Blush
Basilike Pappa
Rowena was hiding behind the
rosebush in her garden, watching Julian through his window. He was having his
morning cup of coffee. Rowena was jealous of that cup. She was jealous of
anything he touched and anyone not too timid to be close to him.
Rowena had been watching
Julian since the first day he came to the neighborhood, about six months ago.
It was his fault; he had such magnetism it was criminal. He lived opposite her, and she had caught many precious
glimpses of him doing this or that. Tableaux of Julian, she called them.
Julian didn’t know she
existed, and that had to change. Speaking to him was out of the question,
though. She would blush; the very thought made her feel a hot flash. She had to
find a way to be seen and remain unseen at the same time. She locked herself in
the house for a week, to think.
*
Julian gaped at the duchess
strolling up and down his street one Monday morning, dressed in Dangerous
Liaisons’ fashion. He looked
around to see the rest of some film crew. He saw no one. The duchess passed by
him. Behind her heavy face powder he guessed delicate features, and a petite
body under her grand dress. The duchess smiled and then walked past him with an
air of pride and dignity. Julian watched her disappear around the corner. Then
he got in his car and drove to work. There, among files and phone calls, he
never gave her a second thought.
But in the evening, when he
got home, an old witch was standing outside his door. She was crooked and gray,
and looked as if she was waiting for him. Julian's hands started to tremble.
'What do you want?' he snapped. The witch said nothing, but kept staring. And
then she smiled all black teeth. Before he could say another word, she pivoted
and ran away, disappearing around the corner. That night Julian had trouble
sleeping.
*
Rowena was having a great time
renting costumes and watching online tutorials on theatrical makeup. She
stalked Julian dressed as a pimply pirate, a gleaming ghost, a flaxen fairy, a
cloaked monk. Her greatest success was when she dressed as Death. Julian really
noticed her. He was adorable.
Soon Rowena couldn't tell
whether she was motivated by her attraction to Julian or by her freshly dug up
talent for disguise. She thought about it when she stayed in bed for a few
days; she had dressed as a harlequin on stilts and sprained her ankle. She reached no conclusion, but
it didn’t really matter.
*
Julian got a new job. He paid
his bills, packed his things and moved out of his house – and out of the city.
As his plane to nights of peaceful sleep was taking off, he smiled happily to
the passenger sitting next to him. It was a woman, a little younger than
Julian, somewhere in her early twenties. She was petite, with a delicate face,
and her cheeks were tinted by the rosiest blush.
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