Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
I park the car and head up the street towards the coffee house. As it happens on other days, four more people are making the same trek. We all share an urgency and focus to our movement. I think again, we’re like ants going toward a piece of food, and amuse myself again, thinking, coffee ants. I can almost picture the others with waving antennae…
Coffee ants. Coffants.
Brewants?
Espressants?
It goes well, satisfying, at the new (for me) coffee writing haunt. Actually, this is a return to this particular haunt, RoCo, which used to be formally known as Roasting Company. They’ve changed the inside tables, making better use of space. They’ve also changed their small parking lot into an additional outdoor seating area, with tables and chairs under black netting. It’s better than I’m describing it. Besides those two areas, seating is available on front and side porches. The side porch features a fire pit and makes it cozy. The place reeks with sociable, companionable, inviting vibes.
My third day back here last week, I noticed the woman beside me was editing a typed manuscript. She struck up conversation about the weather because I’d just come in and she was preparing to leave. It came out that she’s a local cozy mystery writer. Published her first last year and was working on her editor’s feedback for the second. We’ve exchanged names and greet one another regularly since. She introduced me to her husband, who directs the local Peace Choir. Several friends sing in it, and I’ve attended dozens of their concerts. Six degrees, you know?
Another time, as I was sitting and writing, I noticed several others basically doing the same on their laptops. Today featured a conversation beside me between a man and woman. They were discussing a curriculum for a theater class. Included topics that I overheard were screenwriting and directing. Sounds fun, I thought.
So RoCo has good writing vibes, IMO. I’ve written about forty pages since coming here, and edited more. What I thought was the novel’s end, wasn’t. And the coffee works for me. Staff is friendly and professional.
Think I’ll keep coming here, as long as they’re here and will have me.
I witnessed a coffee house conversation that threatened to escalate into violence.
It was a mildly busy day as people gathered and socialized with pleasant autumn weather outside. Many were bent over phones, laptops, or notebooks.
One table hosted an octet of chatting women not far from me. Their age hovered around my own, which is to say sixty to seventy-five years young. They were mostly laughing and talking about books. Somehow their conversation rolled into the important question everyone wants to know, “How much paste should you put on your toothbrush?”
I haven’t read any books on the subject, and I didn’t study it in school, but I agreed with one brunette woman. She said, “Oh, I read that you just need a dab. Especially with an electric toothbrush.”
“No, no, no,” a red-haired woman erupted. “That is wrong. You need to cover the bristles from end to end with paste.”
Coffee shop conversations dropped off a cliff. Focus went to the table of women.
Other women at the table started disagreeing with paste woman. You’d think they were assaulting her grand toddler from her reaction. Voice rising into a screech, she declared, “No! No!” It was like she was channeling Khruschev addressing the United Nations. “The paste must be on all of the bristles! Anything else is wrong!”
I expected a duel to erupt. Pistols at twenty feet on the sunlit sidewalk outside.
Maybe she’d had too much caffeine. Maybe she didn’t have enough. The other women, wide-eyed with alarm, were backing down fast, trying to placate the redhead before she whipped out a sword to defend her toothpaste position.
Thank God they weren’t discussing politics.
The barista yesterday asked, “How’s it going?”
“Going well, thanks. You?”
“I’m looking forward to lunch. I have leftover mashed potatoes and chicken.”
“Ah, comfort food,” I responded.
She grinned. “Exactly!”
Well, you can imagine what I ended up having for dinner: mashed potatoes, chicken, and brussies. Comfort food.
Right on.
He was busy typing at the coffee shop when a young woman approached. He’d been observing her as part of everyone in his orbit, just tracking people and their behavior, wary of anyone becoming a threat. Call it habit or training, it remained as a leftover from his military career.
“Excuse me,” she said, “but I have what probably will sound like a strange question.”
“Why are you bothering me?” he bellowed. No, not really; instead, he said, still typing, “Yes?”
“I need to go back out to my car because I forgot something, but I want to save this table.”
“So?” he roared. “What’s this to do with me, you puny human?” But he didn’t do that. He just tilted his head and typed.
“So I was wondering if I might borrow your hat to put on this table to save it.”
