Window Fellow {pt.3}

Need to catch up? Pt.1 and pt.2 are at these links! :)

I went back the next day—kind of inevitable unless I wanted to walk three extra miles around town. My steps slowed as I neared the street corner, wondering… 

Just as I’d feared, he wasn’t there. No sign of anyone at the second-story window. I held my head high and smothered out the threat of tears. This wasn’t going to get me down. 

But my resolve wasn’t nearly strong enough. 

I felt awful all day. So preoccupied was I that I missed three questions in second period and nearly plowed a professor in the hall. 

The day that followed wasn’t much better. I overslept, missed the bus, and arrived at class twenty minutes late. I was going to have to do something. 

On the way home, three days after I’d learned his secret, I stopped at the corner where Window Fellow’s house was situated. Withdrawing the note that I’d written earlier from my pocket, I re-read the scribblings.

Please come back to the window. I miss your smile. 
-Annalyse 

I’d written “I miss you,” overthinking every thought that could possibly (in a thousand years) cross his mind when he read it, before deciding that it was a tad presumptuous and flirty. So I added “r smile” and stuck it in the mail slot before I could talk myself out of it. 

Which wouldn’t have taken long.


*


I don’t know what power I expected my little note to have, but I definitely had high hopes. Those hopes were rather dampened, however, when again the next morning he was not at the window as I passed. 

Nor the next day, or the next, or the next… 

A week passed. During which, I struggled to keep up with classes, while simultaneously mourning the loss of a friendship. A friendship that I didn’t realize the value of until it was presumably lost for good. 

But on this particular morning, I was choosing to look on the bright side of things. Like, the semester being nearly over and the long, glorious summer stretching out ahead of me. 

I leaned my shoulder against a telephone pole behind the bus stop and let my eyes drift close, enjoying the warm sunshine, the chirp of birds, and the hum of a city coming alive. 

“Good morning, Annalyse.” 

I jerked upright at the sound of his voice, spinning to look across the street. Please, please, please… 

Sure enough, he was back at the window. 

Forearms leaned on the windowsill, hands clasped together, face wearing a hesitant smile. 

“G-good morning,” I stuttered. “I wasn’t expecting you.” 

He didn’t reply, only kept studying me in a manner that was partially unnerving and partially endearing. 

“Thank you for the note.” 

I shrugged, quaking inside. I wasn’t sure if I could have this conversation. “You’re welcome. It wasn’t much of one.” 

“It was what was written in between the lines that meant the most.” 

I smiled, a load lifted from my shoulders. He understood what I couldn’t say, couldn’t write, couldn’t find the words to express. 

“I guess you were right about every pattern being broken.” 

Honestly, this guy. I laughed, shaking my head. “I made that up on the spot.” 

“And you thought I didn’t know that?” He grins down at me, quite handsome, come to think of it. 

“Uh, so, do you want to go out sometime?” 

I smiled, really smiled. Broad and happy and (probably) stupid looking. “Sure, but don’t you think I should know your name first?” 

“They call me Nate.” 


* 

(Yes, that is the end...at least for now. I left  it hanging  on  purpose until I decide if I want to continue. )


Thoughts? Did you enjoy the story?  Would you like to see more about Nate and Annalyse? :D