A Silent Exchange

He leans against the rusted railing, the iron cold and firm beneath his palms, grounding him. His hands are all orange, and his fingernails smell of the wrought iron. He doesn't mind it though; since the Sunday bells have started ringing out in peals of bronze, rippling across the rooftops and cobblestone streets below. From his perch, he watches the village assemble, a slow parade of lives unfolding. There is the baker, his limp more pronounced this week—did the pedals catch him again, or was it something worse? The widow in black, forever clutching her rosary, each bead a silent plea. The butcher’s boy running ahead of his father, laughing, cheeks ruddy with life. He builds stories for them all, fragile narratives strung together like cobwebs in the dim attic of his mind.

It’s a game, yes, but also a solace. Here, in this place not quite home, he feels tethered to them, these strangers whose names elude him. They move with purpose, like pieces on a board he doesn’t know how to play.

Then he sees her. A woman, mid-twenties perhaps, her balcony just a little higher, just a little farther across. She stands motionless, her gaze fixed—on him. His heart stutters, skips a beat as if caught in some awkward rhythm. Her eyes, dark and steady, bore into him, or at least they seem to. He straightens up, tries to act casual, a man merely enjoying the view. But her gaze doesn’t waver.

At first, he allows himself the vanity. A half-smile forms. Maybe she’s taken an interest. He pictures a chance encounter, a fleeting touch of hands, the exchange of words not yet spoken. But then, as the minutes stretch thin, the warmth of her attention turns cold. His skin prickles. A thought uncoils in his mind, slow and insidious: **What if she’s watching him like he watches them?**

His stomach tightens. Is she spinning stories of him, too? What if she sees the cracks beneath his façade? The patched-together man, displaced and untethered. Can she tell? Does she know he’s here not by choice but by circumstance—a career on the brink, savings dwindling like autumn leaves? That this small village was a retreat, yes, but also an exile?

He shifts his weight, suddenly aware of how still he’s been, how exposed. His hands fidget, gripping the railing, releasing, gripping again. A flush creeps up his neck. Does she see his unease? Is she building him into a character? The loner, the failure, the man who moved here to escape himself and found he couldn’t?

Her gaze doesn’t falter. He imagines her whispering to someone—“There’s the man who stares at us all.” She’d be right. She’d see him as he truly is, a man who observes because it’s safer than living.

But then, a flicker of movement. Her head tilts slightly, a hand rises to sweep back a strand of hair. In that instant, something changes. She offers a small, almost imperceptible nod. A gesture that feels neither judgmental nor mocking. Instead, it holds a strange, quiet understanding.

And just like that, she steps back, vanishing into the shadows of her room.

He stands there, heart thrumming, the village below him moving on as though nothing has happened. The stories he weaves seem distant now, hollow. He looks down at his hands, his chest rising and falling.

Maybe, he thinks, she wasn’t imagining him at all. Maybe she was waiting. Watching, yes, but not to judge. Maybe she was wondering if he would nod back.

He stays on the balcony a little longer, the bells tolling their final notes. Then he retreats inside, feeling seen but, strangely, not undone. He sits at his desk, the papers spread before him. His hand hovers over the blank page.

And for the first time in weeks, he writes.