Dream: 03/22/09

There’s no love at first sight. Not for him. He sees it as a heightened sense of self-consciousness, an awareness of the power of someone’s presence on himself. And when he sees that girl, his train of thought loses its course. It takes a long time before he can fully regain that composure. He can’t appreciate a pair of long legs; they’re tools of asphyxiation. A woman’s beauty topples his own vanities, and that’s what he can’t handle.

And this particular case of ‘love’ wasn’t his first sight. In fact, the number of times he’s seen this girl is incalculable. She wasn’t cute enough to invade his mind or shake his concentration; her non-descript cuteness was singed with greasy hair and a smile like a snarl. Plus she shared a dissatisfaction for nearly everything, unwavering disgust, a palpable hate, etc. How could she be worth hating, he thought, if she can’t hold my attention?

He became infatuated with hundreds of girls since he last saw her and loathed each moment of it. But while standing in line for a lecture, he spotted her. She stood at the end of a block, a vertex that formed as the line bent around the corner. Despite her small size, he saw only her, nothing before or beyond her.

What’s her name? he thought. He hadn’t bothered to learn it, so he assigned her the name Lily. He used to view her as an uptight pseudo-feminist, despite never knowing her, but now he sensed a calm aura. Perhaps it was the flower tucked behind her ear or the blue summer dress that influenced his will to surrender.

He ditched his friend for ‘the greater good’: closer proximity. He inched up to Lily and performed a sardonic shuffle, cluttered with clumsy steps and slides. He finished by opening his arms and waving his hands. But she didn’t offer any applause. In fact, his attention to this detail distracted him from analyzing the impulsive jig he had performed. It was that specific action which mattered most. A sarcastic dance couldn’t mask its inherent sweetness, a symbol that represented a shift from his own needs to that of another. His schtick wasn’t solely for his benefit; his smile remained contingent on the arrival of hers.

When the dance failed, he tried some intentionally corny jokes, but Lily still didn’t smile; irony, after all, isn‘t the way to a woman‘s heart. Instead of refueling his veiled sense of misogyny, he gave a shot at some physical gags. Impressed by his resiliency, she cracked out a smile, teeth perfectly aligned. But the sexiest thing about her was the look she gave, a look that proved he still remained a bit caught up in himself. Her eyes didn’t say, “You’ve ensnared me,” but “Alright then, I’ll give you a shot.” The line moved forward like a conveyor belt, and Lily grabbed his hand and led him inside.