Okay, I will confess: I normally hate fics that steal from song lyrics. But I love this song and have always found its story charming, and it seemed a perfect fit. Song lyrics are in italics, like mini-chapter headings. Hope u enjoy.
Bus stop, wet day, she's there, I say,
Please share my umbrella.
It’s raining. Again. I’ve gotten into the habit of carrying my umbrella with me constantly this summer it’s been so wet. I glance at my watch and sigh, just having missed the vorige bus. That means nine minutes. Nine minuten of standing here in the damp. But at least it’s not dripping on my head.
A young woman walks quickly up, holding a newspaper over her head of dark curls. She’s cute. I risk another glance. Very cute. Should I? She’s getting soaked. Gathering up my courage, I walk the three steps to her and say, “Please, share my umbrella.”
“Thank you,” she says, stepping in close. She glances at her newspaper. Ruined. She sighs, and tosses it in the bin nearby.
She is close enough that I can smell her. And she smells good. “I’m Arthur,” I tell her. She looks up at me and smiles. Her eyes, beautiful almond-shaped eyes of translucent brown, like a warm cup of honeyed tea, catch mine for a moment. My hart-, hart stutters.
“Guinevere. But most people call me Gwen,” she says, offering me her hand to shake. I’m holding the umbrella with my right hand, so I awkwardly shake her right hand with my left.
“Guinevere,” I repeat. I love how her name feels on my tongue.
“Your hand is cold,” I say, looking for an excuse to hold onto it. I don’t want to let go. I don’t know why.
“Yours isn’t,” she says, looking down at our joined hands, one tan, one pink. Is she breathing heavier? Suddenly embarrassed door my behavior, I release her hand.
“Oh. Sorry.”
“Don’t be.” She looks shyly up at me again. She smiles, and I forget to breathe.
Bus stop, bus goes, she stays, love grows
Under my umbrella.
“This is really very kind of you,” she says.
“No trouble. Are u staying dry enough?” I ask, inching slightly closer to her. She doesn’t back away. In fact, she inches closer herself.
“I am, but I think that man,” she points to an older man hunched in a trench coat, “may be less than thrilled with u right about now.”
“There’s not enough room under here for three,” I say, and she laughs with me. Her laughter is like music.
I glance at my watch again. Suddenly the bus can take its time. Five meer minutes.
“Do u live around here?” she asks, transferring her laptop bag to her other shoulder.
“Yes, just a few blocks that way,” I point to the left with my thumb. “You?”
“A few blocks that way,” she smiles again, and points to the right with her thumb. “I take this bus every morning. I’ve never seen u before.”
“I usually catch the one before this one, but I was running a little behind this morning. And if the weather is nice, I bike to work.”
Did she just check me out? Yes, I think she did.
“Do u work in the city?” I ask, and as she turns her head back toward me I am distracted door her scent again.
“Yes, at the hospital. I’m an orthopedic surgeon.”
Wow. A doctor. “Well that explains the cold hands,” I say.
“How’s that?”
“Don’t doctors always have cold hands?” I grin devilishly down at her, enjoying waiting for the bus meer than I ever have. She laughs again.
“So what do u do with your warm hands?” she asks me. I raise an eyebrow at her, knowing what she meant but not willing to let it pass.
“Oh! Um… that didn’t come out right, did it? What I meant was…” she stammers, blushing most attractively.
“I know what u meant, but it was too good,” I laugh. “I am also in the health care field. Sort of.”
“Sort of?”
“You know Dragon Fitness? That’s my health club.”
“Yours as in u go there of u work there?”
“Um, I own it.” I promise I’m not bragging. Honest, I’m not.
“That’s a very populair gym,” she says, sounding impressed.
“We’re having a good year, yes. And hey, now I know exactly who to go see if I blow out my knee one day.”
The bus arrives. She looks at it, and hesitates. I scowl at the bus, as if it is interrupting us intentionally. I look down at her, and she looks up at me.
“I can wait for the volgende one,” I say softly, hoping.
“Me, too,” she says, and my hart-, hart leaps. I give a wave to the ever-impatient bus driver. Move along. Did she just come a little closer?
We did take the volgende bus, and sat together until her stop, where we were forced to part. I looked for her on the ride home. When the bus stopped door the hospital, I almost got off to go find her.
But I didn’t want to look like a stalker. I’ll have to make sure to run a little late again tomorrow morning.
All that summer we enjoyed it,
Wind and rain and shine.
