Angels

Gertrude had seen the exchange between the distressed mother and father. In Gertrude‘s mind, she thought that the mother had over-reacted when she had shouted at the father, however she knew that she may have reacted the same if it had been her kid. Still, she knew that they were both at fault for not noticing the kid wander away. It‘s not that she blamed them for not being careful and not watching their child, but Gertrude felt that it was a lesson both of the parents had to learn from this event. Life was always trying to teach something...

Gertrude lingered amidst group of people rushing all around her, her mind rocketing at great speed at what had just happened moments ago. Curse her for being so emphatic and feeling the need to check up on a person she did not even know. So without realizing it, her feet had unconsciously started to lead her after the father as he walked off in some direction, probably to find a quiet corner where he would drown in his thoughts.

She watched his back and how his shoulders were slumped, though tense at the same time. She guessed he was under a fair amount of pressure even before his son wandering away. He did not seem to be one of the crew members so she guessed he was probably in one of the bands that were on this tour that she was working on.

The small amount of time she had to see his face did not give any recognition about seeing him anywhere before, seeing as she had been around tours and working on them for a small portion of time. Who was she trying to deceive? Gertrude was still new at this whole thing and she barely knew anyone so it wasn‘t really a surprise that she did not recognize the man.

When Gertrude finally snapped out of her thoughts, she found herself in one of the secluded hallways with huge black boxes for all the music equipment. The father was sitting on one of the boxes, his hands covering his face as his elbows dug into his knees. It was a sad sight for Gertrude seeing as she had seen it one too many times in her life. To her, it looked as a sign of giving up or feeling defeated or even weak and she knew those feelings very well.

Gertrude took a few unsure steps closer to the guy, feeling like she was intruding, yet she knew that she had to ask if he was okay. It was just her silly nature to care for others, even if Gertrude did not know the person well.

As Gertrude cleared her throat, the guy‘s head snapped up and his surprised eyes connected with hers. She squeezed out a small warm smile and took a few more steps so she was standing closer to the guy, yet not too close enough. She did not want to overstep boundaries by getting too close, seeing as she was just there to make sure everything was okay.

“Are you okay, sir?” The question rolled off her tongue as if Gertrude was speaking in a completely different language than English. Well, English wasn’t her native language, however she felt as if it was and the question that she had asked a moment ago felt like it was spoken in Mandarin. Her throat was dry and she felt a lump forming, making it hard to breathe. What was this? Was she getting nervous? That rarely happened…

The guy gaped at her in surprise, his eyes watching her face and Gertrude felt sweat start to form on the back of her neck. She started to feel stupid for coming to check up on him. It’s not like he knew her and frankly, he wasn’t going to tell her if he was okay. She felt stupid at that moment.

“Umm… Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” the guy dragged his hand down the side of his face after a few seconds of silence and Gertrude swallowed the huge lump down her throat. She had no idea what she was doing. She didn’t understand why she had wanted to ask the guy if he was fine. No, she literally did not understand most of the things she did in her life.

“Good. I… uhh… Just wanted to make sure you were fine,” Gertrude answered slowly, licking her dry lips from nervousness. She offered a small smile to the guy as she ran her hand through her hair.

“Jeff to Gee?” The walkie-talkie blared up suddenly, making Gertrude jump up in surprise as she looked down at her hip and snatched up the black device. Pushing the button on its side, she spoke a brief: “Gee listening”.

Turning away from the guy, she listened to Jeff tell her that she had one last job to do before she could go on her break. Her mind snapped to work mode the second she told Jeff that she understood and as she put the walkie-talkie back on her hip, she snuck a glance at the guy. He was still sitting there, watching the ground and she didn’t know if she was supposed to say anything to him. I mean, she didn’t need to or was inclined to do so. He didn’t know her and he didn’t really care about that so with a small sigh, Gertrude turned around and started to walk off.

She didn’t get that far when she heard a loud ‘wait!’ and she whipped her head around to look at the guy. He stood beside the box, watching her with a small sincere smile.

“Yeah?” Gertrude asked and the nameless guy took a few steps closer to her.

“Thank you,” he told her and Gertrude gawked at him for a second, before she grinned slightly.

“Nah, nothing to thank me for,” she answered and went to walk away, however the guy spoke up again quickly.

“What’s your name? I’d like to know the name of the girl that got me my kid back,” it was an innocent request, though Gertrude didn’t feel like her name had any importance in her ‘heroic’ action.

“Gertrude,” she looked at the guy one last time, giving him a warm grin, before she heard the walkie-talkie blare up again and she knew she had to get back to work immediately. So, with one last glance at the guy, she had to rush away.