Kelly didn’t need you to love her because she worried about it in a way that made you suspect that if she ever stopped worrying, she might drop dead.
From across the room, she watched him tip his chin at the bartender. She was the only woman in the world with doe eyes that could bore a hole in you.
Everyone in town knew. The old guard restrained themselves from rolling their eyes when a newcomer fell head over heels for Kelly’s shiny hair and white teeth. She walked softly even on bad days and rainy days and at first glance, all anyone ever wanted to do was lay their head down in her softness.
It’s hard to spot, that’s what they all say, licking their wounds and staring anyway.
It’s hard to spot until it comes at you.
He didn’t love her.
He didn’t need to.
He spotted it when she asked him if he was new and what it was like to be new and then forgot to listen for the answer.
I’ve been here forever, she giggled and turned those doe eyes up at him.
He chewed the inside of his lip, held his breath to plug up the holes.
He watched her lips move and missed the joke in the story about her brother’s motorbike. He listened to her dream of starry nights in Peru or Japan or Morocco, somewhere fantastical and inviting, not the taproom on 8th.
The beer was golden and cold. His smile was sincere but laced with pity. It was like watching an eighteen year old girl try to wield the sword of womanhood over her head. She wanted you to look too much.
But she was a looker, so he looked.
He didn’t love her, but if he did, the heart in his chest would build a brick house for her.
To give her worry and her softness a warm home.
To rest her head after starry nights in Peru or Japan or Morocco.
To protect her from the way she was looking at him from across the room, clicking her purse shut as slowly as possible before gathering her coat around her neck. She walked softly even on bad days and rainy days.