Extremely tiresome it was as I was returning home,
Gruelling hours put in a job that made my life miserable,
And I hate myself for being stuck in a rut,
That made me question the choices that left me in such a place;
Home was still a few hours away,
As I stood at that light waiting for it to turn green,
So that I could drive to an empty home,
Eat the food and maybe try to sleep in early,
But I knew I was kidding myself;
As I looked around,
I found a rustic cafe,
And from the see-through partially tinted windows I saw,
I saw a set of eyes,
Those eyes scanned the world running away from it;
As I stared into those,
They looked like pools of honey in the warm light of the cafe,
After a while,
Our eyes matched and she stared back at her cup,
After looking at the empty seat she stared back outside;
A stranger’s eyes were better than staring at an empty seat they thought,
So, I made a U-turn,
Parked my car and went into the cafe,
As our eyes met,
She looked at the chair in front of her and those eyes told me to take a seat;
As I sat,
And placed an order of flat white while she sipped on her coffee,
It was supposed to be a date but he ditched me,
Something came up,
“Of course it does…”
But I’m grateful for that;
A few things came to our office too,
That’s the sole reason I stayed late and left at such an odd hour,
As she took another sip,
The waiter brought me my flat white;
Before I could,
She told me to wait a moment,
Because they serve it extremely hot,
On sipping I burnt my lip and tongue,
But I played it off;
As she stared at me,
Thinking it didn’t hurt,
But deep down she knew it did,
And enquired about it,
I tried to refuse but my face told her the truth;
In that moment of laughter and cheerfulness,
She told me,
“It feels good that she was ditched now..”
As I let out a little laughter,
And told her,
“Maybe things do happen for good…”
Like me returning from my 9-to-5 job at 8:30 at night;
“You still have it well,
I used to work where they forced us to work overnight” she told me
There we were,
Trauma dumping,
laughing at each other’s miseries,
Letting out a few laughs,
And then sipping on our coffees;
As it was our last sip,
Out of nowhere I wanted to do a toast,
As I raised my cup,
And held our fate hostage;
“Cheers on being ditched, Yet finding someone to have a coffee with so late at night…!”
A laughter then another,
As she shed a few tears thinking about her fate,
And thanked me for making her night one to remember…
As we walked outside,
A ride waited for her that was supposed to take her home,
She shared her number and told me to call her when I reached home,
And after G0d knows how many years,
I waited,
And waited to reach home…!
-Fin-
A short story I witnessed and expanded on today as I sat at the coffee table…!
Waakiye 
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