Sunday coffee table
Usually in Sunday morning I would sleep a bit late, every times I woke up to find another half of the queen size bed empty, like an indentation of a paragraph, an empty space left on purpose. I felt the warmth on the other pillow. It was still warm. She must have waked up a few minutes earlier than me, never had once I woke up earlier than her or together, I wonder why. Scent of Coffee leaked into the room, her style to lure me up from the bed. Her coffee brewing skill is remarkably outstanding, I would say, working in her industry she has to make good coffee, a little bit less in its taste would have caused complaints to flood in; she would not let that happen. So, I got to my feet and went to our common space, the coffee table.
She was already all set when I walked into the room, pouring coffee into tasteful tea cups she bought it from Egypt, not those elegant kind of kitchen ware, but rather it looked rugged and worn out, like some artistic masterpiece you see in art gallery, imperfection and realization, I guessed that is how they call it? I made a motionless shrug
“Good morning.” She greeted me as I walked into our common area.
“Hey, morning.” I greeted her back as I sat down across her, we were separated by the coffee table.
After greeting each other, we just sat down and quietly drank our coffee. I helped myself with Haruki Murakami’s writing while she took her time for some manicure practices – trimming, polishing, and beautifying her nails. We usually took around half to an hour time to absorb into ourselves at first. I like Murakami’s writing, although just pick up this favorite recently but I have already finished a few of his books, I felt it’s a little too fast, and very unfortunately a good novelist never write too many books I thought. So, sometimes I repeated a book even it was not the first time I reading it, just to make sure I see the detail and picture it as how he is telling the readers.
“What are you going to do in the afternoon?” She asked, breaking the silence. It’s not awkward to be alone and silence with her, after all we have nothing much in common to talk about since we knew each other. I got to know her from a medium-size gathering with my friend, either with luck or absence of luck we sat next to each other during the gathering, the other friends whom she was closed with were sitting quite far away, so we had plenty of chances to talk. We started with the most common topics that usually strangers get to know each others, like working place, company, characteristics of job, where-from, what to do during free time, where to eat nice food in the town sort of topics. And we ended up exchanging phone number. For single city dwellers, that’s one of the ways to get to know new people. We didn’t have any reason to be together, if I have to think of one, I would say people in the city are mostly lonely.
“Nothing much to do, just as usual” I said. Nothing much I can think of this moment. Going out alone will be out of the question if I don’t have anything to buy. If I have anything to buy, I will just grab it in a few minutes time, including time I take to park my car and walk in and out from the shopping mall. I normally just grab what I want without waste of time. So going out for a shopping, for me, I will not think of it as a mean to kill time thus it will not be in my things-to-do list.
“Listen to music and read book?” She guessed, knowing a bit of myself.
“Most probably.” I nodded a few times slowly, considering nothing else will be less interesting that what I would do.
“I see, okay.” She replied simply. If there was prize for shortest verbal reply, I guess she would score one of the highest after me, or we might be able to exchange place alternatively. Sometimes she replied the shortest, and sometimes me. Then we would share one more thing in common.
We both sipped the coffee.
“Where are you flying to this time?” I asked her back, I changed topic, knowing that my answer to what I do in the afternoon question would not lead our conversation anywhere.
“Solomon Island” She responded, no remark, no elaboration.
“Solomon Island.” I parroted.
“Uhuh”
“That’s some place, I read it in National Geographic before.”
“Yea, indeed it is very nice place to go, it’s kind of exotic. My kind of place.” She agreed, raised her eyebrows a bit as she blew the bits of nail off from her delicate fingers. I guessed she really liked the place; else she wouldn’t waste the effort to elaborate. To tell the truth, I couldn’t really relate her with the place she’s into, somewhere likes Egypt, considered her dressing and styling. If I draw her walking down the crowded street of Solomon Island, I will have a picture of contradiction. She is very stylish and sophisticated most of the time when she is back in town, but once she flies out into her own world, she becomes a total different person. The dressing, the style, her mood, and all other things with her will be a total different.
“It kind of reminds me of Pirates of Caribbean” I said.
“I supposed Pirates of Caribbean are from Caribbean Sea?” She asked, looking at me into my eyes. Obviously she has finished with her nails.
I gave it a thought before continued again. “I don’t know. The same kind of rareness I guess, both are so far away, untouchable, like an exquisite gem that you excavated in an archeological convoy.” I said.
She shifted her gaze from my eyes to the coffee cup, and stirred the coffee in slow motion. Her eyes followed the swirling motion. Then she took a short sip at the coffee. “Feeling like you have found your long lost childhood?” She attempted casually, without looking at me then she sipped the coffee again.
