A Startlingly Banal Desire

A shame welled up within her when she considered what exactly led her down such a strikingly lonesome path. To put it simply, she was someone who loved books more than she loved people and desired to turn that into a profession. There was no austere parent shadowing her and hanging emotional trauma on the same rack as her geography bee trophies. No inciting incident that let her open up to the few colleagues like Martin who did try to cultivate extra-professional relationships with her.

Dale had more or less fallen into her lap when the two met at a gala sponsored by a mutual connection through the school and try as she might, there was something about his diction and the way in which he carried himself like a caricature of Indiana Jones that pulled her inexorably closer to his arms with each successive outing. In the ensuing three years of dating, she would often spend just as much time contemplating the mystery of their strange chemistry together as she would the mysteries that the universe presented her. She wondered where he was now and considered taking her phone out to see if their plans were still on before realizing it would be an exercise in futility. Plans with him were either made in person or not at all.