"What are you reading?"
Startled, she looks up from the story. "Oh, um..." Suddenly she recognizes the stranger's smile. "Marshall!" She closes the book and jumps up to hug Marshall. She had not seen him in such long time.
"Where have you been?" she asks.
"Nowhere. Everywhere. What does it matter?"
"Oh, you silly bastard! I missed you."
"Yes. Let's go."
She got up with the stranger almost forgetting the book that had fallen on the floor. He grabs the book as she grabs her bag.
"So what have you been doing? All this time, I mean."
"I've done whatever I've had to do. I don't really want to talk about it now with you. Let us enjoy this time."
***
She looks at the tablecloth. She lifts her head back up to look at him with an amused smile. "Where are we now?"
"We are alive and together. That's where we are for now, at least."
"How long shall we go on like this?"
"As long as it takes. Don't mind the time. It'll pass."
She looked out the window. Her chin rested on her hand she looked so tense yet at ease. She always found comfort when she was deep in thought; one could say that having something to worry about made her feel relaxed. The shock of a perfect position in life is nerve-wrecking for a girl like Acacia.
"It'll pass, but not time... perhaps the dreadful feeling that we are going too slow and should be enjoying happiness now. I don't want you to forget me. I don't want us to grow apart; I would rather have you hate me than for you to drift and forget. I want this to last and I will do whatever it takes... but I want the dreadful feeling that it won't work to pass -- to leave me. I will put it out of mind if I cannot rid myself of it," she said.
He reaches for her hand, the one under her chin. She jerks away at first without meaning to. A dreadful twitch. He stops and then holds her hand, pulling it across the tablecloth.
"They're just feelings. Sometimes they mean nothing. It is just fear."
"Yes. Just feelings, silly feelings."