From where she was working, she could see across the yard of trees and glimpse the row of dignified brick buildings through the fog. She picked this place particularly because of the view, and because of the probability of interruption. Reading mathematics on a Friday afternoon could easily turn into a soporific chore.
A glass door swung open, and as she glimpsed him entering the space, she dropped her eyes to her work and tried to look industrious. He strode past her and across the room, his hair pulled back into a burnished orange ponytail, thick and wavy against the crimson of his sweater, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his paint-spattered corduroys. She lost herself in an exercise concerning open sets, so that she really was surprised when he appeared at her table.
He sat down and as they chatted, she struggled internally to work up the gumption to ask him to meet for coffee, as though that simple suggestion would expose every vulnerability of her psyche, as though speaking those words were tantamount to confessing a hidden corner of her soul. As he got up to leave, she heard her own voice betraying her as if she were observing it from afar, spilling the request out onto the surface between them. Sure, he replied. How about Thursday?
He left her to her books and disappeared into the misty yard of trees. Now that the moment had passed, she felt as though it had always existed, a singularity in an infinite sea of potential, waiting in the wings for her to manifest it.
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