Lunch With A Total Stranger

My lunch yesterday consisted of a 6-inch Subway meatball sandwich on Parmesan Oregano bread. I was scarfing that down on one of those little schooldesk fast food tables when a tall young Greek-looking girl came in to wait in the lineup.

She may have been about 19 or 20 years old, dark hair and features reminiscent of the lovely actress Mary Steenbergen who was discovered by Jack Nicholson working in a diner somewhere down south.

Anyway, I noticed her standing there and looking hungrily down the line and I was reminded of a teenage boy who has just emerged from gym class and who is starving. She had that hungry wolf look on her face like “Food, now and don’t mess around!”

I was about half way through my meal when to my surprise she appeared beside the table opposite me. She could have faced with her back to me, but no, she looked right at me as she sat down and removed her coat, revealing a milk white and pure virginal décolletage as she began unwrapping her sandwich.

She looked almost haloed and I seemed to be looking at her through a mistly lens, like in an old romantic movie as she dove into her sandwich and then glanced up at me again momentarily.

I quickly became very self concious as I clumsily tried to keep my own sandwich remnants from spilling out of the wrap onto my coat as I nibbled and now tried to eat with as much decorum as I could muster, given the dripping mustard and lettuce bits hanging from my mouth.

There was something incredibly sweet and civilized too about how rather than turn away from me and eat facing the street, she would share this moment with a total stranger a table away, and for a few moments we did share a meal together. Neither of us smiled but I wonder if she realized how much her presence touched me?

I suddenly felt terribly old and uncomfortable, and all I could think of was how quickly I could finish my sandwich and be spared the sweet agony of facing her head on for one more moment.

I cleaned up my crumpled and soiled wrappings, deposited them in the garbage and sailed out into the chilly evening street, circling back around by the Paramount Theatre and past the old fashioned barber shop opposite it on Smithe, for a leisurely walk back to the office.

Although neither of us had smiled, I now had a big smile on my face.