Roboprom Part 4: The First Time She Left

Buzzing like a damp hopeful ember, I walked through an unfamiliar part of the arena with my team to pack up our robot and go home. Right across the way, the girl's team color danced about in their heavy shuffle to move boxes into crates.

My eyes lit up, and hers reciprocated like the moon. She willfully hooked me by the arm, the camera snapped at a bunch of happy kids and everyone left. Our lingering hold kept the moment still.

Musing into her eyes for a moment, I shaped my eyes forward with the strength of finite opportunity. Choosing words carefully, I said, "Hey, wanna hear something crazy?" She said yes.

Taking stock of my dry lips, I continued, "usually I take all manner of time to dance around and woo the girls I like, but I don't have the time for that now. I just thought I should say that I like you...a lot." She blushed, but didn't say anything.

Without any middle steps, I just went right for the kiss.

On the way to her mouth, I crossed stares with a member of her team. A rather tall boy that I'd seen her dance with. I began a slow and methodical silent communication that said so curtly, "Leave."
He didn't budge.

The new boy told the girl they had to go home. Before I could heat my eyes into a sword, she tore the moment from its stasis and uttered a 'bye' that was so ordinary, it broke my heart.

I fell into a wet slump over a book I brought, so she could see how sad I was and say goodbye to me with proper heart, or at least pity. She left, anyways. She stopped texting me, and I walked outside with my team, absolutely sure of an opportunity's close.

A small group rendition of 'Halelujah' in the dark parking lot began to comfort me until I saw a van pull up along the street. It parked, and I saw one of the girl's team members run out. Hopeful, I watched the tinted windows of the van for an opening, wishing her there.

My phone buzzed in the way it does, and the screen reported that the girl was sorry for not saying goodbye. I asked her if she was in that van.
She said that she was in the van,
with a sideways face,
and I looked to the window and waved.

I only just saw her arm waving through the tint of the van that was driving away, but that was not the last of that yellow plaid in my brown eyes.

Roboprom Part 3: Held your Hand

I'm in the audience, watching her team grin their way to the winner's circle, giving, taking, and soaking up high fives with the crowd as they all but fell down the bleachers. I watched the girl's yellow plaid shirt flutter by, but I didn't raise my hand to slap hers in congratulations.

While I gawked, my friend had noticed the hesitance and pressed a blush onto my cheeks with a wide grin on his stubbly face. I told him that giving that girl a high five was just as stupid as shaking someone's hand after a romantic afternoon together. To properly express how I was feeling to the girl in yellow plaid, I would need to stand up, climb over the audience, and stop time falling into her lips with mine.

The rest of the ceremony ended, and I still hadn't done anything, so, as she walked back to hear seat, I raised my hand to high five her. I felt anxious in wait for her as the crowd paraded by, proudly slapping my hand in the camaraderie of engineers-to-be. Finally it was her.

I pushed my hand toward hers, and much like a normal high five, our palms clapped together. It was different this time through; in her first step after contact, our hands kept pressed, fingers wide as she walked by. The second step pressed them closer, rounding the shape of our small embrace. In her third step, our hands were full of each other, held like lovers, and in her final step, slowly slid apart, and our eyes met.

It was this moment I kept, held, and told about again with a song. Being a moment, however, it slipped by and continued on its merry way towards the commune of moments past I sometimes take a bath in. Contact broke, and she walked to the rest of her team.

The bolts on my joints torqued against my will to move while my eyes ran after her. I could feel my sensibility about to give into the broad romantic stresses building on my aching knees, poised to tear into the moment of touching lips at the front of the arena's stadium seating.

I didn't move.

"Riley! Crazy matches, right? Bummer we lost..." my mentor excitedly called from behind. I turned to acknowledge him, then looked back at her, and she was an outline. Just the first of a few moments she would be an outline to me.