(please keep in mind that i wrote this when i was 12, so it sucks much.)

Kay was a quiet observer. She’d been one all her life. She hid behind her glasses and her puffy red jacket and her wispy black bangs and she watched the world go on without her. She watched mothers and daughters, fathers and sons. She watched sixty year-old men feeding pigeons in the park, lovers, haters, and everything in-between.

And she had a journal. Into this journal, into this thin leather-bound book of memories, jumbled thoughts and dreams, she emptied in splashes of marker, ink, and lead all that she had retained. The world went on, and she didn’t live, she just existed.

It was on a cool November afternoon as she sat on the stairs of the local library that her eyes fell upon an engaging subject. He was tall, lithe, and he seemed to have the jumbled energy of a five year-old high on too many sweets just below the surface of a calm and collected exterior.

Kay was taken away.

She watched, enthralled but trying desperately not to look it, everyday, as he came up the sidewalk, hands shoved into his pockets. He’d walk up the stone stairs, two at a time, his blonde waves rising and running, and then he’d disappear for a few hours.

And Kay sat, and sketched away, and existed.

As it got dark, as the sky turned lavender and the air got chillier than before, he’d emerge from inside, hands tucked back in pockets, face with an expression of enlightenment and understanding. Kay was taken away. He was everything and anything. He was nothing at all. He was beautiful, inside and out, she was sure of it, because whatever it was that was inside of him was calling out to her.

It was asking her to stop existing, to live.

But she had died a long time ago. All she had was her journal, with a million and one scenarios, a million and one dreams of him. A million and one angles and expressions and emotions and stories and everything she had ever wanted in life.

She watched him every day, until the chill in the air rose into the sky and vanished, replaced with a warmth and a breeze, a sun that shined far brighter than anyone had asked it too, but Kay could stand it, Kay didn’t mind, as long as she could catch a glimpse of a memory she shaped in her mind. A memory fashioned out of silent longing. A memory of him. A memory that would always be there…a two-dimensional memory, but a memory all the same.

It was on a breezy day in April, a day when the sky was the brightest blue it had ever been, that there was a break in the routine. Kay was sat on her spot on the library steps, watching people pass by, imprinting the thought of a daffodil she had seen not too long ago into her journal, waiting for him.

And, like clockwork, he showed up just as he had for the past four months, walking with silent contemplation on his face, hands jammed into pockets, blue eyes staring at the ground. He got to the steps, Kay took a sharp intake of breath and drank him in.

He paused. She scratched away. He began to climb. She followed with her pencil. He got to the heavy glass door and pulled a hand out of a pocket, took that hand and pushed….He paused. He looked at her. Kay froze. He abandoned the door, walked in her direction. Kay thought she might have heard something like her pencil falling onto the stone, but she wasn’t sure, she couldn’t look down. He sat beside her. He picked up her forgotten pencil and handed it to her, “So I guess you’d be drawing, eh?”

Kay didn’t move.

“What’s your name?”

“……..….K…Kay. Kay.”

A smile that just about finished her. “Kay Kay, interesting name you’ve got there. My name’s Daniel. We can cut the bullshit here…You’ve been watching me, haven’t you?”

“I’m…I’m, I’m sorry I….”

“Shhh. It’s OK. May I see?”

Close up, she could see the fine hairs on his face, a scar on his right arm, a tattoo on his left. He smelled like something familiar, yet entirely new. His legs were long. His hair was messy. He had a slight dimple and a crooked smile. A smile that just about finished her.

“S…ee what?” His eyes flicked down to her journal. “I…I don’t know, I don’t think so because I…well. Um.”

“Very articulate, you are.” He smiled again, just to let her know he was kidding around. He smiled and said it would be only fair. She passed it reluctantly in his direction. She felt stupid and untalented and stupid….and fat. Letting a breeze flow against her skin, she tried not to look at him, tried not to imagine all the horrible things he might be thinking of her. Silence passed, for what seemed like ages. “Wow. That’s a lot of me.”

“I’m so sorry, I just, well, you are just so beaut….You were a really good subject. A challenge…to draw. I guess.” She couldn’t read his face. His eyes scanned page upon page of scrap, of masterpiece, of hurried scribbles, and works in progress, of her living vicariously through him.

“You’re very talented, Kay Kay.” He closed the journal, and handed it to her. She was relieved. She felt like puking, but she was relieved. “I’ve noticed you, ya know. I noticed you a while ago. Always sitting, right here. I wondered, ‘Jeeze, doesn’t she get cold? Doesn’t she get tired?’ But I guess it’s an artist thing. Anyway…I never quite got the nerve to approach you. I guess I expected you to come to me. But you didn’t. S-sometimes…I’d show up, even when I didn’t really have to, or want to. Just to see if you’d be here. And you always were. You’re very beautiful, Kay. I can tell you don’t think so. But you are. And I just wanted to talk to you, because you seemed interesting and different and special….It was like you were waiting there for me. Do you want to talk? Would you like to talk? We could go to a coffee shop or somewhere and just talk about meaningless bullshit, or divulge our secrets to one another, doesn’t matter. I’d just like to talk to you….I notice I’ve talked quite a bit already. I’ll stop. And I’m going to wait for you to get over this being shy thing, okay?”

“Okay.”