I haven't talked to her since before I got my emancipation status. What was I going to say? Hey Maria, I was going to leave town completely but I thought about it and decided I couldn't leave you? She'd probably laugh in my face. Well, maybe not, but I've always been more of a man of action.

So I decided I'd show her I was getting my life together. Which is a lot of work. Which means less time to see her. Which is really a big Catch 22 since she's the one I'm doing all this for. Life sucks that way.

"Hey, spaceboy. Aren't you even going to say hello?" Her voice breaks me out of my internal monologue long enough to look up at her.

"Uh, yeah, hi. How are you?" Damn! Why do I always act like such an ass around her? She rolls her eyes at my stammered greeting.

"Don't force yourself to be cordial on my account." She puts down her laundry basket and starts to pull out wet clothes.

I mentally shake myself and try to continue the conversation. "So, what are you doing here?"

Her eyes narrow slightly. "If it bothers you that I'm here, I can wait 'til you're done and come back." She starts to throw the clothes she just removed back into the basket, but I stop her.

"No, I mean, why are you here? You have a washer and dryer at home don't you?"

She relaxes a bit, as do I now that I've finally said something non-offensive. "Our dryer broke right when I was in the middle of the laundry. And my mom is away for a few days. So rather than walk around in dirty clothes for the next week, or sit around in wet ones, I thought I'd come here."

"Oh. Yeah, well, that makes sense." I fall silent. I really don't know what to say to her. How do you make small talk with a girl who you're hoping feels as strongly about you as you do about her without coming out and simply asking her if she feels that way? God, I'm starting to babble like her now for crying out loud. She puts bunches of wet clothes into a few free machines and begins feeding them quarters. Then she sits down in one of the very uncomfortable chairs and begins doing some homework she brought with her. I sit back down on top of the washing machine the rest of my clothes are in, waiting for the spin cycle to be over.

After what seems like an eternity, the machine beneath me buzzes. I stand and start throwing the clothes into the nearest open dryer. I sneak a glance at Maria, who seems content to be doing her homework silently. This annoys me. Why isn't she talking to me? I slam the dryer door shut, and drop a few quarters in to get it going. Then I walk over to her and pull the book she's reading out of her hands.

"Hey! What are you doing?"

"I want to talk to you."

"About what?"

I was silent. I really didn't have a course of action here. I knew I wanted to talk to her but for the life of me I couldn't think of a subject. "Um, well, I was wondering how much trouble you got in for letting me sleep at your house last week."

"A lot." She was very short with me. Which usually meant she was mad at me.

"Well, I just wanted to say thanks for letting me stay. And for not asking questions. And I'm sorry you got in trouble."

She looked at me as if the world had just ended. "Did you just thank me?"

"Um, yes." I stared at her book that I still held in my hands. I didn't dare look at her facial reaction.

She was silent a moment, then she simply took her book back. She opened it to the page she had been reading and buried her nose back in her book. I waited for her to look up at me, but she continued to ignore me. Aggravated, I stalked back over to the other side of the Laundromat and sat down to wait for my machines to go off. If I had a rock to kick I would kick it. Or throw it. Or other things I usually do when I'm mad. Why won't she talk to me? I just apologized and thanked her in the same sentence. This had to be a first ever for me, and yet she sits over there doing her homework for crying out loud.

He sat, silently watching her for a while. Her machines went off and she stood up and started pulling the clothes out, folding them as she went. God, she's beautiful, he thought as he watched her fold. Her hair was pulled off her face by a headband, and it curled up just so at the nape of her neck. She had beautiful hazel eyes; eyes that made his breath catch in his throat when she looked at him right before he kissed her. And her long legs that he wished would wrap around him again as he touched her. Maria…

Shaking his head, he snapped himself out of the daze he was in. What the hell was he doing? Waxing poetic about some girl- some human? What the hell had gotten into him? He slammed the heel of his foot into the washing machine he was sitting on.

She put the last of her now dry clothes into her basket, and started for the door. She leaned against it with her back, and finally she met his eye, smiling a little. "You're welcome," she said quietly as she pushed the door open and left him alone again.

He watched her walk away, the breath frozen in his lungs. Oh yeah, he thought, that's what had gotten into him. Maria. He smiled as he waited for his laundry to be done, thinking of the many ways he was going to prove himself worthy of her trust and love again.

~~~~~

An Ode to Maybe- Third Eye Blind

Lead in the night at a Laundromat
And I'm staring at you pulling clothes from a dryer
And I'm wondering how I got here
But it seems some how I keep getting stuck in the mire
I needed this more than I knew
and I let you down and I said I'm sorry
But the light falls on my castle walls
And my basketballs pelt me with bricks in my dreams

What you need
I hope it finds you
Maybe someday you'll get it right

If I could bottle my hopes in a store bought sent
They'd be nutmeg peach and they'd pay the rent
And I'd ride a horse
And I'd teach a course
On how I got to be a star crossed pimp