Elephant Tightrope
snafu posted at 05:18 PM on July 23, 2006.
The scene was subdued that afternoon in the library. Books spread before her like fallen leaves; She looked like an apparition—a vision of faerie—in the sunlight being thrown through the windows like transparent waterfalls. Her black hair, starkly imposed upon her pale face blew this way and that depending on the oscillating fan near the table. She would occasionally lift a hand to tuck a few strands behind her ear, an act she mostly did from force of habit and the glow from her nimble, delicate hands would suffice to light up a small part of his face like the moon attracting tides—and with just the same amount of force.
He was sitting right across her pretending to read a novel—two navels—and yet failing miserably to convey his disinterest. Pausing every once in a while, every paragraph or so, he would lift his eyes to the level of hers (always down towards those books) in an attempt to catch her gaze. In reality, he was petrified to gaze into those almond shaped, dark brown eyes her short eyebrows for fear of losing himself entirely, like one falling into a well of which there is no escape. Just a glance, he mumbled to himself (his foot continuously tapping the floor to steady nerves and to make a link to the ground, which is essential lest he finds that he has already taken flight and is gently floating around the clouds) and I would…I would be uh…and in that instant she looked up, he blushed instantaneously and with all the finesse of an elephant running a tightrope, looked down at the book and loudly riffled the pages as if it was the most ordinary thing to do in the universe at that instant.
Of course she caught him looking at her. She knew it already seconds after they sat on opposite sides along the length of the table. She, taking a few seconds of relief from eyestrain, would see his furtive glances in the corner of her eye and yet, did not do anything. After all, what would be the use? And had she reacted, what then? He would maybe just deny it and she would feel the tiniest bit of foolishness at herself for even considering it. So like a cat toying with a mouse, she watched him sneak glance upon glance, with the frequency and length increasing with every succeeding one, like the mouse moving closer and closer to the cheese.
A few minutes of Pepe Monson later, he felt sufficiently calm again to sneak looks once again. Now, with all the caution of a spy, he looked and committed to memory his visions of her—her hands, her shoulders, the delicate neck, her hair, her lip, those slightly red cheeks, taking care not to look directly at those eyes again. He sighed a little sigh of relief and yet he knew that sooner or later he would have to answer to his actions and that, he knew, his reaction either would spell doom or would grant him the sweetness of her smile depending on how she receives it. The sun was on its last quarter on its sky journey when he looked out the window across the table to the expanse of forest and he felt something stir inside him…
hands down....