Hesitation

She’s standing in front of a shelf looking through a comic book. He’s watching from a different aisle thinking: “If I reach for one near her maybe that’ll break the ice.” His eyes are on her figure, which is still visible behind her thin jacket. He walks up to her, but she answers her phone making him stop. A few seconds later he moves forward again only to stare at the comics now in front of him.

He takes one off the shelf, opens it and looks at the images as an assessment of himself occurs in his mind: “I haven’t had a haircut in a while, my clothes are old and my shoes are dirty.” Her call ends, and he watches her when she closes the comic. She eyes the rest on the shelf, and he turns to her about to speak but stops when she reaches for one next to him. She smiles, and he looks back expressionless before forcing his stare to the row in front of him. She lifts another one, and he does the same. He looks down at it without turning a page while her body faces his as she flicks through a second comic. When she reaches the last page she slams it shut making him look in the direction of the noise: he sees her smiling at him, although he doesn’t talk or smile back. Instead, he watches her turn and walk away towards the counter.

Featured image by Maya Karmon