she was perfectly small but liked to wear large intricate earrings nearly half the size of her face. she had the makings of the type of girl who others would part the sidewalk for: a graceful jawline and slight earlobes, a slender girlish neck preceding slender collarbones -- she was refined.
he walked proudly beside her, held her hand. but he saw that when she'd let go briefly to push her hair back or answer her phone, she wouldn't reach for his hand again afterward. and it bothered him that he'd always be the one re-clasping hers -- that she never noticed enough to initiate it herself, that it made him feel like he was holding onto her when she didn't particularly care to be held.
sometimes they'd walk a block or two and their hands would just dangle between their bodies in the air. it was childish, he knew, but he would restrain his hand from clutching hers even when the backs of their palms brushed and bumped into each other dumbly in mid-swing; at that point, wouldn't it be natural for her fingers to seek his? how hard was it for her to notice, to want it -- that warmth.
he wondered if it had always this way; he knew there was a time when she was ecstatic to be with him. but maybe things were winding down now because they were comfortable, and of course being comfortable was a good thing, not a sign that things were going stale, that they had finished discovering each other.
