The Space Between Us

With Johnny served, I moved on to the next customer. One at a time, that was how to do it, making sure to listen carefully to the orders so I didn’t make mistakes—it was no good being fast if you were sloppy.

Eric was an emergency room doc who liked a pot of tea while he sat at a table in the front window and wrote list after list on yellow legal pads. Lisa the law student always had a jalapeño-cheese-stuffed pretzel and an iced tea while she studied. Jen was a regular I hadn’t seen in a while, and we chatted about her new job for a minute. I spotted Sadie the psychologist at the back of the line and gave her a wave. Sometimes Sadie came in with her husband, another tasty bit of eye candy, only Joe was the kind of man who never even looked sideways at another woman. Today she was alone. Sadie waved back with the hand not on her hugely pregnant belly.

“Hot chocolate, extra whipped cream, and …” I tilted my head, looking Sadie up and down when she got to the counter. “Bagel with lox spread. Am I right?”

She laughed. “Oh … I was going to be good, but you’ve convinced me.”

“If you can’t indulge when you’re pregnant, when the heck can you?” I tipped my chin toward the front of the shop, where Meredith had snared some other regulars into telling stories. Laughter rose and fell. “I think there’s something exciting going on up there. Grab a seat. I’ll bring it over.”

Sadie huffed a sigh. “Thanks. I swear, I used to be fit. Now just the walk from home to here has me winded. And my feet hurt.”

“No worries.” While she waddled to a table in the sunshine coming through the large front windows, I set to work toasting the bagel, steaming the milk, adding the chocolate syrup.

“The queen’s holding court,” Darek said as he moved behind me to hang up his coat and put on his apron.

I looked up at the sound of Meredith’s laughter floating toward the back of the shop. “Doesn’t she always?”

I’d known her only a few months, uncertain of when she’d gone from a regular to a favorite and then to a friend. It might’ve been the day Joy went into one of her raging shit-fits and Meredith had calmly but coolly put her in her place by reminding her “the customer is always right, or this customer goes someplace else to spend four-fifty on a mocha latte.”

Since then Meredith had weaseled out most of my life history over coffee and sandwiches. I guess I’d had a crush on her from the moment she’d walked through the front doors of the Mocha with her oversize handbag and complementary dark glasses, her shoes that matched her belt, her perfectly styled blond hair. Meredith was the sort of woman I thought about trying to be sometimes, before ultimately accepting it took a lot of money, effort and desire I mostly didn’t have. She’d become a part of our little coffee shop community even though she didn’t live anywhere close to the neighborhood. More than that, she’d become a part of my life. She thought I was crazy. Wild. And she meant it in the best way, whatever that meant.

She really didn’t know me at all.

The crowd waiting for food and coffee dwindled, though most of the tables remained occupied. The Mocha’s a popular place all day long. Sadie left. So did Johnny and Carlos, my regulars. A few of Darek’s came in, but he took care of them. With Joy gone for the rest of the day I had time for a break, and I took my oversize mug of chai to Meredith’s table.

She looked up from her computer when I sat. “You missed some good stories today. You still haven’t told me yours, though.”

“Haven’t I told you enough crazy stories?” I’d told her plenty, most about my summers as a kid in the commune. “What, The Compound wasn’t wacky enough for you?”

“Those were about a place you were, not things you did. There’s a difference.”

I sipped chai and looked her over. “Do I look like someone who does crazy things?”

“Aren’t you?”

I shrugged. “I don’t even have any tattoos.”

Meredith waved a dismissive hand. “Every sorority girl has a tattoo these days. Piercings all over the place. They wear nipple rings like it’s something special.” She eyed me. “When I said you were our wild child, I didn’t mean because of the way you dress or wear your makeup.”

“What, then?” The mug warmed my hands better than the sunshine slanting through the glass. Early October in Pennsylvania can be glorious, warm and fragrant with the scent of changing leaves. This year, it was getting cold early.

Meredith shrugged, so graceful and artless that jealousy slivered through me. I could practice for a million years and never look that elegant. “Let’s just say there’s something about you.”

“There’s something about anyone, isn’t there?” I lifted a fingertip to point discreetly toward Eric, sitting alone with legal pads and lists. “Check out Dr. McSexypants over there. What’s he doing with all that stuff? Every time he comes in here, he’s writing on those legal pads. Why don’t you ask him about a story?”

Meredith laughed, low and throaty, not the same laughter that had earlier filled the shop. This was just for me. “Because he won’t tell anyone about them. Still waters run deep and all that shit.”

“Maybe I have still waters, too.”

She shook her head, playful. Charming. “No, honey, you’re more like a waterfall.”

“Because I rush a lot?” I asked with a wink.

“Nope. A thing of natural beauty with some treasure hidden behind it. C’mon, Tesla. Tell me. The craziest thing you’ve ever done.”

There was no trying to deny her. What Meredith wanted, she’d have, and she made me want to give it to her. “I don’t think anything I’ve done is crazy. Crazy’s like … I dunno. Putting a dead bird in your locker at school so you can bury it later. Lighting stuff on fire.”

“Okay, not crazy. Wild, then. Free? Unique?” She paused, thinking. “Unencumbered.”

“Ah. You mean sexual.”

Meredith wore a huge diamond and a gold band on her left hand. She talked sometimes about her husband, but only in the vaguest of ways. I knew his name was Charlie and that he was a teacher at some fancy private school. They had no kids.

“Yes-s-s,” Meredith hissed with glee. “Sexual. Tell me, Tesla. What’s the wildest sex thing you ever did?”

I wasn’t surprised she wanted to know my wild sex secrets. She liked to talk about sex a lot. Well. Who doesn’t?

“Hmmm.” I turned my mug round and round in my palms, the ceramic sliding on the tabletop. “The craziest thing, huh? I’m not sure I can beat old people porn.”

“Did you know Sadie was married to someone else before Joe?” Meredith said quietly.

“No. She was? Huh.” I shrugged. “Was that the craziest thing she’d done? Got divorced?”

Meredith shook her head. “Oh. No. Her first husband died.”

I frowned, thinking of pretty Sadie with her big belly and gorgeous husband. “Gee, that’s too bad.” Meredith shrugged. “It happens.”

It wasn’t the first time I’d heard her sound a little bored by the pain of others. She liked hearing stories, but mostly only the funny or exciting ones. Sad stories didn’t melt her butter.

I looked up to the counter, but Darek was busy flirting with one of his favorites. Nobody else was waiting. I still had time—and half a mug of chai. “Fine. Crazy things. You go first.”

She shook her head and licked her mouth again. I couldn’t help watching her tongue move over her lips. Meredith has a mouth like Angelina Jolie. Full, soft lips. Pillowy, I think some people call them. She has a smile full of teeth, the kind you can’t help but smile back at. Meredith’s mouth is the sort that would break your heart if you saw it frowning.

“I haven’t done anything crazy. I’m married.”

I laughed at that. “So? Were you a virgin when you got married? Don’t married people get up to crazy shit?”

Her eyelids lowered for a moment, as if she was remembering something. “No. Not really.”

“You must have something crazy to tell me.” I sat back when Eric got up to help himself to a refill from the jugs on the counter next to us.

“Tesla,” he said, and nodded at Meredith. “Hi.”

“Hi, Eric.” She didn’t flutter her lashes or anything contrived like that. Meredith didn’t have to. “How’s tricks?”

“Putting Houdini to shame,” Eric said, though he didn’t have quite the same easy flirting tone with Meredith that he had with me. He looked at her sort of warily, keeping his distance.

She made sure to ogle his ass as he walked away, then turned back to me. “I would bang that man like a screen door in a hurricane.”