caltrain crush

Last year, when my friend (who would probably prefer to remain nameless) and I would sit at the cafe staring at UCLA English department graduate students as they held office hours with their students for our sheer entertainment and narrative-fantasy, a fetish was born.
Of course, we were not the only undergraduates on campus marvelling at the academic cultural phenomenon that is the result of the weakened economy on the college campus. Our lower-division TAs had been predominantly bitter, married 35-year-old women, but this new crop of 23 to 28-year-old nerdy-cute, brilliant, attentive, culturally-insightful, cool TAs were a sight to see, and beyond the simple research I was doing in contemplation of my own graduate studies, we kind of just wanted in on it. We of course only succeeded in having several-line conversations, swaps of extra chairs and embarassing eye-contact exchanges. But at least - some of the funniest things that either of us have ever said out loud were said in context of staring at this or that English department TA.
As a result, I am exceedingly good at picking a graduate student out of a crowd (namely, a crowd of office workers), and I ride the train down to Palo Alto with several from Stanford. Just out of force of habit, I stare at them (because it's something to do) and try to casually eavesdrop on their conversations, which is not terribly unusual, seeing as how I eavesdrop on a lot of people's conversations, but I find it slightly more interesting since they are, after all, Stanford graduate students who live in San Francisco. In addition, I fantasize about dating one of this demograhpic because he would have two deadly-hot characteristics being a. A Stanford graduate student and b. Somebody who has the same commute as I do.
As always, there is one in particular that I stare at, of course knowing from experiences of both staring at people on the train and staring at graduate students that he will never acknowledge my existence except for awkwardness of obviously being stared at.
But no!
Last week as I strategically placed myself in front of him and his friend so that I could eavesdrop on their conversation and possibly use it for material in my "novel," I couldn't hear much, so I put on my headphones. Then the most adorable 3-year-old pops up out of nowhere in the seat in front of me and looks right at me.
"Hey there."
The kid loves it. I start to have a ton of fun with him, pointing out the water and the ducks on the way and making the kid lose it laughing and possibly even educating him slightly about the beauties and mysteries of life if I may be so self-indulgent. He gets off with his dad at 22nd Street, the stop where I know the vast majority of Stanford graduate students get off at. As the kid is making a big production of saying goodbye to me, the whole car is almost as excited as that time somebody in the 2nd car gave out free beer to any takers in a group of teenage Giants fans before a game. And as the kid says goodbye, intriguing graduate student notices me once again staring at him and smiles in return.
The following Friday, I am leaving the office with my co-worker who occasionally trains it, and I see him as the train is approaching, my co-worker rushing towards the ticket-validating machine at the front of the station. Intriguing graduate student waves at me, and I smile back while keeping up with my companion, but am unsure whether he has seen me or whether he believes his gesture of recognition was lost on me.
The suspense!
Ha.
Today I see him at the station speaking to presumed professor he and his friend frequently speak to, so I keep my distance to avoid putting him in an awkward position, also because I am a weak, pathetic chicken. But I gave him a close-lipped smile before boarding the unusually crowded train car. There is nowhere to sit, so I end up sitting two seats in front of him.
Just as we're approaching the 22nd Street station, I feel a tap on my shoulder. No kidding!
"Hi," he says.
"Hey, what's up," I say.
He introduces himself, and I do too.
"I'm about to get off at 22nd Street. But are you going to stay till 6:00 tomorrow?"
"Probably."
"Alright, then I'll see you tomorrow."
He is clearly a genius of timing and language.
And it looks like I'll be staying at work until 6:00 again.