Tessa
I first noticed Phillip when he came into the bookshop—particularly how he’d stare at my body. At eighteen I suppose I was attractive to look at, everyone said my long brown hair was touchable. I wondered if Phillip wanted to touch it then. But it was more than my hair, or my eyes or my lips lightly blushed with pale lipstick that caught his fancy. I could see he liked to look at my breasts, and even more when I’d scoot off my stool behind the counter I could see how he admired my behind.
I was always nervous in his presence. I often blushed.
His twinkling eyes gave nothing away. The tender smirk told me little about what he was thinking. I was terribly naive at eighteen.
Once, he told me that I was a shameful flirt, and I would have denied it on my mother’s grave, but he walked
