a short story revealing an awakening too late #1

(Vickie Coleman on Love.)

Dear Reader

A short story. This one be an awakening too late...this short story will be yours to read to the end...last chapters to be posted by Sunday evening. Trust u shall enjoy.

"She watched him from the other side of the room. They usually shared the same sofa but, this time round, distance was required. And as he spoke she noted how hunched he looked, how quiet his presence.
There was no certainty or that self-assured yet, aloof air about him. She found that quite curious and telling and wandered how she had missed it till then.
In all time they had shared, had she managed to change him? Did she have such an influence that the thought, that  she may be out of his life, left him feeling slightly frazzled and at ends?
Or, was it something else?

Their time together had been quite unusual, a natural progression to a state of oneness very infrequently found and shared. It must have been that unspoken resolve to not ask anything of each other, the expectation being...nothing. 
Two people simply enjoying the share of each others company with no analysis of what may be happening.
Conversation came easy. 
His contribution was stoical, matter of fact, to the point, factual, reserved, professional...very knowledgeable, well read...yet a secluded closed viewpoint, according to her world. 
His feet were firmly planted on the ground and his path in life seemed to be perfectly mapped out, a few hiccups here and there but, he had never asked for much and thus plodded along, yes plodded along, in his state of existence. There was no thought that he was not happy. 
He called it finding and redefining himself.
She would not have described his life as one where he cared to step out of the 'box' and try something too contrary to his nature...it didn't dawn upon him to even try. Now and again, he did though,  think about things different to his world but, somehow they lay dormant and numb.

And when his life was in the deepest lull of quietness where his spirit  seemed to be near dead and accepting that things were pastel, he came across her.

Not that she was anything extra-ordinary but, she was different.
Differently unpredictable yet, reliably predictable in her unpredictability. She was a circus of colour, movement, words, imagination, fantasies, raw realities, intellect....she was those books he read and many he had not, a milieu of mixed up opinions, yet very clear and succinct as to her outlook on life and her joy of it.
She shared freely in conversation, her knowledge neither stoical or reserved as his...she had dared to read books he would have classified as a 'waste of time' meaningless philosophy on the trivialities of things that had no impact on his way or style of living.
Her freedom of expression of self, when in his company, was like a breath of fresh air...took him aback at times...but her resistance to societies hypocrisies began to give him a new outlook on his life.
Her appearance in his world, began to give it colour.

What he didn't realise was the impact his world had on hers...and when he did...it was too late....
As much as she was his colour his spiritual awakening of self...he was her 'box' that she began to step into...bit by bit....bringing balance to her kaleidoscopic existence...(end to be posted by Sunday eve.)

RB.