In Handcuffs

[Zoya Bocharov]

Zoya definitely had not expected the answer she got. She’d thought he’d have some wise crack as a reply. Instead he looked somewhat nervous then proceeded to roll down the window. For a moment she thought she’d finally gotten the best of him. Instead, what he eventually said left her momentarily speechless. His words had come out on a rush that left her wondering if she’d heard him right. Except his smile gave her the feeling that he had in fact said all she had heard.

Silence remained between them for a few seconds before she began to laugh softly. “I’m sorry. I’m not exactly the best conversationalist, at the moment, huh?”
She pushed a lose strand of her hair behind an ear and hoped he would not notice her blush. “Perhaps I’m just tired... And you are not too bad yourself, you know.”


She wasn’t sure if she could say something about all of what he said, or remain quiet. She found him attractive, that was clear enough to her now, but she was afraid of embarrassing them both. These sorts of things tended to work better for her after a shot or two. However, she couldn’t just remain quietly sitting there and let things plunge into awkwardness. “In any case thinking can be a tad bit over rated sometimes.”


Soon after that, they approached her street. The familiar apartment building stood off to their right and she gestured to it. "That's me."