Swap Meet Serendipity
written by
jaron summers (c) 2024
In the dwindling light of a Californian afternoon, amidst the chaos of a swap meet on the verge of a rainstorm, Mark Davidson and Cynthia Wells found themselves at a crossroads not just of paths but of lives well weathered.
Hemingway, with his terse sentences and the weight of unsaid emotions, might have captured their story with a simplicity that belied the complexity of their feelings.
Theirs was a dance of words, a fencing of wits sharpened by too many battles on the fields of love rendered impersonal by screens.
Mark and Cynthia had both known the sting of hope turned sour, the dull ache of loneliness that no app could cure.
In their late twenties—a time not so dire unless one found themselves navigating its uncertainties—they stood, armed not with swords but with barbed words, the remnants of defenses built over too many disappointments.
The swap meet, a place of barter and exchange, under the imminent threat of rain, became their arena. Avocados, the fruit of their labor, lay forgotten as the skies threatened.
Customers, fleeting shadows with treasures underarm, vanished towards the exit, leaving Mark Davidson and Cynthia Wells in a bubble of suspended time.
Mark, with a gaze as direct as his approach, saw in Cynthia not just a counterpart in commerce but a soul perhaps weary, yet as hopeful as his.
Cynthia, her guard up yet curiosity piqued, faced him not just as a rival vendor but as a mirror to her own guarded heart.
Their conversation, a dance of words.
Mark: “What’s the most perfect thing about you?”
Cynthia: “I can spot a good pick up line. That one ain’t bad.”
Mark: “Just answer the question, please. What is the most perfect thing about you?”
Cynthia: “I Give up.”
Mark: “Your philtrum.”
Cynthia: “Really?”
Mark: “Really.”
Cynthia: “I didn’t realize I had a philtrum.”
Mark: “It’s your love trench.”
Cynthia: “I think you may be a dirty old man. By the way, what is your best pick up line?”
Mark: “There are no best pick up lines. Only pick up questions. In your case, it’s a question about your philtrum.”
Cynthia: “I’m not interested in talking dirty at this juncture in our courting.”
Mark: “The only juncture that applies to us is if you go that way and I go this way.”
And with that, he walked away. The skies, as if in judgment, opened up, a deluge that blurred the world to mere inches before one’s eyes.
In this moment, Hemingway might have seen the raw material of life—Mark Davidson and Cynthia Wells, two souls, briefly intersecting, their words a testament to their scars and hopes.
The rain, relentless, washed over them, perhaps a cleansing, perhaps a baptism into new beginnings or a cold reminder of the solitude that awaited.
But in that brief exchange, something palpable shifted, the possibility of connection, of understanding, amidst the impersonal expanse of love.
This was a meeting of two hearts daring to hope that beyond the barriers they had built, their journeys might converge.
Or maybe not….
