“Sure you have all the stuff you need?” she asks.
He gives himself a general pat-down and nods.
“We will throw the garbage first, then we will go.” He tells
her.
She looks at the door 10 meters to her right. She hadn’t
seen a garbage bin on the way in. he had started walking away in the opposite
direction. Ah, the garbage room must be
that way. She looks around at the bare, uniform walls to occupy the time.
He probably won’t take long. It was amazing that all these walls remained so
clean; so pristine, so uniform, and there was no noise emitting from anywhere. Total silence. She closed her
eyes and tried to imagine where noises came from in her home apartment.
She heard a noise.
Oh, it was him. He was a good 20 meters away, and for some
reason he had stopped; garbage bag in his hand, and was beckoning to her.
“Are you coming?” he asks her.
But I thought…the car
is that way, and I…
She caught on that he wanted her to go with him….to the
garbage dump?
She trotted her short little legs over to him as fast as she
could
“I thought the car’s that
way” she gestured in the opposite direction.
“Yes, but I have to throw the garbage away first” he says.
“Well, couldn’t you have thrown the garbage and then come back here for me?”
Why would I do that? He
silently asks himself. She really is a bizarre creature, he thinks to himself.
He turns down to look at her. She was looking around inquisitively. Indeed, she
is easily amused, he concludes to himself.
Garbage safely thrown away, he turns to the steps on the way
to the car. Out through another door, and there is the car. They get in. He
turns to her, she is fumbling with her scarves. So many colors on one person he thinks to himself. And it is not just the clothes!
He turns in to a little café where they served food that
reminded him of his hometown. Ah, a nice taste of comfort, as he munched on a
slice of cake. He looked at her. She was painfully chewing away at her slice.
It was probably her toothache getting to her. He tried to make conversation to
take her mind off the pain.
“We are having a very late breakfast” he says.
“But it is a good breakfast” she smiles at him.
Their order arrives. She looks up at him and pokes at it…
“What is this?” she looked at him meaningfully.
Then he remembers. He slams his palm into his forehead.
“I forgot. I’ll order another”
She nods “And you’ll eat this one?”
“Yes, I will eat them both.”
They chatter away and her order arrives. She is happy with
it, but painfully takes small bites. Never had he seen such a chatty person in
so much obvious pain. And if there was something he was used to seeing, it was
a person who was in pain.
“I don’t think I can finish the other half. Will you help me
eat it?” she gives the pleading look at him.
He was starting to get used to that look.
“Yes, I will eat that.” And he munches it away. “I will get
fat!” he says to her.
“Don’t worry, that won’t scare me away” She grins up at him.
They finish their late breakfast, and make their way to the
car. It will be a long drive, and he was worried about tomorrow’s parking
arrangements. He did not want to be stuck, unable to move. He hated that.
“Why are you frowning?” her small voice penetrates his thoughts.
“I’m sorry, it’s a habit of mine. I was thinking of where to
put the car.” He continues to rant to her of his troubles, of little irritating
things that bothered him; and suddenly he stopped himself. She does not want to hear this, he tells himself.
“…and then?” her voice again pushes through his thoughts.
He stole a glance at her. She was staring at him
attentively. Even her nose appeared questioning. Was she paying attention this whole time? He wonders. No one liked
it when he ranted like this. Why was she asking him to continue? He looked
again at her. She was still waiting for him to continue. And so he did.
How is it that it feels so,..so,..easy to be around her? It
felt like she was, and always had been, a part of his life. But she wasn’t. She
was a stranger. He kept reminding himself that. She was a stranger. And soon,
she will leave him. Soon, that smile will no longer greet him. No more dancing
eyes to challenge him. No more puppy eyes for him to be suspicious of. She
would leave him. He knew that. She knew that.
“You’re frowning again” she turns to him.
He smiles at her. She must never know how much these
thoughts pain him. He doesn’t want to scare her that way.
Instead, he hands her his phone.
“Here, choose a song to play” he says.
“Mm? How do I choose?”
‘You search here”
“Ah….” she fumbles with it for a while.
A song starts blasting through the stereo. He smiles at her
choice. He turns to her, wanting to say something, but a sudden noise wafted
through his ears. She was singing! She turned to him with a slight apologetic
look.
“I’m sorry. Am I being annoying?”
“No, it’s fine. You may sing”
And to his amazement, she starts belting out wholeheartedly.
And she was,….well,….loud. One does
not expect such a small creature to produce that much noise and reach those
decibels. He turned to her one more time as she was belting out a particular
high note.
She stops and gives him that
look again.
“I’m sorry. I haven’t been able to sing in weeks. And it’s
usually hard for me to sing in front of people I’m not used to; but it seems my
voice is coming out for you.”
He smiles “yes, you can sing”.
Could it be? Could it be, that two complete strangers, meet
purely by chance, and yet fit into each other’s habits so well? It was impossible.
This is the thing that happens in movies. Not to real people. They were driving
off into the distance, singing together both in and out of tune, together. He
was mocking her song choices and she retaliated by singing it out of tune. He told
her that she would cause a terrible accident if she didn’t stop. She only
returned a cheeky grin at him.
It was indeed a long drive, and he ranted petty unhapinesses
to her, and she sang to him, and they sang together, and she asked so many
questions. It was bizarre to him. She noticed the smallest of things. And they
resulted in the most unlikely questions. He tried to answer her each time. Most
of the time, he wondered if she would know the difference if he just bluffed
her and made up a response.
They drove on, and he
told her of his childhood, of his food cravings, of places he had been to. She
always seemed so fascinated. There
was no quiet in his car that day. It was a long drive, but there was no
silence. She either entertained him with stories, or made him tell his stories,
or she chose songs to sing, or he chose songs, which at some point he found himself
singing. It was impossible. It was like they had grown up together, or at least
known each other for years. She was no stranger to him, nor was he to her. It
was a dream. One neither of them wanted to wake up from.
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