I watch him pass by my window every day. In the mornings the light bounces off his blonde curls and they gleam in the light. From my window I watch him pass, holding his briefcase in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other. Sometimes he is talking on the phone. I wonder what colour his eyes are? I suspect they are blue but the angle of my view is wrong and he really is too far away for me to see properly. I would like his eyes to be green, I dream that his eyes will be green, with flecks of gold, but that is a dream and I don't really know but I want to, I want to know so badly.
In the evenings, when he passes by, his pace is slower and I can see the tired droop of his shoulders and the long slow stride of his walk. So different to first thing in the morning. I long to speak to him, to ask him his name, to ask him what he has been doing that has made him so tired. But I don't have the courage to go out and speak to him, I am afraid that he will not see me, he will look through me as though through a pane of glass, just like everyone else does.
I have been here for such a long time, in this house, it feels like forever, the passage of time has lost its meaning for me somewhere. I was born in this house, I grew up here, it's always been my home, I've always loved it here. I remember playing in the attic rooms and running up and down the stairs. I remember bouncing my ball against the wall in the vestibule and running races in the garden with my sisters. My parents are gone, Elizabeth and Alice, my sisters, are gone. They have been gone a long time. I was alone for a long time but now the house is full of people again, full of noise and colour but still, I feel invisible, I can't seem to communicate with them, they pass me on the stairs, I smile and hope they will stop and speak to me but I don't have the courage to break the silence. I open my mouth to speak, to introduce myself but they are already gone, rushing off to carry on with their lives. For the longest time there has been no one in my world to talk to.
But now there is him, the blonde man, I wish I knew his name, I want it to be James, in my dreams his name is James but I don't know. I need to know who he is. If he was in my world I wouldn't be alone anymore, I could talk to him, I have so much to tell him and so much I want to share with him, but I have to meet him first. I have to find a way to meet him.
I resolve to go out and to say hello the next time he passes but when that time comes I cannot seem to leave the house to do it. My chance passes me by and I resolve to do it next time and again when the moment arrives I cannot seem to do it. What is stopping me? Am I afraid he will reject my attempt at contact or shyness or the fear that he will look through me and not see me or worse, he will see me and still walk on uninterested in my attempts. Which is worse to be seen and ignored or not to be seen at all?
I spend the evening in the garden beneath the cherry tree, it's my favourite place, I come here to think. It's cool and peaceful here, the breeze whispers through the pink cherry blossom, it's almost musical. I remember when my father built the stone bench that I am sitting on, he carved it himself as a gift for my mother, I remember sitting on the counter in his workshop watching him as he chiseled carefully at the segments of marble, thinking how wonderful it was that my father, a man who usually was so formal, seemed perfectly at ease getting messy and covered with stone dust making something for my mother. The bench forms two semi circles that fit around the the trunk of the tree, of course when my father first put it in place the tree was only slender, a slip of a thing, just as I was. Now the tree fills the circle and I marvel at how clever my father was to know how much space to leave to let the tree grow.
The garden is quiet, the people that share the house with me now rarely seem to come into the garden. The children do sometimes but now it is evening and the children will be getting ready for bed, so it is just me and the birds sharing the space.
How I wish that I was sharing this quiet with James, my blonde man, how wonderful it would be to share this marble symbol dedicated to my father's love to my mother with him. For a moment I feel my loneliness wash over me like a cold wave and a moment suddenly feels like an eternity.
