Have You Ever Been in Love?

"Son, have you ever been in love?"

The old man next to me at the bar had a careworn yet gentle face. He looked like someone who might have seen much hardship but had let it pass over him like waves over a sandy shore. Only his eyes bore witness that time had done anything more than glance carelessly in his direction.

I looked straight into those eyes full of history and quickly looked away.

"Have you ever been in love?" he repeated.

"I once thought I was."

His eyes expected me to continue.

"But now I know I was wrong."

I tried to return to my drink but those eyes followed me and wouldn't let me off so easily.

So I let my mind run back to that summer when I thought love had found me.

* * *

"I didn't have half a clue back then. The first time someone made my heart lose its tempo I thought I'd found it." My mind came back to the bar and I realized I’d been gushing for at least a quarter of an hour. I laughed at myself and at my past naïveté.

"It was all so overwhelming back then. But it won't happen again. The next time will be the last time, because now I know what I'm looking for." My thumb ran over the fold of my badge. "You can't last long at my job without being able to find what you're looking for." I turned back to my companion, half-raising my glass in a toast to love and the past, but there was no one there.

I had to smile. The man was gone and had left me to pay for his drink. I didn't much mind.

Posted by Gregory Taylor