The Woman Who Fell To Earth

Chapter 3

He checked his watch. 4 a.m. He hadn't been out this late in...ever. He looked over at David, walking tall, wide awake as ever, with her head high, her shoulders back, almost swaggering in her purple flip flops, the rug wrapped back around her like a muffler. She sensed him looking at her, turned and smiled. She took his hand and swung his arm gently back and forth as they walked. Why him?

"David?" he started.

"Yes, Art," she answered.

"You're amazing," he said.

She waved her hand at him dismissively. "I am nothing of the sort."

"But all of those people wanted to be around you, like insects to a flame. I've never seen anything like it."

"I'm just friendly."

"No," Arthur disagreed. "People are friendly all the time. I think they sensed it, sensed that it's you, you know, back."

David shrugged. "Maybe," she said.

Arthur tried to cover a yawn, but it was no use.

"Are you tired, mate?" asked David.

"Well, it is 4 o'clock," Arthur reasoned.

David looked up at the sky and all around. "But it's so dark," she argued.

Arthur cocked one eyebrow. "It's four in the morning."

"What use is time, anyway," she said. "It's completely relative. I rather like it at four in the morning. It's quite peaceful, don't you think? Perhaps I'm nocturnal this time around. Everything else is opposite. Where to?"

"I thought we'd go back to my place," he wanted to add to go to sleep, but after her nocturnal comments, decided he needed a different reason. "The milk. We should put away the milk."

"Quite right," David agreed.

David stopped walking abruptly and gasped. "Oh my lord!" she exclaimed. "What is this place? We must go in."

Arthur looked at the store front, trying to see what David saw in the window. It was a second hand store. Mannequins in the window draped with colorful clothing in an attempt to make a fashion plate from the discarded wardrobes of the many. A jewelry counter overflowed with bits of gold and silver-plate, peacock feathers, wooden beads, plastic sunglasses, brooches studded with colored glass, oversized cocktail rings. "We can't go in now," said Arthur. "It's closed."

"I want to go in as soon as it opens," said David, sitting on the front step.

"We don't have to wait out front all night. We can come back when it opens," reasoned Arthur.

"I don't want to miss out on anything," David argued. "Look at all those wonderful things."

"I'm sure it will all be here later."

"But what if it's not? What if someone comes and takes it all away?"

Arthur sighed. "David, the store won't open for another six hours. We can come back as soon as it does. You'll freeze out here all night."

David looked at him stoically and did not move.

"Please, David," said Arthur. "I will bring you back as soon as they open."

"Promise?"

"I promise."

Reluctantly, David stood up. She took one long, wistful look through the window, hand pressed against the pane, like a lover watching out a departing train window. She looked at Arthur. "Promise?" she asked again.