I’m very careful to make it to the bus stop at the same time as yesterday. It’s not raining today, but I’ve got my umbrella nevertheless. Because it might.
I wait, trying to appear casual. Trying not to look like I’m looking for her, even though I am.
I am just about to despair when she appears. She glances at me shyly, smiling. I smile back, and I realize that my mind is blank. I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to appear over-eager, but I don’t want her to think I’m not interested.
So I open my umbrella over my head, and look her way. She bites back a smile as I raise my eyebrows in invitation.
“Hi,” she says, slipping her hand into mine. It’s still cold but it feels so good. I am very glad that I thought to hold the umbrella in my other hand.
“Your hand is still cold,” I grin, my stomach flipping happily.
“And yours is still warm,” she says, and I stroke the back of her hand with my thumb. Her skin is unbelievably soft and her hand fits in mine perfectly.
That umbrella, we employed it.
door August, she was mine.
“What time do u go home?” I finally ask the volgende week. Somehow the umbrella gives us a feeling of privacy, intimacy on the busy straat corner.
“It varies,” she says.
“Okay. What time are u going to be going home… today?” meer specific, then.
“My last appointment is at four. So I would guess around five. What time are u done work?”
“Whenever I feel like going home. Today feels like… around five.”
“Maybe you’ll see me on the bus home.”
“I’d like that very much.”
“Maybe you’ll… decide to walk a different way home… accidentally turn the opposite direction…” her voice is quiet, as if she’s not sure how I’ll react to what she’s suggesting.
“Like, go that way,” I point my thumb towards her home, “instead of that way?” I point my thumb back to the left.
She looks up at me through her lashes, biting her lower lip. She nods. “Maybe we could stop and pick up avondeten, diner on the way,” she suggests shyly.
Yes. Yes. This wasn’t how I was envisioning this conversation, but yes. In my mind, I was going to ask her to dinner, but I’ll take this.
On impulse, I lean down and kiss her once, gently, lingering on her lips, savoring their taste. “Sounds wonderful.”
Ev'ry morning I would see her waiting at the stop.
Sometimes she'd shop,
And she would toon me what she'd bought.
“What have u got there?” She has a shopping bag along with her laptop today.
“I’ve been out early, shopping,” she says, coming to stand beneath my umbrella. It is actually drizzling a little today, so we don’t look that odd for a change.
“What did u buy?” I kraan my neck to try and peer into the bag, and she laughs.
“Really exciting things.” She digs into the bag. “Some Tylenol,” she shows me the bottle and drops it back inside.
“Ooo.”
“A nail file for my office. I keep breaking nails and then I get a ragged edge, which tears through the gloves, and…”
“Got it. It’s not for vanity, but necessity. And safety.”
“Right. Let’s see. Ooo, dental floss,” she flashes the small parcel briefly, then, “and some socks,” she shows me a brief glimpse of a pair of white cotton athletic socks.
“You are a wild woman,” I tease.
“And… aha, Post-it notes, and, oh… never mind,” she says, hurriedly closing the bag back up and putting it back on her shoulder.
“What?” Now I’m intrigued.
“Nothing u need be concerned with.”
“Oh, now I’m really curious.” And I am. Perhaps I shouldn’t be. Who knows, it could be something horrifying, like tampons of hemorrhoid cream, or…
“Just… nothing. Nope, nothing else purchased door me this morning.”
“Guinevere…” I cajole, drawing her name out.
She looks at me, surprised and… aroused? Did I do that? Just door saying her name?
“I bought a new pair of knickers,” she admits, blushing. “But I am not taking them out of this bag to toon you.”
Perhaps I’ll get to see them another time…
“I notice u didn’t buy yourself an umbrella,” I say casually, choosing to change the subject before I drive myself mad with my own imagination.
“Why on earth would I do that?”
Other people stared as if we were both quite insane.
Someday my name and hers are going to be the same.
“That woman keeps giving us strange looks,” Gwen whispers to me, giggling into my shoulder.
“Well, we are standing under an umbrella and it’s not raining. of even particularly sunny.” I put my arm around her shoulders, and she leans into my side. I kiss the top, boven of her head and smile into her hair.
I love her. I know this now. I probably knew it from the moment I looked into those eyes of hers.
“Will u come over tonight?” I ask her.
“Yes.” She leans up and grants me a kiss. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the old woman that Gwen pointed out earlier smile in spite of herself.
That's the way the whole thing started,
Silly, but it's true,
Thinking of a sweet romance
Beginning in that queue.
