Since late May I have been taking a 6:30am bus to the train station to make my daily jaunt into the nation’s capital. Since late May I have almost every day been joined on the bus, two stops after I get on, by a rather attractive woman about my age. ‘M—’ is not beautiful in the ordinary way—her lower lip thrusts too far forward, her nose is too prominent, her cheekbones are flatter than one might hope, her toes turn slightly outward, giving an ever-so-distant hint of a limp to her walk. Yet her ice-blue eyes are bright and clear, her voice is pleasant and forthright, and her wispy but perfectly coiffed wheat-colored hair surrounds her head like a Giotto halo. She dresses sharply but comfortably, usually wearing grey or black wool slacks and a button-down, half-sleeved, soft-colored shirt. She is poised but demure, reserved but affable. She generally keeps to herself, but when engaged in light talk by a stranger she will usually respond openly, with a smile. I took interest the moment she first stepped onto the bus, but my inability to approach her has steadily grown increasingly oppressive.

Our daily routines are almost identical—we live less than a block from each other, we take the same bus to the train station, we both buy a small cup of coffee as soon as we enter the station, we both sit and read to pass the time before the train arrives. We stand in the same place on the platform to board. We ride on the same level of the same double-decker car. We both read rather assiduously in the mornings. We work fairly close to one another in the city. We take the same train home (often falling asleep on the way) to catch the same bus to walk the same three blocks back home. And we never speak, never make eye contact, never acknowledge each other’s existence, even as we are standing next to each other putting cream in our coffee or walking home side by side.

My lifestyle, my roommate, my nocturnal instincts keep me up late most nights. I have trouble waking to my alarm in the mornings. Every morning what gets me out of bed is the fear of missing the bus—not because I’d be late to work (I show up too early as it is) but because I’d miss seeing M—. I’m afraid of her as I’m afraid of any attractive woman, though I’m not intimidated by her beauty as I am by that of so many others. I just don’t have anything to talk about. I’ve never had the patience for small-talk, and in conversation I always lose my self-possession. My mind shuts off, running on some defective auto-pilot. I lose awareness of my surroundings, I have to concentrate to think, and focus is impossible. So each morning, as I stand next to M— on the platform, I peruse my book earnestly to divert my attention.

My friend B—, who for some time was also taking the same bus and train in the mornings, has on occasion shared a taxi home with M— (while I was on vacation in Colorado and once when I stayed in DC for a happy hour). B— tells me that M— is friendly and charming, intelligent and good natured. She is either an architect or an historian (or an architectural historian?), both of which I find to be intriguing occupations, but I know nothing of either subject. My command of history is disastrous; it is an embarrassment to the public school system that someone as poorly educated as myself could ever graduate, much less at the top of his class. I had several friends in college who studied architecture, but we stayed sufficiently intoxicated to avoid ever talking of the subject. I have a naive appreciation for grand structures and beautiful façades, but can’t tell baroque from Byzantine. M— reads well-received critical successes: Jefferson’s Pillow, John Adams, White Teeth and the like. Since I was in high school, I haven’t read more than five books authored in the last fifty years.

I can think of no natural approach to introduce myself, particularly given our long history of mutual disregard. Yesterday, however, while waiting on the platform to board the train, I noticed she was reading a new book of cultural criticism. I had recently read a review written by an economist and determined that I would ask her about the book. She boarded before I did and took a seat next to the window. The seat next to her was empty, as were numerous others around; I hesitated, but something snapped in my brain and I did the unthinkable—I sat next to her. I quickly constructed in my mind a conversation centered around the book, formulated a witty phrase or two, and promptly forgot it all as I opened my mouth. I managed to squeak out some weak question about her opinion of the work. Her answer was concise and unrevealing. I pressed further, citing the review I had read, but adding that since it came from an economist it had to be properly discounted. She smiled, said the review sounded interesting, and fell silent. She didn’t want to talk to me about the book. She didn’t want to talk to me at all. I had made a weak overture, but it sapped my strengh. I withdrew my book from my bag and for the next hour feigned reading, while my angel sat next to me.

I feel like one who smiles, and turning shall remark
Suddenly, his expression in a glass.
My self-possession gutters; we are really in the dark.

—Eliot, Portrait of a Lady

NP: The Autumns, The Angel Pool