story pieces

Aiden took a deep breath, and then exhaled slowly.  He had no idea he would be this nervous.  As he made his way casually around the lake, he went through a dozen different introductions in his head; nothing seemed appropriate.  Still racing to find the right words, he realized time was up.  He had been so pre-occupied he didn’t realize he was now standing only 5 feet away from her.  He took another deep breath to calm himself down and began to walk forward.  His first stride broke a twig in his path, making a sharp crack.  Ava turned, startled by the noise, to see him standing there.  Aiden was close enough now to see with sharp clarity why her eyes had struck him so.  They were the richest brown he’d ever seen, sprinkled with streaks of gold.  Big and dark, you couldn’t help but fall into them.  “Hi,” she said cautiously, “are you ok?  You look a kinda confused.”  He blinked and shook his head, trying to come back to the present.

            “Yeah, sorry about that.  Um, I was just uh, taking a hike on one of the trails and…saw, I mean I heard you humming to yourself,” Aiden stammered nervously.  There are moments in every person’s life when they wish they could stop the camera, rewind, and relive their last few moments, that time was now for Aiden. 

            “Oh, I’m sorry.  I didn’t realize anyone else was around, I hope I didn’t bother you.” 

            “Bother me?” he asked stunned, “You have one of the most beautiful voices I’ve ever heard.”  Looking back, Aiden thought, it was a pretty corny thing to say.  He guessed she appreciated it, she blushed profusely and thanked him with a sheepish grin.  “I live just up that hill, would you like to come by sometime and have some coffee, say…tonight around 7?”

            “Well, it’s a nice offer, but I don’t even know your name,” she said.  Another pitfall in his attempts to woo her, Aiden quickly recovered.

            “Dakota, Aiden Dakota.”  He smiled and extended his hand.  She took it and stood up, grinning from ear to ear.

            “I’m Ava, and it’s nice to meet you Aiden.”

            “The pleasure’s all mine,” Aiden said.  He had never meant it more.

 

3

            Aiden was brought with a screeching halt back to reality by a shrill ring from his phone.  He let it ring a few times, not really wanting to get up to answer it, and not really caring who it was either.  He didn’t have a answering machine right now though, it had broken a few months back and he just never got it repaired.  On about the ninth ring though he’d had enough of the noise, so he hoisted himself out of the leather chair and walked out into the now warm living room.  As he made his way to the coffee table, he glanced at the mirror hanging above the fireplace.  For a brief flicker of a second, he could have sworn he saw someone staring at him in its reflection, but when he darted around, there was no one in sight.  He could hear Ralph up stairs in his room, snoring away.  Who…or what could it have been?  The ringing refocused his attention and he shrugged it off as a hallucination.  “Hello?” he answered casually.

            Shhhh  errrr  shhh, “He-o?”

            “Hello?” Aiden answered again, struggling to hear over the static.

            “Can oo hear ee?” someone yelled anxiously through the receiver.

            “Just barely, who is this?”

            “Good.  I’m stuck out on the highway.  The an oo stopped to elp ee gave me this umber, do oo have a oom available?” the static was getting worse.

           “Yes, we have a vacancy available,” Aiden replied listening closely.

 “Onder-ul! Ank oo so uch.  We ill be there in ifteen inutes.  Ank oo again,” the voice replied and the line went dead.  The thunder outside was kicking up again and the rain was still falling in sheets on the tin roof of the cabin.