We walk to the bus stop together some mornings, either from her flat of mine, depending on which direction we’ve chosen to walk home pagina the vorige night. Not every morning, as our evening schedules don’t always coincide.
But I try. Every dag I try. I always look for her on my way home. Some of the other regular passengers watch me, knowing that I’m looking for her. I don’t care if they think me a silly, lovesick fool; a lost puppy looking for his mistress. Each moment I can spend with her is worth all the odd looks and whispers we get standing at the bus stop under an unnecessary umbrella.
Came the sun, the ice was melting,
No meer shelt'ring now.
Nice to think that that umbrella
Led me to a vow.
“I’ve been shopping,” I tell her one morning. It is a bright sunny morning, and still we stand under my umbrella.
“Oh? New y-fronts for you?” she teases.
“No, I haven’t been shopping for underwear.” I laugh, but I’m nervous.
“What, then?” she asks. “I don’t see a shopping bag…” she peeks around me, looking.
“Hold this, please,” I hand her the umbrella and lower myself down on one knee before her. She gasps.
“Guinevere, that rainy dag I was running late was the best dag of my life, because it was the dag I met you. I love u meer than I can say. I simply don’t have the words. Will u make today and every dag the best dag of my life door saying yes?” I pull a small black velvet box from my pocket and open it for her. “Will u marry me, Guinevere?”
By now we have an audience. There are three other people waiting for the bus with us, and passers-by are also staring. Cars slow as they drive past. I’m making a spectacle of myself and I don’t care.
Gwen drops the umbrella and tackles me, throwing her arms around my neck. I lose my balance and land on my bum on the concrete, but I don’t feel it because all I feel is her arms around me and all I hear is her voice as it whispers, “Yes, Arthur, yes!” again and again in my ear.
I laugh with joy and inpakken, wrap my arms around her holding her to me, sitting on the sidewalk like a fool. Vaguely I realize people are applauding, and Gwen pulls away, blushing furiously, but smiling widely. I take the ring out of the box and slide it onto her finger.
She leans over and kisses me, and I feel happier than I can remember. I pull her into my arms again, deepening the kiss, aware of nothing but her as the bus drives off without us once again.
The umbrella tumbles down the sidewalk, pushed door the wind, forgotten for the moment.
Song can be viewed/heard here:
link
Bus stop, wet day, she's there, I say,
Please share my umbrella.
It’s raining. Again. I’ve gotten into the habit of carrying my umbrella with me constantly this summer it’s been so wet. I glance at my watch and sigh, just having missed the vorige bus. That means nine minutes. Nine minuten of standing here in the damp. But at least it’s not dripping on my head.
A young woman walks quickly up, holding a newspaper over her head of dark curls. She’s cute. I risk another glance. Very cute. Should I? She’s getting soaked. Gathering up my courage, I walk the three steps to her and say, “Please, share my umbrella.”
“Thank you,” she says, stepping in close. She glances at her newspaper. Ruined. She sighs, and tosses it in the bin nearby.
She is close enough that I can smell her. And she smells good. “I’m Arthur,” I tell her. She looks up at me and smiles. Her eyes, beautiful almond-shaped eyes of translucent brown, like a warm cup of honeyed tea, catch mine for a moment. My hart-, hart stutters.
“Guinevere. But most people call me Gwen,” she says, offering me her hand to shake. I’m holding the umbrella with my right hand, so I awkwardly shake her right hand with my left.
“Guinevere,” I repeat. I love how her name feels on my tongue.
“Your hand is cold,” I say, looking for an excuse to hold onto it. I don’t want to let go. I don’t know why.
“Yours isn’t,” she says, looking down at our joined hands, one tan, one pink. Is she breathing heavier? Suddenly embarrassed door my behavior, I release her hand.
“Oh. Sorry.”
“Don’t be.” She looks shyly up at me again. She smiles, and I forget to breathe.
Bus stop, bus goes, she stays, love grows
Under my umbrella.
“This is really very kind of you,” she says.
“No trouble. Are u staying dry enough?” I ask, inching slightly closer to her. She doesn’t back away. In fact, she inches closer herself.
“I am, but I think that man,” she points to an older man hunched in a trench coat, “may be less than thrilled with u right about now.”
“There’s not enough room under here for three,” I say, and she laughs with me. Her laughter is like music.
I glance at my watch again. Suddenly the bus can take its time. Five meer minutes.
