I Waved Back at a Stranger for a Full Block

I am a friendly person, which is the root of most of my problems. I was walking to work down the main street of our small town, and across the road a man raised his arm and waved at me, big and cheerful.

I did not recognize him, but I did not want to be rude, so I waved back. He kept waving. So I kept waving. We waved at each other, warmly, for most of a block, me growing more and more certain that this was someone I should absolutely remember and increasingly panicked that I did not.

I was composing a friendly "great to see you!" that would cover the fact that I had no idea who he was, when a bus pulled up to the stop just behind my shoulder and its doors hissed open. The man jogged across the street, past me, without a glance, and threw his arms around a woman stepping off the bus. His wife, home from a trip, judging by the suitcase and the way he spun her around.

He had been waving at her the entire time. I had been standing directly in the path between them, waving back like an idiot, for a full block, in the middle of our small town, where everyone knows everyone. The bus was still there. Every passenger who had watched the whole thing through the window was now looking at me. One of them gave me a small, pitying wave.

I returned it, because at that point what else could I do, and then I walked the rest of the way to work at roughly the speed of light. Two people at the office had already heard about it before I arrived.