The Snowflake Principal

The world pauses slightly as I sit.

The air is stiff and hot. I can feel the neck of my collar sticking to the damp skin of my neck.

The smells of grease and oil fille my nose and swim in my head.

The dim, flickering lights overhead pulse in my vision.

"You know what I think?"

My head jerks up and then I remember exactly why the world had taken a brief break in the first place.

She's there-sitting across from me.

I can't pinpoint exactly why she's the one to make the universe stop and wait for me to catch up, to pause and shift around me, but she is. By all standards, not many other people really would notice her. She dresses in very dull colors, her long dark hair almost always shielding her pretty, but not outstanding face. She doesn't smile too brightly, and her voice is always soft spoke.

I don't know what makes her so different to me.

"What?" I ask, leaning closer. I don't tell myself to, or make a conscious decision.

But I do.

I have to be closer to her.

Its no longer a choice.

"I think cheeseburgers are like snowflakes."

I blink at her.

Once, twice, and again as I wait for logic to somehow implant itself in her words. But it never does, and maybe that's what I like about her.

She's never really logical, or right.

She's soft spoken, but a tough smart-ass. She hides behind her hair, but gets irritated when it blocks her view. She wears dull colors, but her blush is the most colorful thing I've ever seen. She doesn't smile brightly, but she smiles at almost everything, and especially at me.

And she doesn't speak much, but when she does, it always makes me feel warmer.

"How so?" I quirk an eyebrow at her.

"No two snowflakes are ever the same. I think it's the same with burgers. Whether it be in bun thicknesses, tomato juiciness, or onion….onioniness, I believe that no two are exactly the same. The Snowflake Principal."

She says all of this in a bored, dull tone as it's the simplest thing in the world.

She never does what I expect, even though she's predictable in her own right.

I smile at her, completely without meaning to.

She's smiles back, before humming happily and dipping back down toward the cheap heart-attack inducing meal.

I can't believe I'm here with her.

Not so say that I'm surprised to be here with her, because normally where she is, is where I want to be.

….but here?

My phone rang this morning at around three o'clock. I had been working on something, and had absent-mindedly picked it up.

"Hey!" her voice had greeted me, bright, happy and much too awake for three o'clock in the fucking morning.

"Are you drunk?"

She had laughed. "No!" a giggle. "I want a burger."

Soo…..?

"Take me out for a burger, Edward!"

"What? Why the hell would I do that?"

"bBecause I really want a burger."

A half hour and half-asses argument later we're sitting in a dump of a restaurant, eating a dump of a meal.

I wouldn't have done this for anyone else.

Something occurs to me.

Maybe she operates by the Snowflake Principal too-never more than one her. She's a contradiction within her self.

"Hey, Bella." I call to her, casually.

Her head pops up, a politely interested look in her eyes.

"I love you."

I look down, going back to my meal.

I hear her glass crash against the hard top of our table.

It's nice to know I can surprise her too.