- Golden Child -
"They say your order reveals the depths of your being. Like wearing your heart on your sleeve."
That was the first thing she said to me that day. It had been a coffee shop, three blocks down the street from campus, tucked between a little hair salon and a four-storey Kinokuniya bookstore. It's the bookstore that kept the café full of interesting characters, streaming in and out - books, coffee and cell phones. But surprisingly enough, only a few spend time at the dusty wooden round tables. Tables that look like they have been fished, hook, line and sinker, mismatched and all, out of an antique store from the belly of a fish. I have always been one of those few. Nothing's better than sitting down with a nice paperback novel, cover rolled behind the book in one hand. Books are meant to be read, I always tell whoever happened to inquire why I hold them the way I do.
She didn't talk about the book in my hand however – it was a DeLillo novel – she was talking about my coffee. Surely, one would think to talk about coffee in a coffee shop, yet, that somehow wasn't a common topic. But with her, it was always about the coffee.
She sits down, sets her purse on her lap as if she's bursting to tell her life story or how this girl in her class is a prude – leans forward, so her shirt collar falls just a little too low, causing me to avert my eyes to nowhere in particular – and looks straight at me.
I don't know whether to be intimidated or intrigued. She looks young and carefree. I am certain she's a freshman. But to sit down in front of a stranger like the best of friends and begin with such a profound and penetrating phrase is inviting all kinds of strange impressions. So I straighten a bit to create some distance between us, to say we aren't so acquainted.
She purses her lips and smiles wryly and I make a noncommittal sound of agreement, wondering what to say. She waits and I wait and then I hide behind my cup. The pearl white, smooth porcelain greets my lips. My warm coffee. The temperature of the soul. I watch the depths of its darkness churn and froth and swell, streams of white cream in a swirling galaxy as if it would tell me the answer.
She's still staring at me when I look up.
"My order changes according to mood, season, and my date," I say.
She shrugs. "Then you're a wishy-washy kind of person, like driftwood."
I take it as a compliment and tell her it means I'm adaptive to my environment.
Her nose crinkles in melodic laughter. "Sure, if that helps you sleep at night."
I wait, believing for a moment that she will introduce herself. But she doesn't.
"What's your order?"
She looks at me for a while; she's weighing the value of my question. "Remember this," she says, "tall caramel chai tea latte, soy, 120 degrees, extra whip."
"Don't forget. It can make a big difference," she adds.
I tell her I'll remember. I could imagine the barista at the counter: this young woman with short brown hair - must have been in her teens - bowing and smiling as kindly as she could upon hearing the order. But it would remain in question whether the barista was impressed or not.
I ponder how the order reflects on her person. The contents of her drink aren't visible behind the brim of her cup. She probably drank half of it already; half-empty or half-full. But somehow her order fits like the last tessera in a mosaic. Without it, the picture just won't be complete. If she isn't holding her cup of tall caramel chai tea latte, soy, 120 degrees, extra whip, she might just fall apart, piece by piece, in front of my eyes.
Her face is almost precisely, methodologically, sculpted into flesh on top of creamy pale skin and a large forehead, covered by a painterly cascade of russet hair. Straight, simple hair, well groomed. No stray strands. To one side, it sweeps over her ear like the flow of wine from a bottle. A girl who takes care of her hair is always impressive. Atop her face perches this exquisitely arched nose that points up but not too high, to avoid being arrogant or snarky. But if she tucks her chin in and looks blank, her nose might deem her unapproachable. Still, after a long look at her hair, her face and her complexion, altogether she doesn't stand out all too much - most pretty Japanese girls are the same.
Yet, not every girl has her eyes. It's her eyes that bring to life the world around her. And with those wide stained-glass eyes, deep and intense, she stares at me. A spiraling vortex of jet black and specks of light. Spiraling into the infinite, enough to crystallize any moment in time. I'm careful not to look into them. If I do, I might be sucked in, deeper and deeper, warping into another dimension with no way to return.
"Have we met before?" I ask.
She looks at me with this perplexed expression as if to say, why, of course not.
"Well, nice to meet you then."
"Well," she says, "nice to meet you too." There's an ambiguous smile on her lips now, like hazy fog in the mornings. It's as though she had been waiting all along for me to say that.
I reach out to extend a handshake. "I'm Maeda. Maeda Naoki," I say.
She examines my hand for a second before taking it.
"Kaneko Shizuka."
Her first name, Shizuka, which means quiet, could hardly be fitting. It's quite the opposite, just like her hand, small and gentle. Its warmth seeps through my fingers and up my arms and I let go.
"That's the look everyone gives me when they find out my name. They might be wondering if I had come from another planet or straight out of a strange recurring dream. Have you ever met someone like that? Someone disconcertingly familiar but you can't pinpoint who they are or when you've met them. Yet you'd rather not find out."
She seems to remember something and for a moment, her face is blank. It reminds me of a keen-eyed cat on a stormy day watching its owners come and go, cold and distant.
"I come here every week," she says. "See that couple over there?"
"Which?"
"There." She indicates with a slight jerk of her head. Her hair bounces. "They come here all the time as well."
"What about them?"
"Don't you notice," she pauses and stares off at them.
"Stop staring," I say.
"Don't you notice," she continues, "they never speak to one another. For the six months I've been here, every week, they sit across from one another and stare into space. Sometimes they tap at their phones, other times they watch people shuffle by. Sometimes they must just be sitting and breathing in the aroma of coffee beans. Who knows what they're thinking about? Perhaps nothing? How can anyone know? They never look at each other or say a word. Yet, they're talking today. Strange isn't it?"
"Really?" I ask, intrigued.
"Yes. I'm quite observant." She drawls out the word ob-ser-vant before slipping behind her cup of chai tea latte.
I watch the couple. Matching black parkas, matching black rimmed glasses, matching blue jeans, even matching cell phone cases. They might as well be twins. The girl - she must be in college, no school uniform, and a thick bag that looks quite laden with textbooks - leans closer, resting her elbows on the rickety wooden table.
"What if they've always been speaking but we never notice?"
Chai tea girl shakes her head confidently. "I've watched them for a long time. They're only speaking today."
"What do you think they're talking about?"
She shrugs. "Mozart compared to the Beatles, maybe. The string theory. Or cirrocumulus clouds. But she's smiling and he's frowning. Of the millions of stories that happen every moment around you, you can never know. All you see are bodies and cups."
"What's in their cups?"
She studies them carefully, craning her head even.
"Don't be so obvious."
She waves her hand dismissively. "She's holding a cup of black coffee. He has, I don't know, iced lemon tea?"
"In a coffee shop, in this season? No wonder he's frowning."
She studies me for a moment like she's inspecting my ears or something. Then she laughs, as though I've passed a test, and stretches back, breathing in deep the smell of coffee. We pretend to be good friends.
We soak in the coffee bean sea.
-
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