She was a flower borne in the traffic, and every day she picked his booth to pay her toll. Her warm smile just for him swelled his heart with fondness and longing, but despite their brief moments of closeness, the distance between them seemed vast...
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Would she stop by today?
Leaning through the window, Joe turned his head into the glare of the headlights and breathed the early morning air. Even above the ever-present char of exhaust, the earthy coolness of San Francisco's morning fog filled and comforted his senses. Tiny droplets condensed on his eyelashes. Pausing in his work, he looked up through the dawn gloom and smiled at the lights of the Golden Gate. They glowed gold and red in the dark haze that slowly flowed past those famous orange towers marking the north entrance into San Francisco.
Of course she would stop by.
Joe blinked himself back to work. In a motion made fluid and effortless, he reached out with a smile, counted the toll, and flashed his green light. Within three seconds, the car was back on its way into the city. Joe usually used the few seconds of contact to say thanks and give a welcoming wave. He liked being the first friendly face thousands of commuters saw every day as they entered the city.
He glanced at his watch and sighed as he did the arithmetic. It would be ninety-seven minutes until the swell of rush hour reached its peak, when the busy lines of cars and trucks would slow and stretch far beyond the Golden Gate's graceful crest. In ninety-seven minutes, floating in the press of traffic like a flower floating on a stream, she would appear, and he would savor the best three seconds this day would bring.
Joe sighed and smiled at the traffic as he continued his work. He always worked his favorite booth, the fourth from the left. As he greeted and worked through the stream of commuters with practiced efficiency, he thought about her, how every day she chose this lane.
It was one of the many things about her that intrigued him. Every day she had the exact change for the five-dollar toll, knowing exactly how to fold the bills and hold them at the perfect height and angle for the most efficient exchange. As her fingers briefly brushed his palm to hand him the toll, her face was always alight with a beaming smile that, in the three seconds daily it shined upon him, would energize Joe for hours.
During her brief visit every morning, her voice was an angel's song in his ears as they exchanged greetings and comments on the traffic or the weather. He longed some day to have a real conversation with her, a conversation that extended beyond the routine handful of words that crowded each day's friendly but brief exchange. He often dreamt of the jokes and stories they might share, the things they would learn about one another, if only he could turn those three seconds into three minutes, or three hours. But he hadn't gained the courage even to ask her name. What would such a radiant woman want with a tollbooth guy, anyways?
Between cars, Joe glanced up and squinted at the bridge's orange towers as they floated in the bright white of the morning fog, dissipating quickly in the early warmth of the day's sunshine. Surprised, he looked at his watch. More than an hour and a half had passed as he mindlessly worked through hundreds of commuters, his longing thoughts of her distracting him.