“Yea, I guess so”
“Hmm. Let’s go there together then.” She smiled and gave me a wink.
And the leftover of coffee in our coffee cups vaporized into the thin air, leaving the rest of Sunday morning in serenity full of coffee scent.
She was already all set when I walked into the room, pouring coffee into tasteful tea cups she bought it from Egypt, not those elegant kind of kitchen ware, but rather it looked rugged and worn out, like some artistic masterpiece you see in art gallery, imperfection and realization, I guessed that is how they call it? I made a motionless shrug
“Good morning.” She greeted me as I walked into our common area.
“Hey, morning.” I greeted her back as I sat down across her, we were separated by the coffee table.
After greeting each other, we just sat down and quietly drank our coffee. I helped myself with Haruki Murakami’s writing while she took her time for some manicure practices – trimming, polishing, and beautifying her nails. We usually took around half to an hour time to absorb into ourselves at first. I like Murakami’s writing, although just pick up this favorite recently but I have already finished a few of his books, I felt it’s a little too fast, and very unfortunately a good novelist never write too many books I thought. So, sometimes I repeated a book even it was not the first time I reading it, just to make sure I see the detail and picture it as how he is telling the readers.
“What are you going to do in the afternoon?” She asked, breaking the silence. It’s not awkward to be alone and silence with her, after all we have nothing much in common to talk about since we knew each other. I got to know her from a medium-size gathering with my friend, either with luck or absence of luck we sat next to each other during the gathering, the other friends whom she was closed with were sitting quite far away, so we had plenty of chances to talk. We started with the most common topics that usually strangers get to know each others, like working place, company, characteristics of job, where-from, what to do during free time, where to eat nice food in the town sort of topics. And we ended up exchanging phone number. For single city dwellers, that’s one of the ways to get to know new people. We didn’t have any reason to be together, if I have to think of one, I would say people in the city are mostly lonely.
“Nothing much to do, just as usual” I said. Nothing much I can think of this moment. Going out alone will be out of the question if I don’t have anything to buy. If I have anything to buy, I will just grab it in a few minutes time, including time I take to park my car and walk in and out from the shopping mall. I normally just grab what I want without waste of time. So going out for a shopping, for me, I will not think of it as a mean to kill time thus it will not be in my things-to-do list.
“Listen to music and read book?” She guessed, knowing a bit of myself.
“Most probably.” I nodded a few times slowly, considering nothing else will be less interesting that what I would do.
“I see, okay.” She replied simply. If there was prize for shortest verbal reply, I guess she would score one of the highest after me, or we might be able to exchange place alternatively. Sometimes she replied the shortest, and sometimes me. Then we would share one more thing in common.
We both sipped the coffee.
“Where are you flying to this time?” I asked her back, I changed topic, knowing that my answer to what I do in the afternoon question would not lead our conversation anywhere.
“Solomon Island” She responded, no remark, no elaboration.
“Solomon Island.” I parroted.
“Uhuh”
“That’s some place, I read it in National Geographic before.”
“Yea, indeed it is very nice place to go, it’s kind of exotic. My kind of place.” She agreed, raised her eyebrows a bit as she blew the bits of nail off from her delicate fingers. I guessed she really liked the place; else she wouldn’t waste the effort to elaborate. To tell the truth, I couldn’t really relate her with the place she’s into, somewhere likes Egypt, considered her dressing and styling. If I draw her walking down the crowded street of Solomon Island, I will have a picture of contradiction. She is very stylish and sophisticated most of the time when she is back in town, but once she flies out into her own world, she becomes a total different person. The dressing, the style, her mood, and all other things with her will be a total different.
“It kind of reminds me of Pirates of Caribbean” I said.
“I supposed Pirates of Caribbean are from Caribbean Sea?” She asked, looking at me into my eyes. Obviously she has finished with her nails.
I gave it a thought before continued again. “I don’t know. The same kind of rareness I guess, both are so far away, untouchable, like an exquisite gem that you excavated in an archeological convoy.” I said.
She shifted her gaze from my eyes to the coffee cup, and stirred the coffee in slow motion. Her eyes followed the swirling motion. Then she took a short sip at the coffee. “Feeling like you have found your long lost childhood?” She attempted casually, without looking at me then she sipped the coffee again.
“Yea, I guess so”
“Hmm. Let’s go there together then.” She smiled and gave me a wink.
And the leftover of coffee in our coffee cups vaporized into the thin air, leaving the rest of Sunday morning in serenity full of coffee scent.
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