March 12 - Coffee

Mae walks slowly and deliberately across the room.  A mug from her childhood, from the Adler Planetarium, shakes in her left hand.  She watches it intently, trying not to spill.  Likewise, a man watches her from the kitchen table. 

“How long has it been?”

“What do you mean, Jon?”  She does not look at him.

“How long has it been since you’ve had a cup of coffee?”
“Three days.”

She only spills when she gets to the sink.  A look of “Damn” crosses her face.  Gently, she licks the side of the mug.

“Junkie.”

She looks over her shoulder at him. “I overfilled the mug.”

“Of course you did, junkie.”

She crosses to her laptop.  She always sits across from him at the kitchen table.  Gently, she places the over full mug on the placemat next to her.  Her laptop sits on the surface of the table.  She starts drinking.

“Isn’t that hot?”

“I burned my tongue on the side of the mug.  I can’t feel it if it is.  And you know our kettle doesn’t heat water properly anymore.”

“We can get a new one.”

“It heats water, just not properly.  We don’t need a new one.”

Jon sighs and leans back.  He runs his hand through his dark hair as he does when he knows he’s having the same conversation over.  He looks at Mae.  She looks at him.  They have this conversation every morning, but they haven’t talked about the kettle.  He can tell she doesn’t mean it; proper coffee is too important to her. 

“We can get a new one.”

“We don’t need a new one.”

She is only absent-mindedly continuing the conversation.  She has begun to check her email.  This is more important than coffee.  She needs to know what’s going on elsewhere to be comfortable where she is; that’s what she tells Jon anyway.  He thinks it’s bullshit.

“How’s the coffee?”

“Instant.”

He rises and grabs his mug.  It’s got some kind of modern art on it from their second date when they went to a modern art museum and pretended to understand the art to appear intellectual.  Neither ever admitted to pretending, but they had been.  A mournful saxophone busker had played at them as they left.  He had wanted to give him some money, being from the country and being kind.  She had stopped him, being from the city and being blind to anyone sitting down on a street.  He still uses the mug.  He has a contact addiction to caffeine from being around Mae for two years.

She tips her mug back to catch the last drops as he begins his first cup.  She stands and makes another.  He jokes about her being a junkie again.  She gives him a tired look that calls him a hypocrite for bringing it up every time she boils water.  After all, he drinks just as much as she does.  She is tired, he is just waking up.  She has always needed coffee, he never has.  So it goes.  Every morning.  Beginning with the first cup of coffee.