Silent Souls (Wattys 2014)

Prologue

Him

The first time I laid eyes on her, I melted inside.

Hot. That’s the kind of thing that people say these days. Fit, right? But, no, I didn’t think that. I didn’t think any of those things.

I thought she was beautiful – the kind of beauty you associate with the glorious things in life; the kind of beauty you think of when someone says the word ‘love.’

I’m that guy that sits in the corner of the library everyday without fail, nose stuck behind a book, turning the pages for hours before heading home. She’s the kind of girl that stands behind the counter, handing out shy smiles along with books as she checks them out.

Her

He’s always here – that guy at the back. He’s always looking at me, too. I hope he doesn’t see me looking at him, but I look at him a lot, so he probably has.

I can’t help it. It’s his eyes.

He’s looking out the window. Drawing something. Chuckling silently a little to himself. Rubbing away said doodle as he goes back to his book.

Every time he comes to take out a new book, I have all these words prepared to say, but I accidentally lock gazes with him, and then all the words just disappear as I, too, fall for the splendour of his stormy grey orbs…

And all the words ready on my lips vanish, like they were never there in the first place, because my head’s saying he’s too good for you, and he can do better than you.

Him

I can’t get her out of my head. I try to draw her in the window behind me, but I’m shit at art, so all the lines are wonky, and her eyes are misshaped, and her hair looks like the spaghetti I can’t cook.

I laugh and rub it away.

And, as the laugh fades away and I glance out of the grimy window, eyes catching on the rain streaking down the window, I want to tell her that I think she’s beautiful.

I want to see her smile like she did two hours and forty six minutes ago, at that twenty-something-year-old guy that took out Steve Jobs’ biography by Walter Something (I couldn’t quite see the name from where I’m sitting) when he told her he liked the opal necklace that hung around her neck. I want to see her blush up close – the way the red flush creeps up her neck, staining her cheeks a subtle pink.

But two things stop me.

There’s the fact that my brain is constantly repeating she’s too pretty for you, and she can do better than you like a broken record.

And then there’s the other thing:

I can’t speak.

idk, just a little something i wrote yesterday. should i carry on? :)