A Trace Of Glitter

 I have been flirting with this woman at work. We work in the same build, but for different divisions of the same company.  She was hired during the pandemic. I was working from home that whole time, so I did not notice her until my return to the office in July. Our paths cross near the kitchen or in the warehouse.  Most days, I don't even see her.

She is cute, blond, thirty years old. I noticed her in my local Walmart a few weeks back, which means we live in the same area. That is unusual.  Most people I work with live on the other side of town. Since then, I have been stretching out our conversations. I am going to call her Popstar for now. I got her number the other day after discussing our thirty-minute drive into work under the pretext of, "We should exchange numbers encase we ever need a ride."

Friday, she stopped by my office to ask a question. She was looking for one of my colleagues, who had already gone to lunch. I think it was deliberate that she already knew the answer to her question, but I took the opportunity to start a conversation. 

"Nice office you have here," she tells me. "But you need to decorate it with some glitter."

"Are you kidding me? I want to get rid of the fake plant on the bookshelf." I like my office to be void of personal items. It makes it easier to do a quick exit if needed.

We begin to talk about plants. Popstar mentions she doesn't like flowers because they attract bugs. But when I questioned her, she did admit to putting flowers outside her house for a neighborhood contest. She said she came in second place because she added glitter.

Our conversation drifted on to other topics include restaurants in our area. We talked for several minutes. I know, I should have asked her out then, but I hesitated. She excused herself at the end be saying we would talk more later.

This morning I opened my Amazon Kindle to update my games and read the news. I was looking at book suggestions. My book appears in my reading list.  I started thinking about the cover. I like the cover image, but I keep thinking the title is too long (Lost and Found in Glitter), and the letters should be more prominent.

Then it dawned on me, Popstar read my book. I have a tendency to jump to conclusions, but my intuition is often correct. What is the first thing you do when you are interested in someone these days?  You search for them. You better believe I googled Popstar and found out her age and where she lived. If she googled me, one of the first images she would see is my book. There are two other people with my name in the area, but it isn't hard to figure out that I am the author.

Her references to glitter did seem out of place. Still, she went out of her way to talk to me and seemed to want to talk some more. What do you think? I am going to ask next time I see her. I have laid all the groundwork. Life isn't complicated enough with Firefly coming home in ten days. Why not add to it.