Part III

‘Hey! Where have you been?’ The man is rushing to catch her while she was just about to cross the street.

She stops and she stares at him.

The man asks again, this time with a calm and warm voice: ‘Where have you been?’

She keeps staring and wonders about the person who just stopped her. ‘Let’s go there!’, she says while pointing towards the store door. It was dark outside and the city was shutting down.

The man continues: ‘I wondered about you… about how things have been since I saw you last time… I hope you’ve been well.’ He stops and wants to grab her hand, yet he doesn’t. He knows she will refuse the gesture, the connection. ‘Where have you been? Are you alright?’

She doesn’t like the last question. She always had a bad response to it, almost repulsion like. The man sees that but he doesn’t know the story behind it.

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t want to be rude or offensive in any way. I see there’s something I said that you don’t like’, the man tells her with a serious, yet concerned voice.

She looks at him. After few seconds she replies: ‘You seem to look younger…’.

‘Oh, so you do remember me!’ The man’s face opens up. He is happy now. ‘I thought maybe you don’t remember me’.

‘Yeah… I do remember you.’, the woman says. ‘I was just not expecting this to happen…’ She continues staring at him. ‘There is something different about him this time’, the girl thinks to herself. ‘There is something…’

‘I missed you!’, the man tells her with a warm voice. He is now looking right into her eyes. He sees that she doesn’t know what to say. ‘I missed you! I missed you so much.’, he continues.’Why did you run away?’ He pauses, yet not waiting for an answer but rather to just look at her. He wants to pull her into his arms and to hold her tight, but he knows… he knows she will push him back.

The woman’s lips open as she’s about to say something. She stays still. ‘You look younger’, she thinks to herself.