There is a girl sitting at a two-person table between Jonah and his impending doom, and she is eating a poppy-seed muffin. Not that it matters - she could have been eating a severed head and he'd still have seen her as his saviour. He takes the seat across from her and fails miserably at making it look natural.
"Hi. My name is Jonah." He should probably try and explain his sudden arrival, but he's just gotten out of a linear algebra midterm and his brain is a little fried. Which is probably the reason he's in this situation in the first place. Because if he had been even a little less vegetative, maybe he would have been paying attention to where he was looking and not staring directly at literally the last human being on Earth he wanted to see today.
"...Hi?" The girl seems a little uneasy, understandably so, but Jonah doesn't have the presence of mind to notice. He's looking over her shoulder to the veritable black hole of a person behind her, and -- shit, she's looking. He jerks his eyes back to his table mate, who seems ready to pack her things.
If he told her the truth it would probably stop her, but he thinks today is the first day since the break-up that he hasn't said her name out loud, and he really appreciates what it's doing for his self confidence. So he says the first thing that comes to mind, and in true Jonah-fashion, immediately regrets it.
"What's your sign?" Fucking stupid.
But the girl takes the bait, albeit seemingly reluctantly. "Um, Virgo, I think. Or Sagittarius. Or one of the other ones." Her poppy-red nails click on her laptop keyboard for a moment. Jonah thinks she may be looking up the answer, but she doesn't continue speaking. In fact, even as she types, her eyes don't leave his face. A certain pressure builds in the back of his throat.
"It's, um, just for this-- just for a survey," he blusters. What is he doing? Why is he lying? He's the worst. The worst people in the world ever are, in order:
1. The gremlin taking up much too much of his peripheral vision (except can he really call her a gremlin when she's wearing that shade of yellow and why does she have to be so fucking pretty-)
2. Jonah trying to make small talk with a woman he's never met before
Still, somehow, he perseveres. "And the survey is for an assignment. That's for, a, um, psychology class? Which I am taking. Currently."
The girl makes an exasperated face, like, are we really going to do this? And Jonah suddenly hopes she isn't having a bad day that he's making way worse with whatever the fuck it is he thinks he's doing. He should probably leave, he's probably been sitting long enough to convince any onlookers, or at least one specific onlooker, that he knows this girl. He needs to rip off the band-aid, just go for it and hope for the best, but she's sitting between him and the café door, and honestly, he's kind of a little bitch, so he gives himself a moment to mentally prepare.
He starts off confidently: She doesn't hold any power over you.
But this is a blatant lie, so he moves on quickly. She doesn't know she has any power over you.
That's not true either, is it? Gradually, his internal monologue atrophies until he's left with a pitiful sentiment: If you don't look her in the eyes she can't turn you into stone.
Whatever gets the job done.
He has an apology on the tip of his tongue for the poor girl he's been harassing, but she doesn't give him the chance. Maybe she is moved by the look of anguish in his eyes, or maybe she's just kind of heart. Either way, she throws him a bone.
"Right, that pysch class! I also um, have, that uh, class, I, uh, think," she says, mimicking his pattern of speech. But it is lighthearted, and he is eternally grateful for this.
