User:Anthonyhcole/Pebble

You are walking with a friend discussing a poem. A tiny quartz pebble has found its way into your shoe and is now directly under your heel, but your friend is about to sum up and you don't want to interrupt the flow, so you continue walking, looking interested. Stab. Stab. Stab. Soon she smiles broadly and says, "Well what do you think?" But you think nothing. You have lost the thread. You determine to attend to her with all your might and, as sensitively as possible, ask if she couldn't rephrase what she just said. Stab. Stab. Stab. Something flits across her face. Was it irritation? Contempt? A knife twists in your heart. She begins again and, not smiling, her eyes scan you. Another twist. She flinches at your grimacing attempted smile. Twist. On you trudge. Stab. Stab. Stab. Oblivious to your surroundings, you try to think back about the poem and what she's been saying but can only grasp disconnected fragments. Stab. Stab. Stab. She looks at you to see if you're following and nods to affirm a point. Should you nod too? Was that a frown? Twist. Stab. Stab. Sitting on a bolder, you remove your shoe and shake out the very tiny quartz pebble which pings off the bolder and disappears into the sand, and replace your shoe. In the peachy sky behind your friend the huge orange sun hangs just above the horizon, tracing a gold outline on her cheek. The smell of horses fills the warm, still air and, a mile away, a bull frog is croaking. Her insight washes through the poem; cutting a new, deep, elegant pattern of meaning and you laugh and say, "Of course! I thought I knew that poem so well. How could I have missed that?" She smiles and blushes; you blush and smile. Now you're both smiling at the fact that you're both blushing. She takes your hand and pretends to pull you up from the bolder, and you walk on in silence for a while, feeling perfect.