Fifth Day

Those eyes behind the glasses intrigued him. Every single time he entered that office, he saw those eyes lift up above the computer screen. His own eyes could not resist as he glanced back and at the same time, he walked forward. And through the lucid glasses, the deep dark eyes stared back at him.

As he walked pass the cubicle, he wanted to turn his head. He wanted to see who this girl was who peeked at him and whose eyes seized his own. Yet, something held him back and he did not turn his head. However he could not keep his curiosity at bay and from the corner of his eye he saw a shadow of the girl. He could see she did not stare back at him and it looked like her eyes were now focused on the screen.

He pushed open the door, entering another section of the office and sat down in his cubicle. Now that Jake was seated safely inside his cubicle where no deep dark eyes could follow him, he wanted to stand up and see the girl. Yet he did not. Four days had passed since he had joined the office and began seeing those eyes. He opened up the documents on his computer and turned his eyes back to the screen. His mind, however, flickered back and forth from the corridor. So these four days passed as such.

When the day ended, he got up from his seat and exited the cubicle. Even as he was pushing the door open and stepping out, his brain was deliberating. He slowly gathered courage to turn his head to the right and take a look at this girl. ‘I should do it. It’s just a simple look... a mili-second glance at the most’, he thought to himself. So his head right turned to the right. His mind held all sorts of ideas of a vague image in his head formed from the shadow he had seen from the corner of his eye. A tall girl, with possibly curled up black hair, of a moderate weight, of neither too skinny or too fat, and most of all somehow he felt she had a dark shiny radiant skin.

To Jake's horror his eyes witnessed something other than his imagination, and his heart felt the heavy blow of stupidity. The seat was empty. The computer screen was off. He should have finished his work earlier, maybe then he would have caught a glimpse of her.

So for the fifth day in a row, he exited the office with only a vague image of this girl, formed from the shadow he had seen.

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Bread Crumbs

The old man sat on the bench. He wore a long brown overcoat to protect him from the cold evening. His head hung from his neck as if asleep, and on top of his head rested an old brown faded hat. His hands were in his coat pocket, protecting himself from the cold. People walked about, some stared at this odd man, while children stopped by to take an intensive look at him. Yet he seemed asleep.

Then he lifted his head up. His face was wrinkled and furrowed with his skin stretched thin, exposing his old age. A thick carpet of white grizzly beard covered his face, which he now dug his fingers into and scratched his cheek. He put his hand back in the pocket and felt a hard block. He removed the object out to see, it was a bun he had got in the morning. It had become hard and dry. He considered what to do with it. His teeth were not strong anymore; trying to chew on this hardened piece of bread would only hurt his gums. Using both his hands he split the bun in half. While one half went into his pocket, the other was being broken into pieces and thrown on the ground.

In front of where he sat there was no such open area for feeding pigeons. Instead there was a stone path on which people continuously trampled. Some ignored the senile old man who threw bread crumbs on their path, while some huffed and sighed with annoyance, but none bothered to tell him anything, and all just trampled on the crumbs.
Surprisingly, a grayish blue pigeon with its beady eyes flew down and began pecking the ground, nibbling at the crumbs. A child who was walking with her parents, on seeing the pigeon caught her fancy as she stretched out her arms and ran to it. The pigeon responded by lifting itself up and gliding in the air avoiding the child. And the bread crumbs trampled underneath the child’s feet as she trotted by, imitating a gliding bird.

Once the child passed by the pigeon fluttered back down. And so like an aeroplane the child glided around to disturb the pigeon once again, and the pigeon once again flew up to avoid her and fluttered back down to peck the crumbs. The child turned to pass by again, but the steady hand of her father on her shoulder made her take pause and so she passed by without gliding again.

The cold evening gave way to a chilly night. The pigeon was no longer there. Black darkness had fallen in the park, except for a few far off street lights. There was no sign of life in the park, except for this old man. The second half of the bun was in his hand now and his fingers were in the process of picking that apart and throwing the crumbs on the ground.

This time there was no pigeon that arrived to eat for it was late. After a quarter of an hour, the bun was no more in his hands, and the path in front of him was dotted with bread crumbs.

He put his hands in his pocket, feeling the chilliness of the night set in. He twisted his body to the right, by lifting his legs. Now he was lying down on the bench. He pulled out his hand from his pocket, removed his hat and placed it on his face as he closed his eyes and prepared to get some sleep.

The crumbs were lying on the ground. No feet trampled them as no human being was in the park. No pigeon came to feast on the crumbs since night was not dinner time for them.

Yet a new group arrived and attacked the crumbs. A group of trailing ants stumbled on to the field of crumbs. Soon enough, an army of ants was transporting the crumbs back to their lair and by morning even the tiniest bit of bread crumb would have vanished.

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