She looked at him and conjured up the most apologetic look
she could muster. He looked at her inquiringly.
“What’s the matter?”
“I did something.”
“What did you do?”
“I’m sorry” she clasped her hands together and made herself
as small as she could.
“but what did you do?” he got up.
Then he saw it.
“How did you do that? How is it possible?”
He was clearly upset. She tried the kitten look on him
again. He wasn’t even looking at her.
“I’m sorry” she said in a small voice.
“No, I’m not angry at you, but tell me, how did you do this?
It does not make sense”
“Well, I was wearing these slippers, and then I…”
“but I still don’t understand how this could happen”
“I don’t know how to explain it” she stepped out of his way.
“Well try. It has never happened to me. I don’t see how you
could have done it”
“I’m sorry”
She wanted to dig a hole and bury herself in it.
He finally emerged, and she could see he was trying hard to
make a pleasant face for her. She was still a bit wary. Something caught his
eye.
“What is that on your arm?” he pointed to a spot.
She looked to where he was pointing. There was a deep bruise
the size of a thumb. She didn’t notice that before.
“I don’t know”
He looked at her, but she avoided his gaze. He caught it
anyway.
“Did somebody grab you?”
“No”
“Are you sure?”
She thought for a moment “Well none that I can think of”
“Ahah! So somebody grabbed you. Tell me. Tell me who it is”
“No! I mean, I don’t know. It’s a bruise. I bruise easily.
It’ll heal”
“but who grabbed you?”
“I don’t know! Let it go. There are worse injuries that
could have happened”
“Are you sure nobody grabbed you?”
She looked him in the eyes. They were really beautiful eyes.
She took a deep breath, never leaving those beautiful eyes.
“Nobody grabbed me”
He seemed satisfied with that.
“I’m cold” she says, in a small voice.
“Let me see”
He walks across to check on a window.
“The window, she is open” he tells her.
Did I just hear him
call the window a ‘she’? She wonders. She ponders upon it for a moment.
When she was younger, she studied a language, and in that language even objects
have genders. Perhaps that was it. She recalled her university days when she
studied a different language. Yes, that one also referred to objects as having genders.
She nodded her head. But she had to be sure.
“What did you say?”
“the window, she was open. That’s why it was cold.”
Yes, he definitely
just called the window a ‘she’. She found it amusing, and smiled up at him
in return.
She dug about for a bit.
“Wait! I have something for you!!”
He was bemused. What did she bring him? She turned to him
with something hidden behind her. In his mind she looked like a teenage boy
asking a girl out on a date, awkwardly trying to hide the bouquet of flowers
behind him. He shook his head. This was not a teenage boy and he was certainly
no teenage girl to be asked out on a date. But that was what she looked like;
with hopeful eyes shining up at him, something hidden behind her back, something
she was holding by the stem.
She had a big grin on her face. When she had seen it sold out
on the streets, it made her think of him. She was looking forward to seeing his
puzzled look at seeing it. She was sure he had never seen it before. It was
hard to transport the egg-beater-like thing in her big pack, but it was worth
it.
“Here” she hands it to him.
“Ah!” He takes it and immediately puts it to his head.
A look of disappointment crosses her face.
“You know what it is?”
“Yes, it is for massaging the head” as he placed it on his
and started bouncing it away.
“I was hoping you wouldn’t”
He continued bouncing the thing on his head as he looked
about for somewhere to place it.
Well, so much for that
surprise.
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