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No
by Jessica Alexander
“No.”
It wasn’t loud, nor particularly forceful, but the word resonated with
intensity incongruous to its single syllable. Few had noticed her
leaning against the wall, a small purse clasped tight against negligible
curves. Her pale eyes watched the Friday night chaos from behind a
decidedly dated pair of glasses. Despite an effort to fix her hair, it
refused to be either wild or tame and arranged itself somewhere in
between; and her skirt surely belonged to someone else, hanging as it
did uncomfortably around her bony hips. She blended easily with the
wallpaper, probably invited as a cruel joke quickly forgotten under the
influence of miniskirts and cheap beer.
But with this one word, the wallflower slipped out of her camouflage.
Those pale eyes now glinted steel from behind their metallic frames,
their winter blue riveting wide-eyed stupefaction. Though her wilted
posture had not changed, she now emanated a certain pugnacity, the
straight line of her lips the lynchpin in a face of stony seriousness.
He pulled his hand away from the wall behind her, let her skirt fall
back to her knees, and disappeared into the stale, sweat-stained crowd
of frat boys.
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