Every morning, the last dab of lip color remind her of the tasteless touch she had with him but still no harm to look good. While putting up her lip color and making a peach outline, she suddenly remembered that it’s her turn today for the cab. After finishing the only make up she does, she checked her wallet and found that she carries no change. She hushed the thought by deciding to give the larger note to cabby, hence, nothing to worry.
It is hardly a 5 minute walk from their houses to meet at the intersection and get a cab to work. Without fail, after morning greetings, they have been telling each other how sleepless they have become after moving to this new place. He avoids looking at her completely, not in ignorance, but in an order to resist the temptation of keep looking at her long beautiful hair. This gives her an absolute chance to admire his cuteness. Things and time doesn’t seem to support the idea, still she wishes to tell him someday the curves she makes on his face, put her into century long commitments. She has not gathered the courage yet to admire any of his things. The fear of encouragement on his part impedes her need to admire him in words.
Waving at a cab, he ensures to stop the one she prefers to sit, metered one and sits only after she has made her place at the seat on his back.
She whispered in his ear, “I don’t happen to have change. So will give 20 bucks and I will get the change too”. He nodded his head in negative and said, “No need, I am carrying it”. She ignored him by taking out the note and passing it beside his freshly shaved cheek. Only she knows how hard it was not to feel them.
He asked her firmly to keep it back and put an end to whispering bickering. It was offending for her since he has paid 2 days in a row. Today, for a change, he asked the cabby to take the left turn and stopped at the corner instead of making her cross the road. Earlier, she used to wonder why does he make the cab stop much before office, but now that wondering is wandering else where. She flips over the small walks they make together.
Coming out of the cab, she folded her hands on her chest and made an expression of disapproval. He turned around her saying, “It’s all right” and both started walking. She made a comment in her fastest speaking manner, “You always do what you want to do and then listen to me. It is so hard to convince you”. He smiled and replied, “It’s early in the morning, and we both know no cabby keeps the change this time”. He made sense but she didn’t say it, instead she said “We could have tried.” He continued, while making a way for her between puddles and leaves laden trees, “I always think well before doing anything. I plan beforehand and look at every aspect properly”.
His statement made her slow down her pace and looked at him over his shoulder. Few nights back, what was he thinking when making the move? Back then he told her, that it is an unplanned desire, but now? She so wanted him to stop and answer her, only if she could merge her imagination and words together to ask him all this.
Standing at the crossroads of her thoughts, she is again losing the faith in her judgment and fate. Being a woman, she masters the art of imagination and has dived into it with him, without his knowledge, many a times since that tasteless touch.
Climbing up the stairs, she told herself, that only time and intentions will clarify the fog in her mind, to decide if it was a moment or a mistake. Till then, she has decided to keep change money always.
