There is a woman I like. She is bright, and accomplished, but jokes lightly about how ‘stupid’ she has been. She is stylish, and sophisticated, but doesn’t dress on brand, she uses layers of color and texture, and pockets in odd places. She is composed, at times edgy, yet she looks down shyly when I make her laugh.

Her face is clean and pale, with full feminine lips that I catch myself staring at, and large, innocent eyes that arrest my breathing with their sparkle. Sitting at lunch, my subconscious mind projects the feel of her small hands settling into mine. My fingers twitch, with the thought of them curling up around hers. I have to consciously choose to hold my arms down to prevent them from reaching across the table.

She is one of the most observant and unfiltered people I know. Graceful, and demure with a beautiful, twisted steak of crazy. Whenever it starts to show, I find myself picturing her naked. I adore the splash of a pale pink, amaranth purple, or burnt umber colored nipple on a soft, pale breast.

I wax romantic at the thought of her… her so delicate, with her perfect manners, I gave her a card on Friday. I had cut pieces from her emails, and puzzled them together into a kind of 2015 New Year’s possibility. Threads of dreams… Scraps of intentions… Sewn together, and then draped with blinking lights. She was very moved. Her eyes teared up. God I don’t know how I stopped myself from tasting those lips, how I wanted to slide the tip of my tongue over them, feel them caught between mine. I just watched her, let the moment unfold slowly, listened, then put my hands on her arms as I told her what a pleasure it was to do, that I was grateful, and excited about the spark she had created in me.

Later she asked me if I do things like that for all of my ‘friends’. I had to think about it. I said, ‘no’, smiling, thinking about how long it had been. This knowledge made me feel giddy. I said, the last time, was for M, and it was over a year ago. She cut me off, and said, “Yes, I know how you love him so.” Now I was grinning like mad, and I noticed I had started walking faster for some reason. It made no sense, cause when I did get back to the office, I couldn’t settle in to work anyway.