It's Always the Quiet Ones

The Stranger in the Suit

Morgan noticed him the first time he walked through the battered doors of the cafe. There was something startlingly familiar about him, something she recognized. 

He was wearing a long raincoat in a light shade of brown, dark trousers peeking underneath it with matching leather loafers that were splattered with rainwater. A matching hat rested atop dark tresses that were trimmed in a wayward fashion, long sideburns and a five-o-clock shadow dusted across an angular jaw. The weather outside was dark and gloomy, and at the prime hour of 6:15 in the morning Morgan was the first and only customer of what she'd come to consider as her local hideout. 

From where she was sitting she couldn't see the stranger's face, but something about the way he poised his body, something about his silhouette, tugged at her memory, like the faintest recollection she couldn't quite place. Watching the man approach the counter waiting for Melinda, the waitress, to make her appearance, Morgan blinked a few times, trying to shake off the last remnants of what had proven to be another sleepless night. 

This was the only cafe that was open at all times, and her insomnia had made it rather difficult to find a place where she could spent her time without feeling like an unwarranted visitor. It had become customary for Morgan to come in in the wee hours of the morning, at around 5:30, when sleep eluded her once again. She was extremely grateful for the nearby campus pool, which made the place a regular hangout for swimmers, who were known to keep crazy schedules with all their early morning training sessions and late night workouts. Yet often she found herself alone at the quiet and cozy cafe.

She didn't hear him speak, but once Melinda had scurried out from the kitchen and taken his order, the pretty blonde waitress wasted no time in ogling the man. If her beaming smile and the way she cocked her hip to show off her narrow waist and ample bosom was anything to go by, he must have been quite attractive. Morgan snorted dismissively, shaking her head and returning to her books.

Being one of the only girls in the Criminology class she was taking made for quite an academic challenge, so Morgan liked to keep up to date on her notes and work ahead on assignments whenever possible. So she always carried her battered leather satchel. The structured handbag was stuffed with notebooks, paperwork, and textbooks. Luckily all of it fit into the bag, which was quite heavy. Studying Forensics at Edinburgh University was proving to be quite the challenge, specially since she was an exchange student, and an American one at that! Besides Criminology she had classes in Physiology & Anatomy, Cell-biology, Forensic Toxicology and a bunch of other subjects whose names were too damn complicated to pronounce anyways.

Returning her attention to the now luke-warm cup of tea standing in front of her Morgan sipped the liquid, glad for the liquid courage it provided. How she disliked her isolation! Her insomnia had made her a bit of an outcast, as she was often dead tired or just too focused on her studies to have much of a social life. Being the youngest one in her class didn't exactly help, since most people automatically thought of her as the geeky nerd who'd skipped a few grades and was now crashing the grown ups party that was college. 

Her fingers closed around the porcelain cup, finding no comforting warmth from the tepid liquid in the mug as she clicked her pen and started passing some notes from scattered pieces of paper into a notebook. She heard Melinda call out a fake cheerful goodbye and her eyes flickered up only to see the stranger disappear from her view as the door of the cafe closed behind him, the rain outside continuing to pound down onto the cold wet ground.

It would be almost a week before she saw him again.

In that time, she never gave the stranger any thought, and yet, when one chilly tuesday morning she saw him walk into the cafe again, it was as if it had been only moments earlier since she last saw him. Morgan felt like she should know him from somewhere, that eerie sense of familiarity again causing her to glance up at the handsome stranger.  This time he was facing her way as he leaned onto the cafe counter, propping an elbow up on the wooden surface and chatting away happily with Melinda, who seemed more than happy to entertain the handsome man. Full, sensuous lips that were pulled up into a charming smile were matched with chiseled features, high cheekbones that were perhaps the tiniest bit feminine, and gorgeous brown eyes that sparkled with mischief.