Alpha-Boring

She sat back on the lounge chair, relaxing, enjoying. Another beautiful day on the beach. Anna looked up at the umbrella covering her lounge chair, then out again to her feet. The waters were beginning to wash away her pedicure, but that was okay, she didn't mind it. The waters were still that day, quiet, they had been for so long; one long unending beach vacation. She looked good in her swimsuit and she had a great view, at least she had that going for her.

It was midweek, January when he showed up. Anna wasn't disturbed by his presence, but she certainly noticed him, he was impossible to miss. He just sat down next to her like it was nothing. This was her beach and here was this guy. "Can I help you?" Anna asked.

"Not at all. Just getting settled in for the off season." He said with with a warm smile.

"The off season? How long is that?" Anna asked. She tried to hide the discontent of her disturbance.

"Oh, I figure...I will probably be here much of the year, I might leave for a while in July, But I'll leave when it gets cold again." He replied.

Anna's expression remained stiff and unchanged. "Do you prefer the cold? You dress like you do."

"Cold. Hot. It makes no real difference to me."

"I don't believe that," said Anna.

"I am not a man of lies."

"I don't believe that either," Anna said stiffly.

His warm smile remain unchanged. "My name is Nick. I am a man of belief, whether or not you choose to believe."

She bottled up her thoughts about him, as much as she could. "Since you seem to be sticking around here for a while, you can call me Anna."

"You think I didn't know that already?" Nick said. His smile had yet to leave his face.

"Of course you would know my name, why wouldn't you know that?" Anna asked dryly, rhetorically.

"You been here a long time?" Nick asked.

"It's probably been a few years, maybe longer. I used to be in a different spot. I move around once in a while. But I get the feeling I will be by you for a while. Unless something major happens."

"I think you may be right." Nick said, glancing around.

The pair were quiet for a while. Anna tried to enjoy the quiet she was so often used to - she so often enjoyed.

"I've been there," Nick said.

It could have been minutes or hours , days even. "Where?" Anna asked.

"There." Anna glanced to him and saw him point with his eyes. "The real one. It's huge, bigger than you realize."

"You've been to Stonehenge?" She still didn't believe him.

"Of course. It's quite lovely covered in snow."

"What about Springfield?" Anna asked, pointing with her eyes.

"No. I haven't been to that Springfield. I've been to the others. That one isn't real," he answered sounding a little downtrodden yet still smiling.

"It looks pretty real to me."

"No one is that color yellow. That is a fantasy."

"That's pretty rich coming from you." Anna said dryly.

"I am whatever people believe me to be."

"I believe you are exhausting me."

"Good thing you're lying down on your beach chair then."

"Good thing."

Anna and Nick stopped speaking to each other for the time being. Hours, days or weeks, time was nearly irrelevant. Saint Nick, Santa Anna Beach, Springfield - Simpsons, and the Stonehenge snow globes remained unmoved, alphabetically organized, on the shelf for months, until the Valentine's Day themed snow globes came off the shelf a month later.

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