I spotted you first. You never knew that, but I did. You crackled among lifeless grey faces; bundles of bags and satchels carrying the beginnings and endings of individual odysseys. Everything darkened around you, like in a play when the lights dim and the world drifts downstage to give the star her space. The salt and grime on the windshield that had been an infuriating inconvenience only hours before parted to give me a better view.

I knew you were going to sit next to me. Don't ask me how, you never saw me. Our eyes were strangers until you asked me if that seat was free. You hopped over me and plopped yourself in the checked blue cushion, grinning widely. You seemed happy to be there.

Then you laughed at me and the book I'd been hiding in. You mimicked me, mocking my pursed lips and narrowed eyes. You asked me if it had made me mad and I shushed you, telling you I was trying to stare it down. You doubted me, betting that I would give up first.

We talked solid, no seventh minute silences, no 'Hmms,'� or 'So, what are you studying?'� The university fallback topic, the question that you need not hear the answer to. We were friends within seconds and we both knew it.

Something was tickling the back of my brain, the little cynical lab rat turning the wheel behind my eyes began whispering. For a moment it all shimmered, a glitch in the ' you know. Our less-than-Greyhound bus vanished and I was riding the Eden Express and Mark Vonnegut was just ahead, waving a warning. Couldn't make it out though, I was never good at reading body language.

We parted, my heart sank, and the rodent laughed loudly. Typical, I remember thinking, typical.

Thump, thump, thump. A yell and then movie magic. You smashed through the crowd with such force I expected to see bodies fly, propelled by the kind of ragdoll physics only possible in this kind of unreality. Still you charged, and I remember wanting dramatic music, or an aerial shot for this. Crane operators are never around when you need them.

You were mere feet away when the bubble burst and we were flooded with convention. Time paused and sighed as we let the moment pass. Instead your hand found mine and you left me your number, hugged me, and hopped back on your bus; to your stop.

I guarded that piece of dead tree like it was the fucking Shroud of Turin.

I was scared the whole ride home. Terrified of losing whatever it was that was dangling so precariously over the edge. That paper was a single thread connecting me to you. I was trying to drag you back up from the cliff, all the while each sinew shredded and spun letting the audience relish in the clichéd but still terrifying.

We landed home and touched base within hours. And then we were us.

I'd like to say that it ended badly. That we fought and yelled and hated. That you cheated on me or I cheated on you. Or that you came down with some terminal illness and we had an overwrought, 'A Walk to Remember'� tear jerker of a relationship. Dammit that would be something. And something is better than what happened. We just stopped. You set up the first roadblock and I still can't figure out what went wrong. I'm still confused. Like watching "The Man Who Fell to Earth" in an American theater. Something had been cut out. I had no idea what happened, and I hated it, but if there's one thing I've learned, you've got to always respect the machine.

So I let the cord snap and you plunged away.

And then I found you. I wasn't looking for you ' damn that sounded so much cooler when David Carradine said it ' but I found you anyway. You were hurting. I wasn't sure why. I'm still not. But I stayed away, because I know that was what you wanted. I did my part and, chivalric martyr archetype I am, I kept it anonymous. I know it helped, a little. As much as words and uprooted plant life can. Ever wonder why we hand each other dead things to express our feelings? It's a telling sign of just how terminal we really are. I wonder if you wonder. If you knew it was me, or someone else took the credit. I wonder how they were repaid.

I check in from time to time, just to make sure you're ok. Waiting to offer help if you need it. You don't know it, but someone's listening.

Just from a safe distance.

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