All I did was point out the possibility that her dad didn’t really change. Has she really never considered he was always like that? She didn’t have to get so defensive.
I take a sip of my hot chocolate as a couple comes in. A gust of cold air follows, along with the sound of them stomping the snow from their boots. They look to be in their 70s and are wearing coats and hats so caked in snow, I assume they’ve been walking all morning. In fact, I think they’re the couple Poppy and I saw when we left the hotel.
They stomp snow off onto the mat, and then the woman gives the man a kiss and goes up to the little counter to order. The man comes and takes a seat at the only other table in the coffee shop—right next to me.
He gives me a small nod but doesn’t say anything else. He’s too busy watching his wife like he can’t believe she’s real.
Are they newlyweds? I’ve never seen my parents look at each other like this. Curiosity grips me as I watch this man watch his wife.
“How long have you two been married?” The words slip out before I can catch them. What am I doing? I clear my throat, suddenly self-conscious.
The look the man gives me tells me he’s not one for small talk. I know the feeling. Iamthe feeling. Since when did I ask strangers questions? What has a single day trapped with Poppy Lewis done to me?
“Forty-one years,” he says.
I did not see that coming.
A moment later, the smiling woman sits across from him with a breakfast burrito, a huge blueberry muffin, and two forks.
He stabs his fork into the muffin immediately, and she crosses her fork with his, trying to stop him. The tines clink together, and they both grin. Well, he smirks.
“Don’t you dare take all the crumble,” she says.
“You snooze, you lose,” he says, scooping as much of it in his mouth as he can.
She tuts. “How do I put up with this?” Then she looks at me. “Can you believe the nerve?”
My snort sounds more like clearing congestion. “Pretty gutsy,” I say.
The woman grabs the rest of the crumble topping with her bare hand and puts it in her mouth before her husband can stop her. “We saw you earlier, didn’t we?” The woman asks. “Where’s your wife?”
“She’s not my wife.”
“Sister?”
“No,” I say too strongly.
“Ah, girlfriend, but you’re on the rocks, are you?”
Should I correct her? Tell her the story of our flight and rental car woes?
I look at her husband, at how little he cares about this conversation. I’ve always thought I was that guy, too. Yet, I’m talking to strangers in a small town cafe instead of keeping my head down the way I should have.
How many times did my granddad tell me that growing up?
“Keep your head down. Avoid distractions. You’ve got one chance, Ollie. One. You wanna go through life as a should-have-been?”
It was everything I could do not to yell, “Like you?”
Pressure on my hand yanks me back to the present, to the cafe in Wilson, Kansas. The woman at the other table is patting me, and the knowing look on her face tells me she thinks my silence is agreement. About what, again?
Right. She thinks I’m fighting with my girlfriend—Poppy.
“A fight can either be the end of the story or a new beginning,” the woman is saying.
“Go for the new beginning,” her husband adds.
“We speak from experience.”
