a story written for me by an old college friend

To Connie, in exchange for the 15 cents I borrowed

He was slouching in his couch, enjoying a bag of biscuit while watching 'Music Camp' video that he had borrowed earlier in the day, when the phone rang. Without taking his eyes off the television screen, he leaned to pick up the crying object, his burgundy red phone, which was on the coffee table in front of him. As he picked it up, he rubbed off a smudge of dirt that he had accidentally put when had put his feet up on the coffee table. He had not taken off his shoes yet, partly out of laziness and partly to enjoy the freedom of living alone fully.
"Yeah," he answered, as if he had been talking to the yet-to-be-known person at the other end of the line.
"Hyuk," a deep voice called out his name. "She's here."
It took a moment to register the voice and what the voice had said.
"Wha-" he started to say, and then realized who it was (Sean 형) and what he had said.
"Be there." He put the receiver down, almost slamming it down. He froze and just sat in front of the phone, not knowing what to do first. Thousands of things were rushing through in his mind at once, and in his imagination he had already started to do everything at once. He closed his eyes and shook his head, as if to shake out all the thoughts. It worked.
He slowly opened his eyes. And smiled.
She was here! No not here, but there! He thought as he rushed all over the living room, trying to find his car keys. Where was it? And his glasses. He wanted to wear his glasses, even though he didn't need to, just because all his friends told him he looked good with it. Sophisticated and gentle-looking, they had said. But where were those car keys!
He decided to take a look at himself in the bathroom mirror instead. He took four giant steps into the bathroom and glanced into the mirror at his hair. A little strand of hair was sticking out, and without taking his attention off of the rebelling strand of hair, he reached down to turn the faucet. He felt something strange instead, and looked down to see what he had grabbed. His car keys! He must have left it on the brim of the sink when he had come in to wash his face after a gruesome day at work.
He grabbed the keys, ran out the bathroom, jumped over the couch, snatched his glasses and his jacket, and ran out the front door, seemingly all in one motion. He had heard people showing supernatural powers in intense moments, and he wondered what he had done, his dashing out the apartment in record time, was considered supernatural. He was now driving wildly (even for him) down the street, smiling even more wildly than he was driving. He tried to put on his glasses as he was swerving the corner, and he briefly glanced over to the passenger sesat to make sure he had brought his jacket.
Shoot! It was the wrong jacket. It's too late now, though. He bit the corner of his lips, a habit of his when he realized he made a mistake.
He turned the last corner and saw the restaurant, his work place, in a close distance. Perfect! A parking space right in front of the building. He got out, put on his jacket, and just as he was about to enter, he realized that he had not fixed the strand of hair that was sticking out. He looked at his reflection in the window and smoothed that part of his hair down before he entered.
She was in here, he though. He smiled.
"Just in time, Hyuk," Sean 형 said. "They're about finished."
"They?" he asked.
"She came with some of her friends. See there." Sean 형 indicated with a nod toward her and her friends. "Here, come behind the counter. Get her check."
He did what he was told. He saw the back of her head, and by the looks of it, it seemed like she was laughing at something her friend had said. Why she seemed to sparkle in the midst of all these people, he didn't know. Why her presence demanded his attention, he couldn't figure out. But, he liked it. And he liked her for that.
They were getting up slowly and in a relazed way. She stretched beside her seat, twisting her body as she did so. She burst out giggling when a friend beside her poked her slender belly teasingly. They made their way towards the counter, and Hyuk's heart started to pound. Suddenly, he felt awkward and nervous.
"Hi--" she started to say. Her friends were already outside, talking.
"Hi," Hyuk said, rubbing his palm against the side of his jeans. "Uh... that would be $21.72." He couldn't recognize who was saying that.
"Can I pay with my credit card?" she asked, holding out a Visa.
"Yeah, sure." He took the card from her, touching the tip of her finger as he did so. He was a little startled, but did not show it. The part of his finger that had touched hers felt disembodied and tingly.
"Sign here," he said. She looked down to where he was pointing, while he looked up to glance at her face. He saw how those soft eyelashes touched just underneath her eyes when she blinked. She blinked three or four times, and he thought that she blinked like no other. She signed: Connie Kim. (Note: haha...i'm embarrased to write my name at this part, but hey! can't mess with the author's writing, right?)
"Here you go," she said softly, giving him the pen and the receipt. She looked up, and even though it was for a few seconds, their eyes had met. And the world, it seemed to have stopped rotating, time seemed to have stopped in its track, and everyone in the world seemed to be silent, just to hear the electricity passing between their eyes.
"Thank you," she said and smiled. She smiles! And at the same time his heart stops, and he forgets to breathe. Could it be possible? Could, could his heart have melted? Could his stomach have leaped into his throat?
She, of course, turned around to leave. He wanted to say something, just to get her to turn around once again, just to have her look at him even once more. But alas, he couldn't. He had finally managed to make a soft, inaudible sound within his throat, but she had already left the restaurant, the door sadly swinging back and fort, just as a reminder that she used it.
He couldn't take his eyes from the swinging door. His heart seemed to calm down as the door slowed in its swing.
"Couldn't say one word again?" Sean 형 said from behind him as he put a hand on Hyuk's shoulder.
"Not one," Hyuk said, as he began to smile to himself. "Well, at least none I wanted to say."
"Idiot," Sean 형 said, smacking the back of Hyuk's head, and he left him to his thoughts.
"Yeah, an absolute imbecile," Hyuk said, just under his breath.

Connie continued chatting with her friends as they made their way down the street. The lunch had been good, and now they were ready to take on the world again, well, at least the world of shopping. Her friends were busy chatting about what they were looking for, what they wanted to buy.
But Connie, she was thinking of how the guy at the counter had looked at her eyes when she was signing her name. She smiled.

And in a note to me at the end of the story, she wrote...
P.S. Wouldn't it nice to be special in some other people's eyes? I wrote this thinking of that.

I don't keep in touch with this friend anymore. I know that she got married last summer and moved away, but we've lost contact now. We've gone our separate ways. But I will always remember her and her roommate. I'm sure everyone has people like these in their life at one point or another. People who enter into your life for what amounts to a brief moment but brighten it for that time and then leave you with only happy memories and hopes for a future encounter.