Never Talk to Strangers

It was 11pm, and the place was packed. Someone somewhere decided it is inappropriate to sit with those you do not know, so many tables are taken by a single person rendering many open seats, but nowhere to sit. I had a saucer and a mug of English Breakfast steaming while scanning. There was an empty couch in the back corner. Directly left of me, two men were at two top against the wall. Directly right of me, a young woman sat down with a book in a smaller love seat.

The men were babbling loudly about something, almost to the point of a nuisance except that there was a speaker directly above me blaring Nirvana of all things, and drowning out the legibility of their words. I was working anyways, and wasn't trying to listen in, but that girl to my right; yes, there was something about her. She was pretty, not sexy or flashy, but elegant and pretty. The kind of girl whom no one ever paid attention to in high school, because she obviously didn't go to parties or put out, but will be taken notice of at the reunion for sure in less shallow circumstances.

She is reading an intense Russian novel with deep seeded themes of communist tyranny and religious undertones. However, she is wearing a plain top with a modest skirt, but trying to turn and position herself, attempting to throw her legs over the side of the couch without exposing too much of the underside of her thigh, or worse; as if she were at home, and no one was watching. It took time. It took a few tries. And, it took finesse, but she finally found a comfy ladylike position.

The men to the left spoke of poet's fears of death. I contradicted out loud. She chimed in. We all spoke for hours. I got a call at 1:14am explaining some sort of emergency that required my assistance elsewhere. I meant to tell her she was pretty for the sake of a deserved compliment, but couldn't get past the piece of spinach caught in her teeth, and forgot in my quick scurry out of there. To these bizarre beans: you know who you are.