Looking glass

THE GIRL ON THE SECOND FLOOR 

 

Eighteen? Twenty-one? I don't know, don't even have an inkling of who is at the wheel of the shiny silver Lexus purring at the curb. She walks slowly, carefully as she goes down the wide ten steps of the brownstone building we share with other owners of all five floors. The lay-out of each is identical. A full, large kitchen equipped with now semi-new appliances, cabinets, room for even an old fashioned large round oak table, plus a living room/den that has a cozy working fireplace facing the busy street. We each have a large bathroom and a guest room with its own facilities. AC, of course.

 

I am somewhat of a loner, slow to make friends. I have published three books on the history of Egypt, the income from them has barely covered my basic needs, but the investigating, the love of research kept me alive and still interested in delving further. As do others, I believe the Egyptians were visited by aliens who taught them all they knew and left abruptly to find others in our world to teach. My current book should be finished before the first snowfall covers New York.

 

Traffic has not yet reached its morning climax when I see the young lady who lives on the second floor catch her heel on the pavement and fall to the ground. Her position is frightening even from my third floor view. She is twisted over, left leg seems to be going the opposite direction of the right one. Both shoulders are hunched while the right arm is squashed under her rump. The driver of the Lexus gets out of the car and as he approaches her, I can see him use his cell for help.
He is a brute of a man, tall, muscular, with a small graying goatee. Perhaps he is her father.

 

How I wish I looked like him, had a luxury car like he has, maybe have a lady friend as attractive as the one I see clinging to the goateed gentleman, her uncle, her dad? 'Oh, Nefertiti, come to life, to me,' a lonely man in need of you or the lady who lies almost still on the broken pavement right in front of my dull gray eyes. Enough of the Egyptian workers, building pyramids, dark, silent, airless walkways to bury kings, princesses, children too numerous to count. I do nothing but stand and watch and despise myself for being a writer of little consequence. My loneliness appals me.

 

I look in the bathroom mirror and smile as I realize at last I do get joy out of being pathetic. It is better than no joy at all, isn't it?