He watched as she picked up a book from the small table and leaned back in her chair.  She was the first woman he had seen in three years.  It was intoxicating.

 

“What are you reading?” he asked.  She looked at the front of the book and then at him.

 

“Um…  A mystery, I guess.  I just picked it up,” she said.  She regarded him with the deepest brown eyes he had ever seen.

 

“Right,” he said.  He felt his face grow hot.  He noticed the tiny gem on the side of her nose. It sparkled in the sunlight that peeked in through the open blinds.  Even her nose was captivating.

 

She released him with her eyes and looked back at the book.  He felt able to breathe again.

 

“Do you read a lot of mysteries,” he asked.

 

“No.”  She did not look up.  She brushed her long black hair away from her neck and revealed the edge of a concealed tattoo above her collar.

 

“What is your tattoo?” he asked.

 

She sighed and closed the book.  She pulled her hair back and leaned forward to give him a better view of the black widow spider tattoo on her neck.

 

“Oh,” he said. “That’s cool.”

 

She stared at him long enough to make him uncomfortable again.  He looked away, feigning interest in the television on the wall.

 

“Anything else you want to know?” she said, still staring.

 

“I’m sorry,” he said.  “I have not been around people in a very long time.”

 

“Sure,” she said.  She turned her attention back to her book. A minute later, she stopped reading and put the book back on the table.

 

“What do you mean?” she asked. “Where have you been?”

 

He gulped.  He had not planned to tell anyone about it yet.  The horrors he had seen firsthand.  The dread he felt for humanity.  He wanted to trust her.  He wanted to warn her.  He felt like he could swim in her warm brown eyes.  He felt his heart racing in his chest.  Was he so weak that he was going to tell his secret to the first pretty girl that asked him a question?

 

“Europa,” he said.  Yes.  He was that weak.

 

“What?” she said.

 

“It’s one of Jupiter’s moons.”

 

“That seems unlikely,” she said.

 

“Probably,” he said.  He wanted her to believe him but did not want to argue.  He did not want his memory of this woman to be an argument.

 

The door opened and a nurse wearing lime green scrubs leaned into the small waiting room.  “Mr. Starner, you can come back now.”  She held the door open for him.

He gathered himself and stood.  He tried not to look at the woman he had confessed to again, but she stopped him with an outstretched hand.

 

“Wait,” she said.  “You weren’t joking, were you?”

 

He smiled at her and brushed past her hand.  He knew he would not convince her and she probably thought he was crazy.  She would know the truth soon enough.  They all would.