The Woman With The Cap Turned Backward
A Tale of Infidelity
Her hair was the color of coffee beans with dribbling streaks of caramel blonde. I only caught a glimpse before she covered it with a baseball cap turned backward.
She was stocking shelves at a twenty-four-hour convenience store. Her burgundy work shirt didn’t have a name tag.
“Good morning,” I said while filling a disposable cup with hot chocolate. It was 1:45 a.m.
The sharp corners of her lips dug into her cheeks like little hooks when she smiled, and all at once, I felt the stress and uncertainty of life melt away like a golden stick of butter in the summer sun.
Let’s take a step back before we venture too far forward…
My infatuation for her had blossomed during the annual Lighting of the Trees on a warm winter night the weekend before Christmas. Vibrant blankets of colored light washed across her lovely face as she followed a serpentine path through the park with her friends, and I, accompanied by my significant other, followed behind at a polite distance.
I attempted to decipher her personality based on subtle hand gestures and broken conversations as her soft, genial voice drifted into my red-tipped ears. I was a detective searching for a new…
