Lost Chances

I met her in the market, and we only shared a moment.

"Hey, you. You dropped this," she said. I turned to see who was talking. A girl around my age, probably 21 or something close to that. Short, black hair, red highlights. She held in her hand an old leather wallet. It was my grandfather's, but he was gone.

"Thank you," I said, pulling it from her fingers. Then I laughed. "Most people would have just took the money and run."

"Guess I'm not most people." She smiled.

I stared at her eyes a moment too long and she blushed. They were bright green.

Then she laughed and said, "See you around."

"Hope so," I said back like an ass.

"Just moved into the apartments across the street, so If you shop here you're bound to."

I smiled and nodded at that, then she was gone. I went along slowly buying the ingredients for vegetable soup. And then got in line to pay. While the cashier scanned my cans of tomatoes, I heard a scream. Everyone heard it.

We ran outside. Then I saw. The girl with green eyes and a kind heart. She was struck by an SUV. A big white thing which was stainless, aside from the blood on its dented fender.

The driver was an old lady. Nearly blind and entirely incompetent.

I didn't cry there, but when I got home I collapsed to the floor. Three days later while talking to my neighbor I learned the girl's name.

Monica Hamilton. The apartments she talked about were the same ones I lived in. She had moved in one floor down.

I felt responsible. Maybe if I kept talking and didn't just nod, she would have made it. Maybe if I told her that we would soon be almost neighbors. But I didn't, and she died.

I didn't even know her, yet I felt like a door had been forever shut. What could have been will always be in my mind. That and those brilliant green eyes.