Pavements

He advanced because there was really nothing to say from afar. In this midafternoon of gathering dusts and roadside dialogues he ventured into her space, inwardly daring to remember the times when they were bursting with words to swap over just one cup of coffee. Her expression startled, he squared her off with a smile. In that short smile he had communicated, among many others, the things about him that she no longer knew, things she no longer had right to know. She, too, smiled though not in the way she did when his sight alone filled her up with reasons to thank some god she never really believed in. She smiled, perhaps because there was nothing else to do when the reasons to keep faith had died one after another. She couldn’t draw near him now, snuggle up beside him, and link her arm with his that strangers around them would turn to look. Even when there were no strangers, she had imagined and didn’t like to see the looks on their faces once she’d done it. She couldn’t offer a handshake when she knew exactly just how his skin felt on hers. After too much remembering, she had grown tired of that.

That’s when a cab pulled right in front of them. She didn’t mean to take one today; a public and cheaper form of transit would just do. Nothing was worth the trouble words can do them now.