a balancing act including dance and manuscripts

There was a smitten man on the crowded train, smitten with me. I would have been smitten back but I'm not inclined to the male variety. I was making eye contact with the girl six people over. The one with the straight brown gold hair, eyes perfectly green and brown. Distinctly, they were green, they were brown.

I am the courteous train passenger, melting and slinking into free spaces to avoid the jostling of ass and shoulder. I was busy, I watched the girl watch me watch her and I watched the man read and edit a manuscript while balancing his long frame lightly against a pole. The train lurched and he stepped on my foot. I was already whispering, "no worries" and shaking my head in forgiveness by the time he straightened himself and looked up to me to apologize.

His eyes widened by a fraction of a centimeter, lighting up then quickly snuffed, as to not come out of his cool. But I saw it, I was a Lego fit, at least for the rest of this ride. And from this time on he looked to me between sentences and corrections. He adjusted his position to be in front of me when I moved to sit down. I watched him watch me out of the corner of my eye as I watched the hazel eyed girl get off the train.

I kept my gaze pleasant and never quite on him as we left the train. I did that subtle dance of awareness and polite disinterest. He lingered a second or two, gentle and in step, balancing his role with mine. Then aware that the song ended he increased in speed and just before he took a flight of stairs to his next train, he looked back and smiled.