Coffee for Two

Chapter 1

The moment I crack open the door, I hear the familiar chime of a bell. Its high pitched ringing makes a young girl's head turn nearby. As soon as I step inside, I breathe in deeply through my nose and smell the delicious aroma of freshly ground coffee beans. I casually make my way over to the counter and smile at the barista. She smiles back. I order a French vanilla cappuccino - as usual - and mindlessly glance around at my surroundings as I wait for my drink. I can hear indie music softly playing through the speakers and start to get lost in my own thoughts. Only the calling of my name breaks me out of my trance.

"Emma?", I start walking toward the voice the second I hear my name being called. I smile at the second barista as I carefully grab the cappuccino cup and saucer off of the counter.

I walk over to my favourite spot right at the front of the shop beside a window and place my drink down on the rustic, wooden table. I sit down on the cushioned seat and start to bring the warm cup up to my lips. The minute the sweetness of the beverage touches the tip of my tongue and I feel the warmth of the drink sliding down my throat and warming my stomach, I feel contented. I continue to sip from my cup as I look out the window, onto the street at the people rushing by.

Anne's Coffee Shop has been my favourite place to visit since I moved to Toronto from a small, one-stoplight town in New Brunswick last year. We had one where I used to live and coming here would remind me of home. Sometimes I still miss home and my friends but, a year later, I'm pretty much over it. Coming to Anne's has become a habit, however, and I find myself craving a French vanilla cappuccino every Sunday morning.

As I'm staring out the window at the busy street, I start to wonder what it would be like to live a life other than my own. I pick out a middle-aged man with salt-and-pepper hair and a bit of a beer belly walking briskly past the coffee shop window, probably on his way to work. I find myself trying to figure out what his life might be like. Is he married? Does he have kids? Where does he work exactly? I start to picture myself walking around in his shoes and ask myself if I'd be happy living a life such as this man's. Then, I pick out a teenage girl with gorgeous honey blonde hair tied up into a ponytail at the top of her head, and do the exact same thing. I wonder where she's going. I find myself doing this often, where I try to picture myself living somebody else's life. I find it so interesting that each and every person leads a completely different life than my own.

I snap back into reality and start to focus instead on the soothing music playing in the background of the shop as I finish my drink. After I take the last sip of my cappuccino, I set the cup down on the table and begin to get up to leave. As I grip the edge of the table to push out my chair, however, I feel my fingertips brush against something that feels like a piece of paper. I reach under the table and pull out a yellow post-it note. I sit back down in my chair and try to make out the messy handwriting written on the paper.

"And anytime you feel the pain, hey Jude, refrain. Don't carry the world upon your shoulders. For well you know that it's a fool who plays it cool by making his world a little colder."

I smile as I realize that written on this post-it note is my favourite Beatles song, Hey Jude.
I stand up once again and walk over to the counter.

"Hey, do you happen to have a pen that I could borrow?" I ask the barista who took my order earlier.

"Yes of course," she responds. The barista hands me a pen and I make my way back over to the table. I flip over the yellow post-it note and begin to write the following lyrics in the song;

"Hey Jude, don't let me down
You have found her, now go and get her
Remember to let her into your heart
Then you can start to make it better."

I smile as I place the note back on the underside of the table and hope that nobody will take it down before tomorrow.

As I swing the coffee shop door back open and step outside onto the busy street, I hear the chiming of that all-too-familiar bell, the scent of freshly ground coffee disappears, and all I'm left to think about is that insignificant, yet completely significant yellow post-it note.