They're people, too! Honestly!

Today's the day of my second BLOGFEST! YAY! 

For those of you who don't know about it yet, you can find the rules HERE.

(you can also still join till midnight tonight, London time)

(that's London, UK)
(if you're looking for the Bad News entry, see below)

First of all, let me thank you for joining in the fun and/or popping in to see what everyone (and me) got up to! I hope you enjoy the fruits of our imaginative labour. Don't forget to read as many entries as you can and give everyone some comment love (and no, taking part is not a prerequisite to commenting so feel free!). 

I plan to have read all entries by Sunday night, Random.org shall be employed thereafter and the winner of Seven Steps on the Writer's Path will be announced on Monday! 

Now to get to the writerly part...here's my story (exactly 500 words btw)! Enjoy!

ps. I won't tell you in advance just what it is I'm personifying here...can you tell?

***

One of my all-time favourite things is sitting down in a coffee shop with a huge mug of coffee, watching the hustle and bustle of town life all around me. It was noon by the time I got to my usual spot that day and I found it already taken. 

Thankfully it took only the blink of an eye for the unkempt student currently camping out there to remember he was late for lectures. He ran off, leaving papers behind like breadcrumbs, and I fell into the chair to settle in for the day. 

I grabbed my current book from my messenger bag - for some reason people were more wary of me if I just sat there than if I had a book in my hand - and pretended to start the third chapter. There was a young mother right in front of me, wrestling with her brat whilst venting her sorrows to the obviously unmarried friend sitting across from her. 

I watched the friend’s face, the hint of wrinkles around her eyes, the flutter of her eyelashes. I could see her break out in goosebumps as a cold draft swept by her. She listened to her friend and started to worry, started to wonder why she wasn’t married yet, why she didn’t have a child, if she’d ever have one. 

I saw her realize that her friends marriage wasn’t even close to ideal, nowhere near the fairy tale she’d thought it might be, and started to stress about how that would probably be her life soon, how she’d have to marry the next potential suitor just to beat the biological clock, to have a child she could then fret and worry some more about. I saw her eyes go glassy with tears and watched her jump up, make a flimsy excuse to her friend and run off to cry in the toilets. 

The young mom sat there staring at the seat her friend had used, absently putting down the little boy in her arms. She picked up her non-fat latte and then put it down again quickly to grab an old napkin from her son’s pudgy fist before he could stick it in his mouth. I could see her thinking of all the horrid diseases he might catch if he did something like that, if he picked up a stray bit of rubbish and actually touched it to his mouth, never mind chewing it, swallowing it. She picked the squirming kid up again. 

He was a cute little thing. I could see he had his mom’s eyes, and what was probably the father’s nose. Even as it scrunched up with a fearful cry, it was a cute little face he had. The mom felt his forehead and gasped, then packed her stuff and hurried towards the pediatrician’s office around the corner. 

It didn’t take long before someone else took her place, and I watched them think, watched them worry, watched them run off in panic. 

I really do love sitting in coffee shops.

***

So, what did you think of that? Could you recognize Fear (or Worry, as the case may be)? Highly contagious, he is... ; )

Don't forget to check out the other entries and let them know what you think, too!