quartz street ➢ brad simpson [au]

ten

// monday //

It was three o'clock.

It was three o'clock, and my mind wasn't focused on what I was doing.

It was three o'clock, and I still hadn't been outside to see the boy from across the road.

Would he be looking for me? No, he probably wouldn't.

It had been two weeks of meeting eyes with him, and I wondered today if he took notice of my absence during our break.

Was it alright to hope for something so impossible?

Initially, I was supposed to be outside, at the same time, at the same place, to see him once again, but I had been tasked by Mrs. Johnson to aid an old woman in looking for a book.

When we had found it, I had felt relieved, because I could finally see him. 

"All things are ready, if our mind be so," the elderly lady had quoted Henry V, the book she was looking for, before parting ways with me.

I dusted off my dress, as I stood up from the stool I had been sitting on. Those words made me think that maybe, just maybe, today I would have the courage to go talk to that boy at the coffee shop.

It was the first time I've ever had a sense of boldness within me.

I was no longer distressed when I had passed my employer and the old lady to have my break.

But the moment I opened the door to the bookshop, only to find that same boy I had been thinking about for two weeks facing me, all the nerves came back.

I was baffled and surprised on finding him there, especially since from the corner of my eye, I saw a book on the table next to my chair, along with something that looked like a packet of sugar on top.

I thought that, perhaps, my mind was playing tricks on me, that this was just a dream.

But I was wide awake.

It was three-ten.

It was three-ten, and all the fearlessness I thought I had was drained in a matter of seconds.

It was three-ten when I stared into his brown eyes, lips quivering.

"H-Hi, I'm Monday."