“How dare you disturb me with such insolence. No, you may not have my hat,” he retorted. “Don’t touch it.”
In reality, he kept typing, nodded once, and answered, “Yes, go ahead.”
He was still typing when she returned ten minutes later. Moving his hat from the saved table to his location, she said, “Thank you.”
Continuing to type, he replied, “You’re welcome.”
Then she went off to a different table.
He stopped table and watched, wondering, why did she change tables?
Was it something he said?
I’m a regular at one coffee house in town. There are other regulars but I’m told that I’m one of the most consistent and dependable. I spend a few hours a day in there, drinking my favorite black brew while sitting in the corner, writing.
The baristas and manager all know me just because I’ve been coming here so long, and we chat when I’m ordering. We talk about football, politics, books, news, movies, etc. They know my drink — it’s always the same — so ordering is not necessary, though paying is. It isn’t unusual for them to hand me my drink when I step up to order.
I suppose this is why one small but touching practice has evolved. For whatever reasons — miscommunication or mistake — they’ll end up with food that the customer they made it for doesn’t want it. This includes pastries, cookies, brownies, cake, and sandwiches. So often, they walk across the crowded room to offer it to me first.
I am touched but usually turn it down. I have more than enough to eat. While I appreciate it, I think there are others who would appreciate, enjoy, and need it more than me. And, when I turn it down, they do find another who wants it.
The ceiling fans are still. Baristas behind the counter are quiet. Low-key. Not like them.
The coffee house is a third full. Music plays. People chat and work phones and laptops, sipping beverages, nibbling treats. But a feeling rolls through. Something is off. Different. Like the building is waiting to inhale.
Maybe it’s not them or the building. Perhaps it’s only him.
She sat at a coffee shop table a dozen feet away, alone, attractive, maybe thirty, so he watched, a voyeur.
She probably knew but didn’t look. Setting her small black purse down, she opened it and took out a phone. An Apple laptop followed.
He gawked. Purse that small, little circular thing with a gold chain, couldn’t hold anything that big. That purse was like a TARDIS.
She drew out a power cord. A hardback book followed. Bottle of water.
No way, he told himself, no way. All that stuff from that purse wasn’t possible, and yet, he knew what he saw.
Looking up, she gazed at him with electric blue eyes and smiled.
Like she knew exactly what he was thinking.
The standard coffee house greeting is, “Hi, what can I git ya?” It’s said so often but after a bit, it slides under the cover of other sounds as his mind fixates on his writing.
I was driving. Wife with me, I was following instructions to my new home.
There was a twist. I was keeping my old home, but, per the instructions, I’d been rewarded with more space.
Pleased and excited, I drove along winding roads through green countryside, toward…my old home. But slowing within visual of my old home, I told my wife, “It says to turn left here,” so I did.
There…was my new ‘additional’ home, on the right.
Huge, set back on a sprawling green lawn, it startled me. This was mine…too. Yes, according to the instructions. I parked. My wife and I entered the house, walking around and gawking. Furnished, it was ready for us to move in. I discovered it had a pool in the back, which really excited me. Checking out the area, I discovered the road my new house was on looped around back to my old house, making it easy to go back and forth between the two.
My friend, Kevin arrived. He and his family were moving to the area. He said that they needed a place to stay. Happily, I informed him, “You can stay here. I have a guest house.” After I showed him and he agreed, I said, “And I have a pool, so I’m going to take a swim before I dress for work.
The dream shifted. I’d joined a group. We were about to explore our new little town. It was covered in snowy white, and a large map in the sky showed me the route to take. Twenty of us piled into five cars. I drove the lead car. Though the town was supposed to be new to me, I was familiar with it, so I took on the role of tour guide.
Our first stop was at a coffee shop. The young male barista shared a photo with me of a large red coffee cup. This was, he explained, painted on the landing of a local ski jump. It was where he’d proposed marriage to his girlfriend.
I shared this info with my group. Getting back into the cars, I drove us downtown. We jumped out of the cars and ran through the snow on the sidewalk. In a few moments, I realized, we’re at the sky jump. “Look! There’s the big red cup of coffee.” I pointed it out everyone.
We then chatted about that, which was where the dream ended.
Michael Seidel, writer 