In that crowded restaurant, the air was thick with smoke my head was lost in a gentle buzz. The din of the dinner crowd was matched only by the music blaring on the loudspeakers. It was so loud I could not even hear myself think. A good excuse to lean in close whenever you spoke. I pretended not to hear you the first two or three times just so that you would remain inches from my face. You were so close that I could feel your hot breath on my cheek. I watched your lips move and tried to focus on what you wee saying. Every instinct told me I should lean a few inches forward and close that gap between us. But there were too many people watching. That restaurant was too **** well lit for even the briefest of encounters between waiting lips. I’m sure people were watching us. I’m sure people were watching you. Could they tell what was on both our minds? The elderly couple behind you kept looking at us. Maybe they thought we were siblings. How funny that would be because just then, you grabbed my hand from off the table and placed it on your thigh. You could’ve been a little drunk but I didn’t mind at all. Maybe I was a little bit intoxicated as well. Intoxicated on your perfume, your smile, your eyes and your thigh under my hand. You didn’t care that now you’d caught everyone’s attention. The bar manager saw and I guess he was smiling. Because given half a chance I bet he would have loved to be me at that moment. But you were with me and I was getting lost in the way your lips moved when you spoke. You kept drinking and I wished I could be the libation that would quench your thirst forever. I wished that I could be everything you ever needed. And I kept wishing we weren’t in that busy restaurant and I cursed that table for being so small. Maybe it was the smoke, or that look in your eyes, but if you would have asked me, even in a hesitant whisper, I would have taken you home with me immediately. But instead we sat there and our mouths spoke of the mundane whilst our eyes communicated the profane. I kept drawing circles on your thigh. Hoping the signal I was sending out was loud and clear. Why’d you have to be so close yet so far away?