Emily, Emily, Emily
The blonde with the red coat sits at a table, scribing in a beige paper notebook. She holds the ballpoint with such a subtle grip I imagine the words flow from her mind with such ease they come out in cursive. Unfortunately, she is continually interrupted, and my initial hopes of conversing are dashed as I refuse to be one of them who create a bother and upend her moment of flow. She eats a jam biscuit from a paper container and sips what I imagine to be a cappuccino or latte. I imagine she requests oat milk of some variety as dairy is out of fashion. She sits and stares at the corner of the ceiling. Her brain fires as her eyes jump to the right. She adjusts her position to become more comfortable and shifts her shoulders into a writer's position. She brushes her fingers through her hair, and I can't help but imagine what that must feel like on my head. I imagine my eyes would close, and I would dig my head into her fingertips like a feline brushes up against a caress.
Seconds tick away on the clock, and as I watch the minute hand reach closer to the twelve denoting the change in hour, I work up the courage to say something, to say anything. the biscuit is half finished, and the coffee is half empty. I hope she stands up to order another as the chance to catch her eye becomes greater the longer I stay here, cemented in the seat facing infinity. The sun is begging, peeking behind the clouds, screaming for a clear sky. She wears small hoop earrings, and I'd love to have dinner with her.
It's not enough to sit here and wait for the gate to open like a racehorse waits for open field. I can hear the seconds ticking, and I know it's only a matter of time before she stands to leave this coffee house, and I'm left watching her pack her things, exiting through the door I entered through hours ago. She knows not of my existence, yet I am painfully aware of hers, and on mornings like this, I'm not sure if I'm better or worse for it.
She drains the last drop of coffee from the paper cup, and I can tell my time is dwindling. The chance is evading me like trying to put your fingers on time itself, like trying to hold a minute in the palm of your hand. The page on which she writes is beginning to fill; ink is drained from the pen as the words become burned into the pages of her paper journal.
She makes a ponytail with her hair, exposing her right shoulder and revealing the left flank of her neck. The nape shines and pulls me in. I wish to put my face in the crevice created by her bone structure and ear shape. I wish to brush the tip of my tongue against her lobe and wrap my arms around her midsection. Would she want to waste a day with me? Would she like to be the subject of my affections, or would she rather be distant and disconnected, alone in her world? Maybe she has someone who loves her, loves her so deeply that in a crowded room, she is all he sees. Bodies fill the space that separates us as she reviews what she has written. A hand supports her chin as she covers a cough with her elbow. Her pen moves furiously as thoughts bounce off the walls of her cranium.
Her cup reads “Emily” and the name sounds nice inside my head. Emily, Emily, Emily, a perfect companion to her green scarf and zebra patterned tote bag. I wonder if my life could fit inside that bag. I wonder if there's space enough to include all the trappings of two lives, let alone one? We'll leave this place separately the same way we entered it.
Emily shifts and puts her right leg under her left . . .
Cover Art: Volegov - Mood
