Jeanne Mettler
Let’s go for a coffee!
This is a sentence I want to hear as a tired student, a tiny excuse to postpone my work.
After holding the coffee in my hand, let’s talk about how your cat ate your plant for the fourth time, while I admit I still have no idea what comes after finishing my degree.
But please, let’s drink our coffee with frothed milk and a cute little heart on top – so that we can’t see our real reflections when we look deeper into our cups.
Nothing about my normal strategy of concealing my identity in mundane conversation worked with this guy.
Or maybe I was the one who started something different.
He ordered an espresso – what else, it’s the purist’s drink.
I ordered the same as I wanted to match him. You don’t even know that a long while ago, I stopped drinking espressi and began decorating them with clouds and sweet rivers.
The espresso’s bitter, sharp – it cuts through my tiredness. His voice does the same. I nod too often. Why am I matching him again? Habit? Hunger for something real?
“Mind or emotion?” he asks.
Always mind, my friend – just open up my brain you’ll see the endless labyrinth my thoughts must go through until they can rest.
I can only remember that suddenly, I honestly felt so tired of pretending and being boring. Where’s the limit of a conversation between strangers? Will we build a connection, or will this flow suddenly come to an end?
Truth over comfort. Truth over convention.
And suddenly – I’m awake.
Is this you, or the coffee doing that?
I matched your black espresso and drank it like I used to do, back when I still felt like myself. “Stubborn as a thousand cattle”, something my dad used to say to me.
Will you open up if I show you that I truly want to know?
There was this moment when I just decided to be like that again.
Internally shouting: So judge me, please!
If that’s what you’ll do, what’s the worst that can happen?
I craved to really see someone – to scan through their bones, to reach hidden thoughts, like coffee spreading warmth through one’s body, shared and unseen.
And I want to be seen too.
Answer me – can I really be myself with you?
Honest, playful, throw questions at you, moving, withdrawing only to strike again?
I want to confuse you, but you still have to get what I’m saying.
Can you do that?
I sip from my cup and wait for your answer.
Small sips – I don’t want the conversation to end.
Later, I can’t recall the words that were spoken – just the warmth in my chest, like the last sip before the coffee goes cold.
It really doesn’t matter.
Your smile widens, this is so raw.
Ah, finally – relief.
The cups are empty now.
I glance down – nothing left to hide.
