It was the only way I could think of to get close to her. Honest. It’s not like I planned it – ok so I had to know a few details beforehand like her route, the day, the time, that sort of thing. But I never meant to scare her. A part of me thought she might find it funny, that after the initial shock she might laugh, we might laugh, then she might take off that red cape, slick with rain, and then we might go for a drink. Then years later, we might tell our story of how we got together at dinner parties with our friends, prompting each other, finishing each other’s sentences. Parties where it would be me slipping the cape off her shoulders and hanging it on her chair, me who would already know her stories but still laugh at them, me who would take her home. I’d seen Laura, watched her walking to her grandmother’s flat, the short route from Hyndland to Woodlands, every second Thursday for about six months. Thirteen times. At first it was the cape I fell for, she wore it no matter what the skies told her – usually they were pregnant with rain. The cape was as certain and red as her trotting steps, it wasn’t a red that thought it might be pink or orange, it was primary red. How did I know where she was going? It happened by accident though now that I have hindsight on my side nothing about me and Laura seems like an accident. Laura was buying flowers, pink carnations, at Roots and Fruits and I heard her telling the man at the counter – how jealous I felt of him just for being the person she was talking to – that they were for her grandmother, that she visited her every other week. She said it without a great deal of thought, as though it were as much a habit as putting on that red cape. Later I would start to think Laura did it just to be close to me and to keep me close. But at that point, it was only our second encounter and I was just transfixed by her cape, the redness of it, the fact of it. Who wears a cape anyway? Laura, that’s who. She wore it well, casually, as though it were her signature but confidently too. It looked like it was made of heavy material, I still don’t know what, I never got to touch it. But from a distance it looked heavy like velvet but also rippled and flighty, like satin. Sometimes I was convinced it was waterproof because it seemed to shimmer and wink in the rain. So I followed Laura. At first it was just the length of Byres Road joining her at Tinderbox on the corner, then Great Western Road too and finally all the way to her grandmother’s ground floor tenement flat on West Princes Street, just a few doors down from the Scottish Ballet. They sat drinking tea from bone china teacups in the front room, her grandmother on the sofa and Laura on a chair opposite with her legs folded under her, the red cape nowhere to be seen. Her grandmother did most of the talking, the room was lit by one of those awful muddy green tassled light shades and Laura seemed to listen, smile in the right places, leave at the right time. I never followed her home. It’s amazing how much you can get from so little. I learned to love the trip of Laura’s step, the swoosh of her cape and the curve of her arms as she walked. Sometimes she talked on her mobile – I never listened, in fact I would hang back; it would have been disrespectful. How stupid I was. Then something happened that changed the dynamic of our relationship or rather my relationship with her caped walk. I met Laura’s grandmother. It wasn’t planned, I was just passing though I did find myself passing along West Princes Street quite often during those months. She was out on the steps enjoying some unexpected sunshine and drinking tea out of one of the bone china teacups. I’d never seen them so close before in all their floral glory and I found myself imagining Laura’s lips against the fine gold rim. Every time I drank out of those cups it gave me a thrill. We ended up talking and she liked me. That was when I started to find out about Laura. I discovered that her father was a labourer, that she struggled with little money and worked in a bar on Ashton Lane – I never went there – and that she was the sweetest granddaughter anyone could hope to have. I pieced it all together, formed a patchwork quilt of Laura that was made up of squares of red cape, curving arms, trotting feet, pink carnations and sweet words from an old stranger. If only she hadn’t invited me in, hadn’t trusted me, I might not be in this situation now. I could have gone on loving Laura through a window, from the rim of a teacup, from the other side of the street. I would never have had to scare her. I never wanted to do that. One question continues to haunt me, it wakes me at night and keeps me on the move: where is Laura now?