“Do u live around here?” she asks, transferring her laptop bag to her other shoulder.
“Yes, just a few blocks that way,” I point to the left with my thumb. “You?”
“A few blocks that way,” she smiles again, and points to the right with her thumb. “I take this bus every morning. I’ve never seen u before.”
“I usually catch the one before this one, but I was running a little behind this morning. And if the weather is nice, I bike to work.”
Did she just check me out? Yes, I think she did.
“Do u work in the city?” I ask, and as she turns her head back toward me I am distracted door her scent again.
“Yes, at the hospital. I’m an orthopedic surgeon.”
Wow. A doctor. “Well that explains the cold hands,” I say.
“How’s that?”
“Don’t doctors always have cold hands?” I grin devilishly down at her, enjoying waiting for the bus meer than I ever have. She laughs again.
“So what do u do with your warm hands?” she asks me. I raise an eyebrow at her, knowing what she meant but not willing to let it pass.
“Oh! Um… that didn’t come out right, did it? What I meant was…” she stammers, blushing most attractively.
“I know what u meant, but it was too good,” I laugh. “I am also in the health care field. Sort of.”
“Sort of?”
“You know Dragon Fitness? That’s my health club.”
“Yours as in u go there of u work there?”
“Um, I own it.” I promise I’m not bragging. Honest, I’m not.
“That’s a very populair gym,” she says, sounding impressed.
“We’re having a good year, yes. And hey, now I know exactly who to go see if I blow out my knee one day.”
The bus arrives. She looks at it, and hesitates. I scowl at the bus, as if it is interrupting us intentionally. I look down at her, and she looks up at me.
“I can wait for the volgende one,” I say softly, hoping.
“Me, too,” she says, and my hart-, hart leaps. I give a wave to the ever-impatient bus driver. Move along. Did she just come a little closer?
We did take the volgende bus, and sat together until her stop, where we were forced to part. I looked for her on the ride home. When the bus stopped door the hospital, I almost got off to go find her.
But I didn’t want to look like a stalker. I’ll have to make sure to run a little late again tomorrow morning.
All that summer we enjoyed it,
Wind and rain and shine.
I’m very careful to make it to the bus stop at the same time as yesterday. It’s not raining today, but I’ve got my umbrella nevertheless. Because it might.
I wait, trying to appear casual. Trying not to look like I’m looking for her, even though I am.
I am just about to despair when she appears. She glances at me shyly, smiling. I smile back, and I realize that my mind is blank. I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to appear over-eager, but I don’t want her to think I’m not interested.
So I open my umbrella over my head, and look her way. She bites back a smile as I raise my eyebrows in invitation.
“Hi,” she says, slipping her hand into mine. It’s still cold but it feels so good. I am very glad that I thought to hold the umbrella in my other hand.
“Your hand is still cold,” I grin, my stomach flipping happily.
“And yours is still warm,” she says, and I stroke the back of her hand with my thumb. Her skin is unbelievably soft and her hand fits in mine perfectly.
That umbrella, we employed it.
door August, she was mine.
“What time do u go home?” I finally ask the volgende week. Somehow the umbrella gives us a feeling of privacy, intimacy on the busy straat corner.
“It varies,” she says.
“Okay. What time are u going to be going home… today?” meer specific, then.
“My last appointment is at four. So I would guess around five. What time are u done work?”
“Whenever I feel like going home. Today feels like… around five.”
“Maybe you’ll see me on the bus home.”
“I’d like that very much.”
“Maybe you’ll… decide to walk a different way home… accidentally turn the opposite direction…” her voice is quiet, as if she’s not sure how I’ll react to what she’s suggesting.
“Like, go that way,” I point my thumb towards her home, “instead of that way?” I point my thumb back to the left.
She looks up at me through her lashes, biting her lower lip. She nods. “Maybe we could stop and pick up avondeten, diner on the way,” she suggests shyly.
Yes. Yes. This wasn’t how I was envisioning this conversation, but yes. In my mind, I was going to ask her to dinner, but I’ll take this.
On impulse, I lean down and kiss her once, gently, lingering on her lips, savoring their taste. “Sounds wonderful.”
Ev'ry morning I would see her waiting at the stop.
Sometimes she'd shop,
And she would toon me what she'd bought.
“What have u got there?” She has a shopping bag along with her laptop today.
“I’ve been out early, shopping,” she says, coming to stand beneath my umbrella. It is actually drizzling a little today, so we don’t look that odd for a change.
