It's Her!

It was her. The mystery woman from the bridge. Mei!

Today she wore a long black Victorian style dress with a collar that reached halfway up her neck, lace fringed sleeves to the wrist, and a skirt so long I couldn’t see her feet. I wouldn’t quite call it a funeral dress but it wasn’t far off of that. Over top of that she wore a sturdy tan color canvas apron with gray and black smudges down the front. Her long onyx hair was up in a tidy bun which only highlighted the elegant swoop of her jaw and the graceful curve or her neck. Her posture was perfect, like a classic marble sculpture. She stood still but not stiff, the very embodiment of composure. And that face…that face! She was even more beautiful than I remembered. This house might have have been brimming with worthless old junk but inside I had stumbled upon something priceless.

“Mei.” As my smile blooms her blank expression only tightens.

“How do you know my name?” She asks, her words precise and clipped.

“Well, I asked.” I say, turning to face her with the binder still in my hand.

“Are you stalking me?”

“What? No! I was just curious.”

“Why are you here, Dusty?”

“Eyyy.” I give her a finger gun. “You remembered my name.” The quip lands as flat as the cards in the binder. With unnerving stillness she continues to stare and wait for my answer. Showing her the binder I say. “I was looking around the town after supper and I saw your shop. Thought I’d check it out.”

“No.” Her silky voice is somehow both so soft I have to lean closer yet filled the room at the same time. “I mean here. In Halcyon. Why?”

“Oh, that.” I say with a shrug. “As you know I was a bit light in the pocket. After your gas got me into town I saw the Help Wanted on Barb’s place and I thought I’d apply. She hired me on the spot.”

She shifts the apron so that it lay absolutely flat over her body, a subtle motion I only noticed because of the otherwise statuesque stillness. “You saw a sign and decided to stay? Don’t you have somewhere to be? Don’t you have a home?”

“Right now I’m a tumblin tumbleweed. Taking in as much of this great nation as I can before settling down.” I smile, again to no reaction. “I’ll probably end up back in Athens eventually, but for now I go where the wind takes me.” After an awkward pause I add. “That’s Athens, Georgia.”

“I didn’t think you looked very Hellenic.”

“Huh?” I laugh off the comment. “You’ve got a lovely little town here.”

“You think so?”

“Well, yeah.”

“No accounting for taste.” Again she smooths her apron just so. The action is so swift yet precise, an exact repetition of what she’d done before, I wonder if it is an unconscious habit not dissimilar to Ric’s stimming. “Halcyon is the back end of nowhere. It’s only claim to fame being that it has none. Nothing significant has ever happened here or ever will. Take my advice. Leave while you still can. This is where dreams come to die.”

“Oh.” What the hell was I supposed to say to that!? “Well…I think it’s nice.”

“No accounting for taste.” She repeats. “You’ll quickly learn that…”

“Come on, now.” I cut in, trying to curtail anymore negativity. “It can’t be THAT bad. I mean you stuck around, there must be something about it.”

With both middle fingers she pushes her glasses to the top of her nose then returns to her perfect pose and takes a breath. “Is it your habit to interrupt people when they are speaking?”

“Huh? Oh. Oh! Uh, sorry.”

“I suppose you’ve told half the town what you thought you saw out on the bridge by now.”

“What? No! Of course not.” My voice softens. “I wouldn’t do that.”

After a long pause she adjusts her apron again then says with something approaching warmth. “Thank you.”

“Hey, I’m glad you seem to be feeling better.”

“Hrm.” She scoffs. “It’s none of your business how I am feeling.”

Fuck. I thought we were having a moment for a second there.

“Er, right.” Stepping closer I get us off this awkwardness by bringing our attention back to the binder. “So about these cards.”

“You are a collector?”

“Not anymore.” I say. “They’re for my brother back home.”

Like a pebble dropped into still water I watch as…something happens. What it was I can’t be sure but in the blink of an eye something had changed. Her expression softens ever so slightly, her tight shoulders relax an inch, her dark eyes widen and her pink lips part. For a moment, just an instant, I catch a glimpse of the woman behind the mask that I’d seen on the bridge. As quick as it appeared it was gone again.

“I see.” She says, her voice a bit more forceful than before. “I have more of those if you’re interested to see them.”

Without waiting for my answer she walks straight up to me, showing not a lick of intimidation despite our disparate sizes and the fact we were alone. Not sure what she was doing I stand flat-footed. Instead of excusing herself and slipping around me like most folks would do…she grabs my hips and pushes me to one side like she was shifting a piece of furniture! A small gasp escapes me as for just a fraction of a second her hands grip tighter as she pins me to an old oak dresser so that she could slide by. Her left brow raises at the sound of my surprised exhale of air but she doesn’t linger. Stepping by she takes extra care that no part of her body touches mine though she leaves the aroma of orange blossoms lingering in my nostrils. As quick as it happened it was over as she strides away toward the corner I’d found the binder.

A second late Little Dusty twitches at the realization that I’d just been manhandled by the hottest girl in town. I gawk after her like some over-horny virgin. With her apron snug around her waist her full-bodied hourglass curves are more pronounced from behind despite the long dress, and boy do I notice it. Just in time, or so I hope, my eyes snap back up to meet hers as she peers over her shoulder at me.

“Is it just baseball or does he collect other sports?”

“Just baseball.” I nod.

She comes a set of shelves that had a cabinet at the base and kneels down. Opening the doors she reveals a stack of other binders along with an assortment of card boxes.

“Ohhh, sweet! Jackpot! Gimme, gimme, gimme!”

She glances back my way again…was that a smirk I caught? Nahhh.

“Gimme, gimme? I think not.” She says with a raise of her chin. “If you can’t ask nicely…” She lets the comment hang in the silence.

I don’t know why, but I was smiling again. “Please?”

“Better.” She nods. “These ones are mostly hockey.” She says, setting a couple of the binders to the side as I approach. “But I know I’ve got a couple more…”

Just then a bling chimes from my pocket. She pauses and looks up at me.

My first instinct is to ignore the ill-timed notification…until I hear Ric’s voice from last night repeating ‘Dusty lost. Dusty lost.’

“Shit.” I mutter under my breath, causing Mei’s brows to furrow. I pull my phone out to see that I had just a couple of minutes until 6. “Hey, listen. I gotta go, sorry. I have to take this.” Setting down the binder I hurry for the door. ‘Dusty lost! Dusty lost! Dusty can’t come home no more!’

Mei looks at the binder in her hand then back to me. “I thought…”

“Just give me like…half an hour! I’ll be right back. I swear.” I cringe at her deepening scowl. “Shit, sorry. I interrupted again. Sorry!” Pointing back it I say. “I’m interested in those cards. I’ll be right back. I promise.”

The last thing I see before turning the corner was Mei’s jaw tighten and her lips purse as she begins to put the binders back into the cabinet. The door chimes behind me as I jog out just past the front steps. I double check the time and ensure I was getting good signal then pull up my parent’s number and dial.

Behind me I hear the click of a door locking. Looking back there is a big red ‘Closed’ sign on the door that wasn’t there before. My shoulders slump as a sigh escapes me. Fuck! I consider walking back and knocking but a second later I hear the line go live.

“Hey champ!”

I let out a laugh, turn and begin to walk and talk. “Hey! That’s my line.”