Looking at his shoulder made her notice wind. Gushing past the crook of her neck. The empty space that wasn’t filled with the curve of his shoulder was filled with wind.
At each stop, the BART train jerked to a halt and she was forced backwards, pressed into the scratchy blue fabric of the seat. She couldn’t help thinking that wouldn’t happen as much if she would just put her head on his shoulder for support.
And for warmth.
For fulfillment, really.
The minute they stepped across the sliver of tracks between the platform and the train, after her bag got stuck between the doors and Brent wrenched it into the safety of the car with them, in that minute, she realized how little they knew each other. She also realized, in that small collection of seconds, that in the two weeks they had been awkwardly dating she had never put her head on his shoulder. Silly, she silently muttered, shook her head, and frowned inwardly at how pathetic she seemed. It had been an image stamped in the blurred imagination of her high school self: head resting on the shoulder of a boy. So silly, Josephine, she repeated again, silently, regrettably, achingly.
So her head did not rest on the inviting crook of his shoulder, not yet, as they sat perched, her legs crossed and his sprawled. Josephine’s head faced forward as she fixated on the advertisement typed in Spanish block letters on the wall across from them. Brent sat on his phone, scrolling but never typing. He had turned up the pointed collar of his black coat and she almost called him Dracula, but didn’t. Being that girl, the kind who cracks meaningless jokes, did not come gracefully, but awkwardly.
Besides, she didn’t even know if he would have laughed. Didn’t know if he was that guy, who could laugh at himself without being self-deprecating.
Instead of resting her head, now heavy from the thoughts and lack of support, she held it up on her own. Instead of making a dumb joke in exchange for a forced laugh, Josephine allowed her eyes to wander to the screen of Brent’s phone. He didn’t notice, but the girls behind them did. They cast judgemental and occasionally pitiful looks at her desperation. She watched as he scrolled through the newspaper, then his emails, and back to the newspaper again. Articles he had already read. On that tiny screen, she realized, he could see so much without feeling like he was ignoring her. Or without it bothering him that he was ignoring her. She felt her head pulled to the left, towards his shoulder, she wanted to touch him, to get his attention. It wasn’t a conscious decision, but one that carried her head to where Brent was sitting. She felt the scratching of his ridiculous collar, then the seams of the coat where the body was sewn to the arm, and finally, the weight of her head released from her own body onto his.
Now, he was holding her up.
Four and a half seconds later, however, Josephine felt him shift forward. She managed to catch herself before she allowed her head to fall into the empty space he had just left when he moved. She sat up again, ramrod straight, mortified. Adjusted her black felt beret––she felt a bit ridiculous wearing that thing, but Brent bought it for her, so of course she let it perch on her flat brown hair. That day seemed lifetimes ago. The day of coffee and black hats and refills of the same coffee. Now, he’s jerking forward and away from her heavy head.
Brent nudged closer to her, surprising her. As if he was trying to make up for the rudeness of his last gesture. His shoulder’s position, to Josephine, looked like both an apology and an invitation. This time, consciously and after calculated weighings of a decision, she allowed her head to lower. His shoulder had never looked warmer. Her head felt heavier with each second passed. She found herself awkwardly leaning with her head halfway to Brent when he picked up his phone again.
Josephine turned forward again, head upright. The train lurched and an elderly man grabbed Brent’s shoulder for support. Brent smiled warmly and put down his phone. Unperturbed. She fixed her eyes once again on the block letters of the Spanish sign in front of them as the lights of the next station slid by.