Wednesday 5 March 2008

Three. Seaside-Bound Train

He wakes me by tapping on my window. It freaks me out, until I realise what it is, and then I am relieved. I let him in through the front door and get him to make us both a coffee while I get ready. I hear him dropping things, but there is no sound of broken porcelain, so I don’t worry. Today we are going to the seaside. I think that it’s probably a bit too cold for going to the seaside, but we got the idea in our heads and haven’t been able to shake it. So we made plans. And now today is the day.

On the train, Ivan presses his face against the window pretty much the whole way. He likes to look at scenes, landscapes. He is always framing an idea, working out compositions. He takes a lot of photos, mostly of fields. Every now and then he turns the camera to me and clicks me into a picture, and then he goes back to staring through the glass, lining up his next shot of meadow.

I do my best thinking when I’m in motion. I am thinking about how it felt to be holding hands with him, and I am wondering if that is going to happen again today. I think I would like it to. I think that I would be okay with that.

The sea comes into view and Ivan leans towards me, grinning. I am instantly caught up in his adventure. I know I will follow him anywhere. His hand is very close to my hand on the table. Our fingers could touch if the train moved a little to the left or the right. Our hands would slide together and come to a delicious halt. And I would feel the tingle, and it would make me giddy for the whole day, and whenever I looked at him, I would be feeling the giddiness and it would make me look at him in a different way. But the train keeps steady on the tracks, and our hands stay that small distance apart, and we both stare out of the window and anticipate the smell of the ocean.

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