Took 15 Minutes

A series of opening lines...

1. The fork tines rang anger in clanking waves of constrained soundwave rings that was easily heard amid the hunched shoulder, tense but polite guests seated for the dinner. "Invites be damned, if he...," she thought while locking her forehead into the opposite of tense, but nowhere near relaxed. "HEY, oh shoot, dinner is on the table!" her husband proclaimed as he and her best friend emerged to join the dinner in progress from their extensive, lengthy tour of their basement.

2. "Drop me off here dude...", and then he added, "please." The rain was fierce hammering points of liquid fury onto fools out-of-doors. He slammed the truck's door and dipped into his coat's hood with the repetitive rain clouding his hearing so that he only heard the passing hiss of air as if he was trapped in a seashell's cavernous nautilus, intoning brief reflection on his youth before quickly striding down into the dark neighborhood streets of danger, demise, regret...alone.

3. Exiting the train station he had the cigarette perched upon his lip, ready, before he opened the exterior push doors. The cold scratched at his exposed skin, a flame kissed the awaiting tobacco stick, wind curling around skyscrapers making ignition troublesome. A down-on-his-luck character approached him in his hurry; eyes connected, pleading looks and inward groaning, he shook his head no. Across the busy street he paused, guilt clouding his gut. He looked back to recompense his callousness but the person was gone, the moment passed, decision cast.

4. I raced into the train as the doors shut, settling into the gaze of an old gentleman observer, and in reaching for my small Bible I saw the hidden fortune cookie. I offered it to the man, who was so surprised that he took a long time before shaking his head negatively, and it caused me to smile to myself as I put the unopened message back in my satchel in exchange for the book of Mark in my tiny Bible given to me as a gift when I was baptised.

5. I was so happy to have time alone with her because she amazes me with each topic we squeeze in between the crowd's surges and exclamations and peels of laughter. I'm too scared to let her know that I admire her, nervous to move too fast, cautious of error, and I find myself spending long thoughts, daydreams I guess, hoping for more minutes to become lost together with her.