How does one explain the sound of a perfectly-fitted strappy sandal hitting the concrete?
In summertime, but overcast cardigan-wearing weather. No makeup; simple skin dewey with moisturising SPF 15 lotion.
A glove, maybe an envelope. Somehow the ground caresses the foot like a pervert, or fetishest.
You walk to the counter and order a long black, the waiter’s eyes expressive, soft. He passes you a breakfast menu: orange paper, Comic Sans. Creased by the hands of a thousand previous coffee drinkers.
You sit outside and cars hum and bicycles click on by, changing gears.
The coffee comes.
The exposed timber tabletop smells like forever-evoking the hunter, the man who can conquer with bare fists, within.
You slide the coffee in it’s red cup and saucer towards you, sliding along the woodland tabletop as though it is gravel, the teaspoon clinking gently over each ripple in the surface. Gritty, and yet, to the coffee addict, the most pleasing of sounds.
Coffee and wood.
You drink in the scent deeply as the cup approaches your lips. The first sip: bitter, and mingled with toothpaste.
You write this down.
Jazz, a woman chatting, the grumble of grinding coffee beans, the incessant beeping of a truck reversing. The sun comes out and you cup your mug in both hands, revelling in the steam on your nose, the bitter and sweet, warming your esophagus.
You forgot your sunglasses.
–
There are certain feelings you just can’t explain with words:
- being too full
- smelling him again for the first time in months