I am trash.
Ruby noticed the same man with the red hair from the Chelsea Market. She started to pick up on his routine: pick up cheap coffee and walk the Hi-line. No, of course she doesn't follow him, she just notices him going up the stairs with the same coffee cup each morning. But, admittedly, she did change her alarm clock just so she'd be at the market when he was.
Ruby craned her neck to look up at him. He stood in front of the foreign language section, holding a book with one hand, leafing through the pages with the other. She squinted at the books in the next shelf. French, German, Hebrew, and Japanese. Well, she studied French in high school, so she could feign an interest in the French language. Or, she could check out Japanese. After all, if she's here to buy a book on a language, she must be a real newbie on the scene. But she doesn't want to look like that.
Ruby locates the spiral staircase near the right wall and moves towards it, inhaling for four seconds, holding, exhaling for four seconds. Her heartbeat got faster and faster, making her breath hitch at the top step. Crap. Ruby visualized herself tripping, her foot catching on the last step, her face flattening against the cheap carpet—oh crap, she didn't put on makeup this morning. Her foot, in spite of her own imagination, stuck the landing personally, and Ruby celebrated a private victory before she realized she was in his peripheral vision.
Her legs shook when she moved closer. Which language did she choose again? Shoot. Without thinking, she reached for something in French. She bit her lip in realization of the fact that she was standing less than ten feet from him. As covertly as possible, she snuck a peek at the book he had in his hands. Ruby saw nothing but connected random scribbles, but her eyes barely skimmed over it before flashing back to the book in her own hands. Which she hadn't even opened yet.
She considered putting it back on the shelf and fleeing, but if he even glanced in her direction, he would immediately notice how badly she was shaking when she put down the book. She flipped the book over in her hands, trying to think about what a person would do if they were thinking about buying a book.
Ruby suddenly felt like throwing up, running away, and wallowing in misery in the comfort of her own home when he spoke.
"Parlez-vous français?" He asked in an accent too thick for Ruby to understand.
Ruby blinked before she realized that he asked her a question. She looked up at him, taken back by the sudden prompt of conversation.
"Huh?" Ruby gasped.
He smiled, the corners of his mouth pushing dimples in his cheeks. "Do you speak French?"
Ruby tried to gather herself, but she hardly felt prepared. "Um, not really," Ruby responded quietly. She stared at the black fabric of his shirt instead of into his emerald-green eyes, scratching the back of her neck. "I studied it in high school, but I've been thinking of picking it back up."
Ruby's eyes flitted to the book he was skimming through a few moments ago. He followed her gaze and acknowledged that he was still looking through it.
"Oh yeah," he muttered. "I was thinking about Arabic for a while. It's a very interesting language."
"Do you speak a lot of them?" Ruby asked. She wanted to kick herself for being such a terrible conversationalist.
"Hmm?" he mumbled, looking up from the text.
"Do you speak a lot of languages?" Oh God, she must be wearing such a pained expression.
He tilted his head to the side, bangs shifting away from his nose. "I wouldn't say I do. I'm fluent in French, but that's only because my mother was from France."
"That's pretty cool," Ruby remarked. She was starting to think that things would go a lot smoother if she just walked away now.
He chuckled, perfect glittering teeth appearing beneath his lips. Ruby could've sworn that she saw them sparkle. "Very. I guess it's easier here."
"What, learning languages?"
"Mhmm," he mumbled. "A lot of people from different places come here. You can practice on a lot of them—they're really considerate."
Ruby blushed. "I don't think I could hold a conversation with any of them."
He flipped his book closed with a flick of his wrist. "Oh come on, I'd bet you can say something in French."
Ruby covered her mouth, smiling awkwardly as she felt a blush heat her skin. "Oh, no, I couldn't."
He rested his elbow on one of the shelves, shifting his weight onto one foot as the other crossed over. "Go ahead. I won't laugh."
Ruby felt her heartbeat hammering away against her ribcage. "J-je seulement parle un peu de français."
Her eyes nervously travelled back up to his face, where a grin spread from ear to ear. "Perfect," he said.
"That wasn't very good at all, was it?" Ruby wondered out loud, suddenly more interested with her chipping nail polish rather than the intensity of his eyes.
"You nailed it."
Ruby scoffed lightly, knowing that she massively screwed up the 'r'.
"Hey, what's your name? I've seen you around the Chelsea Bay area."
Ruby looked back up, still feeling warmth in her cheeks. "Ruby," she answered.
"I'm Roman." His voice was warm, the sentiment sticking in her mind, floating in her consciousness. "Would you like to get coffee sometime?"
Ruby smiled, feeling the muscles under her eyes act on their own, overtaken by the giddy feeling in her chest. "I'd love to," she affirmed enthusiastically.
"Do you have a pen and paper?" he asked.
"Uh, I might have a pen," she muttered, fishing in her purse for a pen. When she found one, she pulled it out quickly and handed it to him.
"No paper?" he assumed.
Ruby shook her head.
"May I use your arm, then?" He reached for Ruby's hand, which she offered palm up with a twinge of hesitance.
He wrapped his slender fingers around her wrist, pressing the tip of the pen against her flesh. He carefully wrote out ten digits each punctuated by the warmth of his flesh against hers. Her stomach fluttered as she realized that he was writing his number. When he finished, pulling away and holding out her pen, the absence of his skin made her flesh feel weirdly cold. Her skin prickled with goosebumps.
She took the pen back and slid it back into her purse. When her head was listed downwards, he placed his fingers along her jawline and pulled her head up slightly. She hardly had time to react before she felt her lips pressed against his. After a short moment that felt like forever, he pulled away, watching her face flush. Her entire face heated up under his gaze, which lazily wandered over her mouth as it tried to form words.
"I'll see you tomorrow?" Roman breathed, his fingers slowly sliding away from her chin.
Ruby nodded, hardly able to draw breath.
Roman regained composure in mere seconds, his dazed expression shifting to a coy smirk that did nothing to help Ruby out of her own lapse.
He whispered, "I'll see you tomorrow, then."
As he departs, he turns his head over his shoulder. "Let me know when."
What'd I tell ya? Trash.
Fun fact: This is actually a removed subplot from a larger fanfic I'm writing. "Aphrodite Shoots to Kill," however, is not full-length, so I don't expect that it'll get more than 8,000 words.
By the way, if you ever have the pleasure of visiting New York and you happen to stumble upon Chelsea Market, I recommend Bar Suzette. Their crepes are freakin' divine.