Auburn

This is a sort of psychological fiction in some ways and is written during a sort of mental break. I don't know if I need a warning for that for not, but I thought to add one just in case.

One.

Two.

Three...

Four. It was on the fourth pass of the side street that Tessa could finally confirm what she had felt all along. Silly. What was she doing? It was the seventh of October on a dreary Wednesday and the only good thing she, as a busy woman could find to do in her busy day, was stalk a ghost. She groaned into the wheel of her car, tilting her gaze back to the bus stop. At six thirty on a weeknight the road was desolate, save for the one or two cars turning into the neighborhood just beyond the stop. And, despite the time and the date, it was surprisingly dark. The flickering of a lone streetlamp light, held precariously by its wire, frames the stop.

Silly.

This whole endeavor had been so silly. What was she expecting to see, exactly? The flash of auburn hair she'd caught sight of mere days ago? The downcast gaze of the woman who she'd seen sitting so forlorn on the bench? Her tattered clothing soaked through with rain. Maybe she was a little delusional to think that such a woman would reappear again. Or think of her at all, for the matter.

What if her name was 'Jolene'? Or 'Adeline'? No, her hair had been too bold a style for her to be an Adeline. She imagined an Adeline would look traditional, checkered apron, short up-do and all. Yes, she was certainly silly. But the woman! God could never have crafted a more perfect vessel than when he crafted the woman, surely. But that one...her auburn sweetheart was most perfect in particular. Her mind had been filled with the most curious of dreams since she'd seen her.

Dreams of forests and fields. Of soft hands braiding daisies through her hair and the alluring curve of a mirthful smile. One, even, of a cottage. How she loathed the gentleness and freeness that filled her that very night. How the smell of drying herbs and warming tea had invaded her senses. And, oh! How the press of plush, soft skin on her back had driven her mad. Perhaps this woman was meant to drive her absolutely wild. With a huff of annoyance she sped off.

Days.

She had made it many before the spot called her back. This time, after nights of restless slumber. Seated on the concrete now, she glimpsed the melancholy of it all. The cold sting against her skin as she stares at the dull grey and brown of fallen and dying leaves, all accompanied by the subtle sound of cars passing by. What had the woman felt standing here that day? Dark clouds crowding the sky. The cold bite of stinging rain pummeling the ground and drenching the earth. Tessa lifts a stone into her hand and rubs the smooth belly of it. Head tilted in contemplation. Why would seeing one woman, a being she could see down any old street and in any crowded room, spark her imagination so suddenly?

Maybe the woman had been pondering. Pondering brought its sorrow. One weighty with the truth of reality. A reality filled with contradictions, and facts blunt by years of wear. She could picture the auburn haired woman sitting with her and speaking for hours. Detail how little everything mattered and how outrageous everything was in the world these days. Who would smile and laugh and brush her fingers fleetingly over her arm in amused affection. There is the barest glance of a touch that graces her now, she swears it. A touch that could be mistaken for a breeze, or maybe just a memory of a memory. And with the subtle and startlingly familiar hint of rosemary scenting the air, a small smile quirks her lips. She rises, gazes one more time, longingly, at the creaking light post and the bench, and returns home. Though even gone from the place the memory plagues her mind the rest of her achingly arbitrary day.

She pictured, that night, a sky.

Void.

Deep.

Endless.

Filled with nothingness and bleeding thickly into the fabric of reality. An emptiness vast and overwhelming. And at its core, the woman. The very one. With hair that lit up like the gentlest of flames in the light and eyes blue as clear ocean waters. Her skin a tanned softness, her figure altogether intriguing. But on her face, she held the sting of some sort of understanding sadness. As though she, alone, could fathom all the treachery of the world and could not quell it. The throbbing in her head was what woke her, the tears spilling down her face startled her. That morning, she went about her routine. Rise, scratch uselessly at the itch between her shoulder blades her hands alone could never find, pour two cups of coffee, (Two? When had that begun?), make a serving of eggs and bacon enough for a couple, (a couple?), then brush her teeth. When she lifts her face, however, hers wasn't there. Only a hollow, devouring emptiness. And when she sits down on her couch to laugh at some k-drama, no one is there to watch it with her.

When had she begun expecting company? When had she gotten so used to the woman she dreamed up that she had bought an extra toothbrush and kept one side of the bed open? She lets out a soft sob and clenches her fists to her burning chest, the hole that had never been there before the day by the bus stop was ripping open and spilling her onto the floor. There had never been a woman, only the glimpse of red autumn leaves in the trees as they fell to the ground. And there never had been a 'Jolene', or an 'Adeline'.

But there had to have been! What else had filled her head with all those lives? All those days spent in the spring sun laughing and frolicking through those lush fields? All the nights spent wrapped in the supple arms of a woman? She sped down the streets, cutting through traffic patterns and ignoring the honking of cautious drivers. All of it could burn now. She slammed to a screeching stop in the parking lot and stepped, almost hesitantly, out. Across from the small park sat the bus stop, and behind it a tree. A tree full of dark, auburn leaves.

Perhaps the loneliness which had stalked her all her life had finally broken her enough to imagine an ideal life. But the tears dripping down her face, those were real. Were they not? And the droll passing of cars was too. Even if the sound seemed ceaseless, and the rain always came at 5:15 on the dot. Reality had always been a fluid concept to Tessa. A construct she struggled to conceptualize. Just like the woman. The one standing right before her, soaking in the evening rain at her bus stop. And as she buckles into her car, Tessa decides to drive away. Maybe some ghosts were better left unmet.