eOriginal work of fiction; any resemblance with real persons, situations or events is purely concidental (and sort of cool, lemme know about it LOL).
~ Dedicated to my darling tokiko *kiss* ~
He said “hello” while wearing a tame, almost lifeless smile. I didn’t hear him, the fact that he had done so registered only some time after.
”Hello”…his black eyes were lazily running over me, not entirely appraisingly. His expression was blank, anti-expressive if in any way describable, yet to me it was nothing but liquid metal trickling down ice. As soon as I laid eyes on his distant smile, my mind sizzled. My heart steamed. My thoughts stuttered.
I first met him in a train station, some lazy afternoon at the beginning of December. People were fussing about last minute changes, with their coats all shiny and new, hugging dramatically and wiping tears away. They all squirmed around, fervent, imperative, lost. He stood out with his alien aloofness, his dusty biker jacket and his small backpack.
His black hair was complexly shaped; the type of intricacy only a month’s worth of “morning hair” could result in. It was curly, or perhaps it was just wavy. His hair signaled the degree of mystery that surrounded this stupendously peculiar creature.
I noted he had no luggage on himself but that petty backpack, it almost seemed thoroughly rude in a train station. His improperness would stain the honor of the place of arrival and departure. He was probably the kind of traveler that never lingers enough to make luggage.
I couldn’t help but stare, and I knew I was being uncivilized. Lingering upon anything is uncivilized; we are taught that you simply have to speed by. But I admit to lingering while looking at him. As taken as I was with studying his stance, his dusty black boots or his worn out black jeans, I hardly heard him the first time he spoke. He must have thought me a bit slower then stationary paper; the idea horribly bugged me later.
“Didn’t you hear me?”
I shook off my dream state and focused on him, on his already chipped off expression, on his almost scowling face. He was taller than me, more manly with broader shoulders and much bigger hands. His brows were thicker, his jaw more square. All those differences jumped out at me, lightning like a Christmas tree. There was something incredibly sexy about his furrowing thick brows.
“Sorry, didn’t catch that, you were saying?” I tried to politely appease his light annoyance.
“I said ‘hello’.” he suddenly offered me with a tame, almost lifeless smile.
My heart sped, my thoughts rushed past me.
“Hello back.” I tried to smile flirtingly. Why was I feeling so small, so young and inexperienced?
“I’m a man of few words, so I’ll just cut to the chase. I need a place to stay at for a few nights, and you look like a decent enough guy. I’d pay some rent or something.”
His eyes fixed me, nailing me to the ground. My heart stopped after speeding recklessly. He needed a place to stay for a few nights? Well, he didn’t look like a criminal. I just smiled and answered “Sure.”
You would expect a complete stranger that’s coming to your house to stay for a few nights to at least try and make conversation. Tell you about his journey, about the reasons why he didn’t get to his hotel in time, or how someone forgot to pick him up at the station, but he just silently walked alongside me, holding his backpack leisurely and not uttering one word.
After the first minutes of silent walking, I felt the silence starting to clog my arteries. I simply had to speak. It was the civilized thing to do, after all, wasn’t it?
