it was books that made me feel that
Perhaps I was not completely alone

Despite Piper's focus being entirely on finding a place to sit within the crowded bakery, she wasn't surprised to see that the young man sitting at the table's focus wasn't on her seating woes. No, he had that look that she knew well from her own experiences. The lost in your art expression, and she wasn't surprised when her 'excuse me' fell on deaf ears. She knew how hard it was to be wrenched out of your world when you had found that focused place within your art. For a moment, Piper considered abandoning hope of finding a place at the table. But alas, she wanted to find her own focus in her writing and that wouldn't happen elsewhere. Momentarily, Piper watched his pencils fly across the paper with that furious intensity that came from a true artist, and she couldn't help the smile that quirked on her lips. Artists were her favorite, after all. Having no talent for a pencil and paper, Piper envied those that could bring their thoughts to life upon a piece of white paper. Still, it wasn't enough to stop Piper from speaking further, pressing the issue that she so needed a place to sit down. She did so so awkwardly, and for a moment her cheeks rushed with color as she considered how ridiculous she must sound.

It was his emerald green eyes that scanned her as she spoke that did her in. She'd always been a sucker for green eyes. But it was the slightly impatient way he looked at her that made her halt in her speaking, offering him a brief introduction that her name was Piper, and she really, really wasn't this annoying usually (though, she supposed that could be argued). Her fingers clenched on the strap of her messenger bag as she watched him glance at the outlet she so desired, then to all the other occupied tables. "Again, I am so sorry to bother you," She said as he considered her words, fully prepared for him to turn her away when he did the exact opposite and permitted her presence within his workspace, though he didn't bother offering his name. "Thank you," Piper said, a grateful sigh escaping her lips as she gently lowered her bag into the seat. The blonde tried to be as unobtrusive as possible as she removed her coat and settled into the chair. Briefly, she admired his focus as he turned his attention directly back to his work. How she wanted to sit and watch what he would create, but that was certainly creepy and not at all what she had sold him in asking for permission to be at the table.

Instead, Piper busied herself with removing her laptop and charger from the bag. After untangling the power cord and getting it into the outlet, she booted up her computer and paused as she looked at the blank screen in front of her. Ah, that same daunting white screen that had tormented her at the bookstore and in her home. For three days, she'd been stuck on chapter three of her novel. She had all the ideas for the dystopian tale inspired by so many of the books she'd loved, but nothing would come to her now. A world so unlike their own lived inside her head, and while she knew exactly what she wanted to say, she had no idea how to get it out of her own head and onto the computer. Her fingers hovered over the keys as she typed a paragraph, then deleted the whole thing. And repeat. Over and over again until she looked out the window, defeated by her own brain. One glance at the silver fitness tracker on her left wrist told her it had been about twenty minutes since she'd started here, and she had just about nothing to show for it.

Abruptly, the blonde looked up at the artist, and for a moment she was jealous of the way he had continued to move and create something upon that piece of paper. How she longed for that clarity of what to write for herself. After a moment of watching him, she couldn't help herself. He clearly had some sort of muse, and perhaps she could steal some of it. "Let me ask you a hypothetical question," She blurted, her gaze coming to rest on him. "Say the government decided that you had to marry a random person that they decided, and you'd never met them. And on your wedding day, you got locked in a house with them for twenty four hours. How would you react? What would you even say to each other?" Perhaps his answers to her hypothetical question could provide some soft of inspiration. Or at the very least, perhaps it would end the silence between them.

       

Piper Aldersley