The Couple:
I won't deny that I got the story idea from the first chapter of "People Watcher", a great FanFic here on this site. I hope I bring something slightly different to light, so please try to think of this as a different story entirely. I mean no disrespect to the original author, Chris Carter, Fox, and so on. I own nothing- please R&R!
I sat down in the warm coffee shop and took a long sip of strawberry smoothie. The first taste was always the best: cold, icy, and too sweet, yet somehow completely perfect in an overpriced-sugar-filled way. I licked the whipped cream from the top of the plastic cup and gazed absentmindedly around at the people near me. A twenty-something year old woman read the boise weekly from behind a decaf frap, and two teenage boys chugged cokes from across the sea of honey colored chairs. I sighed and played with the rim of my glass in a flirtatious way, but the boys payed no notice and continued to laugh loudly. I stared out the window before opening the front page of the statesman and scanning for something worthy of my time.
I was disturbed from my reverie by the sound of the glass door opening, a burst of spring air blowing in as two people made their way inside. At first glance they seemed to be a couple, businesslike and attractive and far too well dressed to be here by accident. However, after a few moments of intently watching them I noticed that they made no couple-esk contact: no hand holding, no soft laughter, no head leaning on a shoulder.
The woman was undoubtedly beautiful: a perfect bob cut accentuating her heart shaped face and blazing red hair, and she was very... strong? prim? I was not sure how to describe it... She held herself with a certain... delicate authority, that practically radiated off her as she smiled at the cashier and scanned the menu behind the counter. The man was also attractive, but he seemed more at ease, his hands in the deep pockets of his trench coat playing with something out of my sight. With his dark hair, green eyes, and strong features, he definitely had the "dark and handsome" look going for him. Once again their differences showed as they stood in line, the two exchanging a few words or a smile every now and then until the cashier called them forward. The woman took only a moment to calculate her order, smoothly pulling out a bottle of water and container of yogurt from the chilled cabinet. The man took a moment longer, carefully considering before ordering a black coffee and a lemon bar.
As the cashier printed their reciept, the man slid his hand onto the small of the woman's back, guiding her to a table directly behind me. The woman did not mind the gesture, but showed no signs of emotion either, simply walking at the same pace as the man, allowing his hand to remain on her back for as long as possible before sliding into a chair across from him. The woman was trying to remain indifferent to the contact, but clearly enjoyed it: the way she looked away from him and busied herself with opening her water allowed her a reasonable excuse to avoid his gaze, yet she moved her foot slightly closer to his, and smiled at him in an almost-not-quite flirty way that I knew only too well.
She struggled with the cap for only a moment before the man slid it away from her and broke the seal. She gave him a rather annoyed look, but she smiled despite herself, which caused him to smile back. Finally I heard them speak, and I was surprised by the deep quality to her voice, and the strangely formal manner which they addressed each other with.
"Since when do you drink chai teas, Scully?"
The woman smiled dryly: "Since my coffee maker broke after you tried to put it in the dishwasher"
The man inclined his head slightly in way of apology. "I guess you need a better dishwasher."
"I guess you need to start reading the labels on kitchen appliances."
"I thought everything was dishwasher safe these days."
The woman rolled her eyes, returning to her drink and playing with a hang nail on her pinky finger.
Mulder? Scully? What kind of names were these? Who named their child "Scully"? And more importantly, it seemed that friends or lovers would have nick names for each other, especially if their birth names were so queer... I mulled this over, but quickly turned my mind back to listening to the strange couple, playing with the whipped cream on my smoothie with a straw.
The woman took a sip of water, allowing her eyes to wonder around the empty coffee shoppe.
The man opened the brown bag in front of him and took a bite of lemon bar before offering it to the woman. She shook her head no but he persisted, rocking the lemon bar side to side in front of her, closer and closer until she laughed and shook her head again. He sighed in a "your loss" kind of way before picking up his coffee and staring out the window.
The woman stared intently behind the man, following his gaze out the window. "What's that?" She said suddenly, pointing directly behind the man's head.
"Where?" He turned quickly in search of the unknown object and in one fell swoop she grabbed the tire lemon bar and crammed it into her mouth, an innocent look on her face. The man turned around and saw his missing dessert, raising an eye brow at the woman, who laughed and slid over her yogurt to him.
The two chatted a little, and the more they interacted, the more I began to notice their moments of tenderness, the brushing of hands, the slaps on the arm and quick looks away from each other that were so prevalent in my High School world. I began to feel slightly envious of their joy, of the ease that they communicated with and the simple back and forth rhythm of their conversations. Eventually the food was gone, the paper cups flimsy without their contents, and the couple stood up, throwing away their trash in the nearby can. They made their way back to the door silently, without any more jokes or laughter exchanged. His hand still lingered on the small of her back, but this time she seemed to relax more into it, allowing the fabric of her blazer to fold into his touch, the grey linen folding into a tiny river of creases. The door swung open, the man holding it open for his partner and she stepped outside, without a glance behind her. Before following suit, the man glanced around the nearly empty room, causing his eyes to meet mine. For a moment he paused, mouth slightly agape as his sea green eyes fell onto my brown ones, and I swear that the breath in my lungs was stolen away in a millisecond. He smiled, a secret smile, one full of unsaid words, before striding out into the afternoon sun. I'm not sure, but I swear he winked at me before the glass door swung shut, and they were gone.
THE END