As mentioned previously, I take the train to work each day. Sometimes I jot down descriptions and invent back stories for my fellow train-goers. And sometimes I'll share those brief, messy character sketches with you.
Today, I'd like to introduce Paul:
Close cropped dark hair, black, black, back. His nose is angular and juts out, narrow tipped. Lean, with skin the color of weak cofee, day-old tea. He’s wearing an aggressively pink dress shirt, the sort of pink you’d find in a six-year-old’s closet or gracing an overly-cheerful cartoon monster. He closes his eyes and rests his head against the side of the train. Stubble dusts his chin and lip, patchy on his cheeks. It’s been three days since he shaved.
Three days since the fight.
Shaving would mean that Edmond is coming back and he doesn’t believe that anymore. Hasn’t believed it since the first night when his phone didn’t ring. Even though he stayed up until 4 am waiting. Blunt-tipped fingers. Neatly trimmed nails. There’s a scar on the back of his hand like a crescent, circling the base of his thumb. He tells his coworkers it happened while working on his car, a too-sharp piece of metal sheeting he didn’t see as he reached for a tool. The truth is a drunken bar-fight at Christy’s one night - the jagged shard of a beer bottle cutting his skin as he raised his hands to protect his face when Edmond lost his temper.
He looks down to check his phone, eyes lingering on the scar for a moment. Still no call. He sighs and slips the phone back in his pocket, rubs a finger over the scar on his hand and wishes for the twentieth time that morning that love was a choice and not a compulsion.
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