Love

She sat on the beach waiting for him. She knew he would be there any moment and in fact he should have arrived by now. A bit worried about him, playing with the sand between her toes for leisure, she wondered if she could by some measures, measure the love she had towards him. Then, just as pointlessly, she turned around to see if she could find his short figure walking towards her in a certain, peculiar fashion. What she saw instead was a lot of people who were looking at her as if she didn’t belong to their species. It would have made any woman uneasy. But she wasn’t any woman. Throwing an easy glance at them, she turned to the sea again. And although she looked composed, in her heart she knew that she was a little insecure.
Just then, someone patted her back. She knew this touch. It gave her a sense of belonging and made her happy.
“You’re late”, she said.
He didn’t reply. Instead, he sat beside her comfortably and held her hand. With the sea-wind blowing in their faces, they sat in silence for a while. Then, he turned towards her and said,
“You look beautiful.”
She smiled. His words always seemed so real. It made her feel good, very good in fact. Compliments and kind words were not a part of the miserable life that she lived.
“You make me feel beautiful”, she looked at him and sighed.
His eyes immediately caught a gleam. It relieved him, moreover it relieved the man’s pride that he bore in his heart. Not all men had the fortune to hear something like this from a woman like her. He remembered how he had promised her that they would leave this place and find a better one and get married.
“We will get married some day”, he said, still sunk in the thoughts of their future.
“Is it really possible?” she asked with a thick air of sadness about her.
“I’m trying”, he said, “I’m trying to get a job. The money we have now isn’t sufficient to run a home. We need more. Then we’ll go to a different place, a different city and begin a new life. We will get there.”
She looked into his eyes with awe, respect and yes, love. But it lasted only for a moment. She looked away. The red skies were losing their colors to the first shades of darkness and they met the colorless sea at the horizons and it all looked beautiful. She wished she could freeze in this moment. But she had a job to do. Looking at him like a sensible woman, she said, “We need to earn to get there. Find me a customer, its time.”
He nodded and got up heavily. Then k just while leaving, he turned and in a rather shrill voice, said, ” I love you.”
And with a million promises in her tearful eyes, she replied to her pimp,
“I love you too.”