled looking girls wandered through the court yard. The murmur of voices around him grew in volume until it was a low thunder rolling across the lawn.

And because the man loved to note small details, he knew the exact instant in which she walked into the courtyard. He knew because in the midst of the low thunder of conversation, there was a tiny hiccup of a pause before everyone pretended that they hadn’t noticed her. Every man there pretended that they were there on accident and every girl pretended they weren’t jealous. Only the man stared at her, looking her full in the face.

She was average.

That was really the only thing he could say about her.

Her height was average, a bit on the petite side. She wasn’t fat but, then, she wasn’t thin. She had a nose that was a bit fat and lips a bit too full. Admittedly, her dark hair shone in the sunlight, but then again, whose hair didn’t? Admittedly, she had nice skin, but if that was the only quality to recommend her, it wasn’t much to go on.

He found himself walking towards her, deliberately ignoring the desperate tugs on his sleeves from the two young men who didn’t wish to draw attention to themselves.

He wasn’t exactly sure what he’d do once he got near her. He had a mental image of himself shaking her, shaking her for being such a disappointment to him. He wanted to yell at her for wasting his time, for wasting his anticipation.

Then she turned her head and smiled at him.

And in that moment, his scuffed shoes stumbled. Later on, he wouldn’t be sure what he had stumbled on or why he had even stumbled in the first place. Later on, he would smile to himself and tell himself that he had planned it that way. No matter the reason, in that moment, the man stumbled. Right. Into. Her.

Hurridely, he forced himself upright and steadied the warm body that he had crashed into.

He found himself looking down at her. His heart stilled in his chest and he found himself gasping a little for breath. Her eyes stared into his, looking, looking until he felt sure that she knew every dirty secret he had hidden inside of him that even he wouldn’t admit to. Her skin was smooth and slightly cool under his hands and her hair wrapped teasingly around her neck, her shoulders, as if mocking him that he would never brush her skin in the same way. Her full, too full lips parted in surprise and then a smile that seemed to reach deep into his throat and strangled his heart.

He jerked his arms back and shoved them into his pockets, his fingers, his wrists quivering with emotion and need, need he never knew that he had.

She slid past him, her soft, unidentifiable, not-of-this-earth scent left a teasing reminder in the soft breeze that had picked up, rustling the last of the autumn leaves.

He was left standing there, feeling utterly bereft, utterly useless, and utterly confused. A hand on his arm brought him back and he turned to face the two young men standing there, one solemn looking, one with a mischievous smile on his face.

There didn’t need to be any words.

They knew merely from the look on his face that he had joined their club, their secret.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

The girl slid into the plush seat of the car.

“Have a good day today?”

She turned her head and smiled at the man waiting for her answer patiently.

“It was good.” She looked thoughtful. “A man stumbled into me just now.”

He laughed, “I told you! They’re all falling in love with you!” He was amused briefly with his own cleverness and filed that joke away in his brain to tease her with it later. She slapped him lightly on his shoulder.

“That joke was really bad!” She laughed anyways. She liked to laugh. She liked the feeling it made her feel even if the laugh wasn’t quite real. However, this time, the laugh was real.

He turned to look at her and his laughing died into soberness. “You know. I’m the luckiest man on earth to have you.” He meant it. It didn’t matter to him if others didn’t think so. It only mattered to him that it was the truth.

“Oh stop already! You know I’m just average.”

“You’re beautiful.” It was a simple statement.

“I look in the mirror everyday and I still don’t see what you’re talking about. My nose is too big. I’m too short. And. And. And, well, I’m just average.”

He smiled to himself. She thought she was average and yes, perhaps she was. But, through his eyes, she was the most miraculous creature in the whole world. And his eyes, that was all that mattered.

The girl noticed the small smile and mumbled disgruntled to herself at the inanity of it all. What did he know? She thought to herself. What did he know? He was the only one that saw her like that. But. Of course. One was enough.

And as she looked out the window, the tired brown leaves rustling, cracking underneath the car’s tires, her eyes turned thoughtful again as she remembered the man that had stumbled into her and the look in his eyes.

Perhaps two would be enough.