“What did u buy?” I kraan my neck to try and peer into the bag, and she laughs.
“Really exciting things.” She digs into the bag. “Some Tylenol,” she shows me the bottle and drops it back inside.
“Ooo.”
“A nail file for my office. I keep breaking nails and then I get a ragged edge, which tears through the gloves, and…”
“Got it. It’s not for vanity, but necessity. And safety.”
“Right. Let’s see. Ooo, dental floss,” she flashes the small parcel briefly, then, “and some socks,” she shows me a brief glimpse of a pair of white cotton athletic socks.
“You are a wild woman,” I tease.
“And… aha, Post-it notes, and, oh… never mind,” she says, hurriedly closing the bag back up and putting it back on her shoulder.
“What?” Now I’m intrigued.
“Nothing u need be concerned with.”
“Oh, now I’m really curious.” And I am. Perhaps I shouldn’t be. Who knows, it could be something horrifying, like tampons of hemorrhoid cream, or…
“Just… nothing. Nope, nothing else purchased door me this morning.”
“Guinevere…” I cajole, drawing her name out.
She looks at me, surprised and… aroused? Did I do that? Just door saying her name?
“I bought a new pair of knickers,” she admits, blushing. “But I am not taking them out of this bag to toon you.”
Perhaps I’ll get to see them another time…
“I notice u didn’t buy yourself an umbrella,” I say casually, choosing to change the subject before I drive myself mad with my own imagination.
“Why on earth would I do that?”
Other people stared as if we were both quite insane.
Someday my name and hers are going to be the same.
“That woman keeps giving us strange looks,” Gwen whispers to me, giggling into my shoulder.
“Well, we are standing under an umbrella and it’s not raining. of even particularly sunny.” I put my arm around her shoulders, and she leans into my side. I kiss the top, boven of her head and smile into her hair.
I love her. I know this now. I probably knew it from the moment I looked into those eyes of hers.
“Will u come over tonight?” I ask her.
“Yes.” She leans up and grants me a kiss. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the old woman that Gwen pointed out earlier smile in spite of herself.
That's the way the whole thing started,
Silly, but it's true,
Thinking of a sweet romance
Beginning in that queue.
We walk to the bus stop together some mornings, either from her flat of mine, depending on which direction we’ve chosen to walk home pagina the vorige night. Not every morning, as our evening schedules don’t always coincide.
But I try. Every dag I try. I always look for her on my way home. Some of the other regular passengers watch me, knowing that I’m looking for her. I don’t care if they think me a silly, lovesick fool; a lost puppy looking for his mistress. Each moment I can spend with her is worth all the odd looks and whispers we get standing at the bus stop under an unnecessary umbrella.
Came the sun, the ice was melting,
No meer shelt'ring now.
Nice to think that that umbrella
Led me to a vow.
“I’ve been shopping,” I tell her one morning. It is a bright sunny morning, and still we stand under my umbrella.
“Oh? New y-fronts for you?” she teases.
“No, I haven’t been shopping for underwear.” I laugh, but I’m nervous.
“What, then?” she asks. “I don’t see a shopping bag…” she peeks around me, looking.
“Hold this, please,” I hand her the umbrella and lower myself down on one knee before her. She gasps.
“Guinevere, that rainy dag I was running late was the best dag of my life, because it was the dag I met you. I love u meer than I can say. I simply don’t have the words. Will u make today and every dag the best dag of my life door saying yes?” I pull a small black velvet box from my pocket and open it for her. “Will u marry me, Guinevere?”
By now we have an audience. There are three other people waiting for the bus with us, and passers-by are also staring. Cars slow as they drive past. I’m making a spectacle of myself and I don’t care.
Gwen drops the umbrella and tackles me, throwing her arms around my neck. I lose my balance and land on my bum on the concrete, but I don’t feel it because all I feel is her arms around me and all I hear is her voice as it whispers, “Yes, Arthur, yes!” again and again in my ear.
I laugh with joy and inpakken, wrap my arms around her holding her to me, sitting on the sidewalk like a fool. Vaguely I realize people are applauding, and Gwen pulls away, blushing furiously, but smiling widely. I take the ring out of the box and slide it onto her finger.
She leans over and kisses me, and I feel happier than I can remember. I pull her into my arms again, deepening the kiss, aware of nothing but her as the bus drives off without us once again.
The umbrella tumbles down the sidewalk, pushed door the wind, forgotten for the moment.
Song can be viewed/heard here:
link