I like to call it Apple Green.

I felt his stare from across the bright colored climbing toys.  You know that feeling when someone’s eyes are upon you?  When you want to look, you’re going to look, you know you shouldn’t look, but, still, you look.  And then the eye contact, it’s awkward.  Quick, uncomfortable, you look away; trying to pretend it never happen.  Until it happens again, of course, and then there’s no denying.

Why’s he looking at me!?  Do I know him?  He doesn’t look familiar.  Oh, for crap sake. . . I just caught his eye again.  Why does he keep looking at me?  

Nose check?  Good.  Zipper check?  A-okay.  Zit check!?  

Ahh dang.  It’s probably this zit.  He’s totally staring at my zit (!!)  What a jerk, like he’s never had one. 

It was around 3:00 on a Thursday afternoon.  The kids and I had spent the morning demolishing the toy room and I was completely out of entertaining ideas.  It was too cold to spend the afternoon outside and we still had a good amount of time to waste before Brynlee’s ballet class.  And that’s the story behind how we found ourselves in the middle of the local mall playing on those germ-infested climbing toys.  We were joined by about ten other kids whose caretakers were obviously just as desperate as me.

I’d brought a big ole’ stack of reading material – that day’s newspaper, the mail, a cookbook, a FamilyFun magazine – and they were all rolled up and stuck in my oversized purse.  I’d already freed the kids of coats and shoes and while doing so had picked out an isolated, unclaimed corner to attend to my reading.  Just as I was about to read Abby’s response to Feeling Forgotten in Texas I felt his stare again.   This time he’d left his spot from across the play area and was sitting right next to me.  In my corner that I’d already claimed for mysellf.

I pretended to continue my reading while making sure I had tabs on both my children.  You can never be too safe.

“Ummm Miss. . . .?” 

I glanced up from my newspaper, looking right at him.  He was a good looking guy.  Early thirties, well dressed.  Business man would be my first guess, but then again it was 3:00 on a Thursday afternoon and he was hanging out at the mall play area – so, maybe not.

“What color is this?” he asked while pointing to my purse that was currently spewing personal belongings and reading material all over the bench next to me. 

“It’s aaa..um..” I was completely caught off guard.

“Lime green?” he finished for me.  “It’s lime green, right?  Isn’t that some kind of fashion faux pas?  A lime green purse?” 

Excuse me?  Who do you think you are?  You come over here, on my claimed turf, and start pointing out my ‘fashion faux pas’.  No, it’s not lime green.  It’s um. . .I don’t know. . . more of a. . .

“Yeah I guess that’s kind of what I am,” I answered back, pretending to find humor in the whole ordeal, “one big walking fashion faux pas!”

Wanna know what else is a fashion faux pas?  Having a zit on your chin.  A zit so big it should be paying your face rent.  Ya gonna mention that too, huh?  Why don’t you go ahead and point that out while you’re over here.

“It’s huge.  What do you carry in that thing?  A gun?”

I assume you’re still talking about my lime green purse and not my zit, thankyouverymuch.  And a gun’s not a bad idea; I think I’ll start carrying one.  And why do you think its okay to ask a girl - a girl you don’t even know - what she has stashed in her purse.  That’s personal.

“Well, a gun, a small library, and some goldfish” I answered his bizarre question while trying to shove my purses contents back into a part that could be zipped for safe keeping.

“A purse that big would be good for shoplifting” he continued the awkward conversation.  “Ever shoplifted with it?”

What the crap.  Shoplift?  Why did I agree to bring the kids here?  Am I really having this conversation?

“Never successfully!”  I smiled, and then turned my eyes back toward my newspaper hoping he would just go away.

“Well the good news is,” he continued, not letting my newspaper reading put an end to our enlightening conversation,” that with your blue eyes and your beautiful smile no one will even notice the lime green purse.”

Say wha!!  Did he just hit on me?  He totally just hit one me.  Are you kidding!  At the play area in the mall?  Didn’t he see my kids?  My wedding ring?  And most importantly, the zit?  He couldn’t have missed that zit.  Was the talk of lime green purses and fashion faux pas part of his hitting on me tactics?  Or was he really disgusted by my purse. 

Now what?  What do I say?  Should I pretend I didn’t hear him?

“Um. . . thanks?” I mumbled glancing back at my newspaper.

And then he continued talking to me while I watched my kids, read my paper and texted my husband.

And then, to make an escape, I pretended it was time for Brynlee to be at ballet.  I gathered the kids, took hold of my ‘lime green’ purse, and quickly said goodbye. 

He thanked me for the conversation and told me to keep smiling.  And then he winked at me.  Twice!

I decided he must have been drunk.

Happy Presidents Day, you guys.