Maybe he should not have done it – torn the tenderness, the love for her out of his heart. It had been a brutal operation: lie down, make incision, cut, remove, close with suture, get up. No anesthetic.
Would the suture last?
He was human after all, meaning changeable and given to mood swings, and he was going to see her again … and again. Five days a week because she worked in the office next to his. There would be the inevitable hellos, how-are-yous and good-byes, some chitchat – the hell of avoidance of what really went on inside.
Perhaps he should throw caution to the wind? Forget the old wounds, the fact that he was not quite over a recent divorce, was much older and not exactly film star material (she wasn’t either, even though very cute with her petite figure, Central Asian features and big brown eyes between mirth, frown and surprise).
And then what? What if she had never even thought of him that way? How (im)possibly embarrassing!
More self-procured surgery or certainty?
– James Steerforth ( © 2008 )
Written using the words cautious (close enough: caution), human, maybe from 3 Word Wednesday LXXXV.
Steer Forth! 
a very wizened approach to visual infatuation… for some reason the odds are so diminished at this age that i rarely even entertain the thought anymore….
Quite an enigmatic approach to a magnetism for another that defies all logic.
There would be the inevitable hellos, how-are-yous and good-byes, some chitchat – the hell of avoidance of what really went on inside.
That’s so spot on.
I loved the beginning of this, the heartattack. I wasn’t as sure how his bringing up their age and “maybe she didn’t think the same about him… it didn’t seem to fit with the original heartbreak to me.
Interesting piece for sure.
I like the surgical metaphor. and also how the reader needs to guess at the end what will happen. I have hope for the guy.
You took the story to a higher level and I felt this story is special since it grew out of a metaphor. It was wonderful.
Well done. I think every guy has been there a few times in life. More than once, I’ve thrown caution to the wind and been rebuffed. But I only end up regretting the times I didn’t say anything.