Fleeting Meetings

I'm heading home in my car. I feel cosy and protected from the world in my little cocoon of metal and plastic. Tunes are playing, fingers tapping on the steering wheel, the sun glinting against the black metallic paint and things are good. The light ahead is red, so I slow down and pull up alongside a bus. Glancing up, I catch the eye of a woman. I smile. She smiles back. I smile again, wider. She laughs. I laugh. The lights change and I drive straight ahead while the bus turns right and we never see each other again.

Six months ago, that was. I quite often find myself wondering who she was and where she was going. She was dressed in black and had those light blonde curls that suggest she was really grey but hiding it well. Older. Not old though. Smartly dressed, or what my mother would call "well turned out". At first I thought she'd come back from a funeral, but unless it was someone she was glad to be rid of, she seemed far too, jolly, for such things. I wonder if she ever thinks of me?