My hands are tucked into my sweatshirt pockets
Headphones tether my ears to my phone
As I listen to the album that the girl I yearn for showed me
This is my fifth time listening to it from front to back
Last night, I fell asleep to her favorite song

I look up from staring down at my sneakers
To glance around the mostly-empty train that surrounds me
My eyes land on someone not too far away
She tucks her long auburn hair behind her ear
With manicured fingers, painted my favorite shade of blue
So her deep brown eyes can better read her book
Poetry, she’s a woman of taste

She looks up from her book to look out the window
Catching my gaze on the way
I blush and avert my eyes, but not for long
Her hand fidgets with the dog ear on the corner of her book’s page
I wonder what it might feel like to hold it
To interlace my fingers with hers and give it a soft squeeze
To coax a smile onto her face so I can gaze at it
Her hair escapes its place behind her ear and falls into her face again
Cascading down her cheek to frame her face like a masterpiece
I imagine how soft it must feel

Her eyes land on me again
She gives a small smile, showing the dimples on her cheeks
I can feel my face flush, as red as the shirt she wore
I wish that I could take a photograph of that smile
Her rosy lips part, she speaks, and I realize I can’t hear her
So I take my headphones out of my ears to give her my attention
“What are you listening to?” she asks me again
“How to be a Human Being,” I tell her
She smiles and says she hasn’t heard of it
But she’ll look it up when she gets home
I smile back, my mind unable to piece together words for a response
She looks away
I put my headphones back in
We never speak again

I think of her again
The one I yearn for