Octopus

It’s a freezing cold day, and I’ve survived the walk across campus and have reached the cafeteria in the Student Center. I’ve just gotten a big-ass thing of hot soup and am attempting to place the lid on it while turning towards the drink machine, where I can get some sweet tea. My attention is completely focused on the hot soup, as you would expect, and I don’t see the young woman approaching rapidly on my right flank. I’ve got my headphones in, and so I don’t hear her footsteps, either. She, for her part, is trying valiantly to stuff loose sheets of paper into the inadequate folder inside the front cover on her notebook without dropping her plate; probably she is planning to study while she eats.  In any case, she is sparing no attention for where she’s going.
She reaches me just as I return to a fully upright position, and just as her notebook brushes against my shoulder I become aware of her. She still hasn’t seen me, and I’ve got practically no time to avoid her. Most men in this situation would simply stop and let her run into them, or fall frantically back in an effort to avoid the collision.  However, I’m me, and I like for everything to involve grand, flamboyant gestures. As far as I’m concerned, the camera is always on, you know?
I continue the upward motion of standing so that I’m on tiptoe and raise my arms high above my head. I make a big show of dancing from one foot to the next, swing my hips around, shift my shoulders. I slither next to, past, and behind her, and the motion startles her; she finally notices me, and stumbles in an effort to pull up short. I slip completely around her and do a full turn, but we both keep our balance. Although our clothes brush against each other all the way ‘round, our personal gravity never meets, and I don’t spill any of the soup. It is a grand, goofy, graceful, impromptu pirouette.  Afterwards, when my momentum has carried me safely clear of her, I (the consummate dancer and perfect avatar of cool) nod to my partner, bow to the audience, and still none of the soup spills.
She smiles at me, bemused and intrigued, and I smile back. She speaks. I shake my head, so she repeats herself. I realize that my headphones are still on. I shrug my left shoulder up and knock the phones clear of that ear. “Sorry,” I say.
“No, really, it was my fault.”
“No, I meant, sorry, I couldn’t hear you.”
“Oh. Well, no, but I was just apologizing for running into you.”
“You didn’t,” I say, and gesture grandly as I continue, “Fortunately, I am light as the air, and graceful as the mighty…" for some reason I can't think of a graceful animal, "...I don’t know, the mighty…octopus…or something.”
She laughs and then smiles again, still bemusedly, as though I’m something entirely outside of her experience. She is lovely: red hair, fair skin, wide lips, long fingers. She is dressed down, a student preparing for exams:  sweatshirt, sweater, worn-out jeans and ancient sneakers.  She usually wears glasses, but is not wearing them now, and her eyes are merry and kind. She looks me up and down, and she thinks I’m interesting. She wants to get to know me better. “You’re puzzling,” she says, and her voice implies that she would like to solve me.
I’m on a break from work, just here to grab food that I’ll go back and eat in my office. I wish I could invite her to lunch with me. Instead I say, “Well, I’m really not so much of a puzzle, once you get to know me.  Like how, if you stare at the two faces long enough, you see the vase between them, and then, you know, mystery solved.”
She nods, and when I make a move to walk to the drinks she turns, and we fall into step together. I’m thinking what a good “How We Met” story this will make for our grandchildren someday, and am already choosing the words and picturing their little faces in my head.  She gets a fruit juice, and while I’m pouring my tea she asks me what I’m listening to. I had forgotten the iPod was even on, frankly. It’s on Shuffle, but I recognize the piece that’s playing. “Ravel, at the moment,” I answer, and begin trying to put a lid on the teacup.
“Oh, do you like Ravel?”
“Yes, very much.”
She is surprised and pleased. I hope that she is a pianist or violinist, a musician of some kind. She steps a bit closer as I continue wrestling with the lid. One edge has folded under and it won't go on.  Why is it fighting me when I'm trying to be at my coolest?
“I love him, too,” she says, “he's on of my favorites, in fact.  I like it that you’re listening to him.”
“Well, thank you very much,” I say, and perhaps my voice betrays some frustration with the lid as I continue, “I was hoping someone would validate my tastes for me.”
She reacts to this, starts abruptly. It hadn’t occurred to me before I'd said it that this statement could be taken as sarcastic, arrogant, and bitchy; I didn’t mean it that way, certainly, but that’s how she’s perceived it. Her bright, friendly eyes cloud over; she has the look I get when someone sits down next to me at the bar and tries to talk to me while I’m reading, the look that says, “I must get out of this conversation, politely if possible, but in any case immediately.”
The coolness is gone and I am suddenly flustered. My tongue stumbles around my lips. I want to apologize, but before I can speak, she has said, “Well, it was nice meeting you” in a voice like a knife slipping between ribs and is walking away. I stand stunned for a moment. Should I follow? Try to explain and make it up to her? Bewildered, I hesitate too long and am lost; she’s gone.  One non-functional plastic drink lid has ruined wondrously limitless possibilities.  And it's on a line that thin that all fate depends, isn't it?
I’ll see her again, though. She’s gotta eat. I’ll do better next time. No more being stupid. Promise.