Fingers Winding the Bag's Strap

The morning light moved slowly down the zipper of the bag. Cold air misted the surface of the leather. One strap had come loose and lay touching the floor. The handle held the deep grooves of several years. He picked up the bag to set it between the two of them, and stopped. To set it down would mean keeping a distance; to keep it at his side would mean staying close. There was no way he didn't know that. His fingers stayed on the strap, not moving. I can almost see the fingers loosening for a moment and winding again. In between, the sunlight from the window lay long across the floor. The wish to keep a distance and the wish to be close overlap quietly on a single strap. While the curtain brushes loose in the wind and settles again, where will your bag come to rest today, I wonder. In the end, where he set the bag down, the sunlight moved very slowly. Even after the sunlight passed over the bag, the fingers wound in the strap stayed where they were. Only after the curtain settled did he set the bag down, not on the floor, but a little closer, on the seat beside him.