Let me preface this by saying that I HATE HEMINGWAY. Bleh. Ok, so anyway, my Creative Writing teacher assigned us to writing, you guessed it, a Hemingway-type vignette. So I did, and this is what I got. Enjoy (or not). Oh and it looks really long but it's actually only 3 pages (double spaced) aaaand most of it is dialogue so it goes pretty fast.

On the Curb

The city was loud and busy. The sun shone bright on the ground but the air was crisp. Winter had begun a little early that year. Cabs rushed by, honking their horns but the people walking by hardly noticed them. A man waited patiently for the bus to arrive. He looked as though his mind was elsewhere. At the same time, a woman of about the same age, dressed in business clothes and high heels searched her purse for some much-needed object. She was in a hurry and moments later found herself ramming head-first into the man and then falling to the ground. Dazed, she began to attempt to compose herself.

“I’m so sorry,” said the woman. She was frantically grabbing at her scattered objects.

The man only stared in disbelief.

“I was just in a hurry, I’m late for work and I have a meeting and my boss is already on my case for being late too often and-”

“Renee?” he blurted out.

The woman looked up at the man, searching his face for something recognizable. He was tall, and handsome. His hair was a dirty gold color and his eyes were bluer than the berries in her mother’s garden. Only one person she’d ever known had eyes like that.

“Graham? Graham! What are you…?”

“I’m waiting for the bus. Wh-What about you?”

“I’m late… again. Happens a lot, but of course you’d know that.”

“Yeah, I would,” he replied, trying to decide whether or not he should look her in the eyes. “Well, you look…nice.”

“Thanks, Graham. You look nice too. What are you doing these days? Still trying to become a rock star?”

“You know me. I’ve got music in my blood, only now it’s folk, not rock. How’s…?”

“Oh, I don’t know, I haven’t seen him in two years at least. He turned out to be a bum. You have no idea what it’s like to be treated so badly by someone you care so much about,” she said, wincing at the words toward the end of her sentence.

“You’re probably right, I have no idea. I’m sorry to hear that, though.”

The woman knew she had already managed to retrieve the last of her dropped possessions, but she still searched the ground.

“So, Renee, you should probably be getting to work, right?”

“It’s not that important.”

“But what about your boss?”

“Oh, he’ll live,” she said. “Where are you headed?”

“Well this musician thing isn’t quite paying off… yet. So I have a day job at FedEx. It pays decently enough and the hours still give me time to play gigs, as long as I don’t get stuck with a late delivery.”

“You take the bus?”

“Yeah. I could afford a car, I guess, but why waste the money when the bus is right here?” he asked. The woman eyed the keys hidden within her still open purse. “You should try it sometime. The people you meet can be pretty interesting.”

“Maybe I will have to try it sometime, perhaps on a day when I’m not so scattered. You’re lucky you aren’t as clumsy as me. I drop things all the time, usually on my toes, or worse yet, other people’s,” she said, amused at the thought.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “You’re not the only person in the world who lets things slip from your hands.”

“I guess not. But I have a knack for causing problems.”

“What?” he asked.

“What I mean is that I’m unlucky. Mistakes seem to follow me around. I prefer the unavoidable ones like purse explosions, but… well, you know. The avoidable ones prefer me.”

The man looked at her, running a hand through his dirty gold hair. He shrugged.

“So now I’m running really late and I still think I missed something on the ground and I could really use some coffee so maybe I will just call in sick,” she said frantically.

“Maybe you will.”

“And then… maybe you’ll call in sick, too?” Her eyes searched but could not find his.

“Why should I call in sick?”

“Because then we could get some coffee. Catch up.”

“Funny that you said ‘catch.’ Appropriate,” he said, still without looking at her.

“So…?” She asked.

The bus arrived at the stop and its doors popped open. The man took a step forward and looked back. “You got a pen in that purse?”

“Yeah,” she replied, and began to dig. “Oh, I guess not.”

“Well then, I guess I’d better be off,” he said, and stepped onto the bus, just before the doors closed.

The bus drove away. The woman stood in silence, watching after it. A few yards away, a black pen rolled down the curb and into the gutter.