That Parallels Never Do

She was smoking a cigarette furtively; and only because she was more than occasionally glancing around she seemed to be waiting for someone, but in actuality, she was waiting for something instead; and only because waiting is awfully boring to be done all alone, is why nothing but a few hurried drags would even barely relieve her of the dullness.

He was smoking a loosely-wrapped joint, rolled in haste, falling apart along the seam. He might have been waiting, he might have been not; there was not anyone and there was not anything that required his immediate concern; none and nothing, but those few shreds of mildly influenced tobacco simpering and smouldering such between his fingertips.

She looked around, yet again, and she caught his eye - he had been hoping she might, and he was glad she did. He smiled meekly, not wanting to outrightly suggest the possibilities frolicking behind his eyes, and she smiled back, faintly aware that his smile held far more promise than he might have wanted to reveal.

He flicks the stub in a manner he thought was unusually nonchalant; and he finds that she was staring at him with so much more than just casual interest. She smiled, and he gladly reciprocated with a faint nod of his head, hoping whatever and whosoever she might have been waiting for such, may just take about forever.

She was reasonably assured that they had previously once chanced upon each other, she can’t remember when.

He suddenly realised that they might just have shared a very similar encounter before, he can’t remember where.

She usually would never find herself at such amusing odds, and never before so curiously excited either. They might have only smiled at each other, but she was suddenly bursting with many other memories, mirthful and melancholic in equal measures.

Where, she so wonders, had they met before, if at all, and would they meet again, to share more than just these smiles of promise?

He generally refused to involve himself in any sense of unfamiliarity, and they may have never before even smiled at each other, and so he was gradually working his way through twenty years of faces, trying to find a reference, expecting recollection.

When, he thought of, did they meet before, if at all, and would they meet again, to glance at with more than just twinkling eyes?

The bus screeched to a halt, she climbed in, and something makes him follow. He found a seat near the far-end, and somehow, she couldn’t find another but right next to him. They smiled, she was about to ask him when, but he did instead.

The bus gently rolled into the stop, he climbed in because he was sure she would, and she already had. He looked for two empty seats, sat down, and finds himself beside her. They smiled, and he might have asked about where, but she did.

The buses sped off, in an opposite direction each. She was talking to him, heading for one end in this city of uncharted possibilities, and he was talking to her, heading in a direction quite another, along only a route decidedly parallel.

By:

Sarthak Prakash