Starbucks Lovers

I get there early and snag a coveted corner table. No matter the day or time, this Starbucks is always hopping. I know because it’s a block from my son’s “play” group, designed for kids who are socially awkward. My son is 4 years-old. Apparently one of his developmental delays involves chatting up other children.

This particular morning there’s a bucket collecting dirty water dripping from the ceiling. It’s close to one of the chairs at my table. That will be his seat. I’m sitting with the wall to my back so I’ll know he isn’t looking at someone else over my shoulder.

He’s late. Fifteen minutes later than the fifteen minutes late he texted me. Never mind. I can nurse a mint tea for hours if I have to. A half hour is nothing.

He arrives slightly out of breath, his curly hair windblown. He looks good. We haven’t seen each other in 15 years. Our last phone conversation went something like this:

Him: I don’t know why you’re so upset.

Me: How could you marry someone else when you were just trying so hard to be with me?

Him: But you weren’t interested.

Me: F*ck you. I hate you and I never want to see you or hear your voice again!

Then I gratifyingly slam down the receiver. That was before everyone gave up their land lines.

I get up from my chair and he gives me a long hug. I’m taken a little off guard, but it feels good. He drops his knapsack (he still has a knapsack!) and gets in the coffee line. I sit back down with my tea and think about the first time I saw him.

We met at a party. I went with a girl from my acting class who assured me there would be plenty of “creative types” in attendance. I start to get a little nervous when we arrive at a dingy walk-up in Hell’s Kitchen.

The place is packed, frat house style with a keg in the kitchen, the ubiquitous red solo cups at the ready. This is definitely a male only roommate situation. I spy bare mattresses in bedrooms down a long hall, and a couple of sagging couches in what passes for a living room. Luckily I don’t have to use the bathroom.

For some reason I don’t run out screaming, “I’m too old for this sh*t!” Danny Glover style. I’ve been out of college for four whole years.

And then I see him. He’s on the short side in a T-shirt and jeans, maybe shorts. He’s got a Jew-fro and glasses. I’m smitten. Even the knowledge that this is his apartment doesn’t deter me. Well, his and four other guys.

We talk for five minutes, but I’m already hatching a plan to see him again. My acting school friend plans a dinner with some other people (in a restaurant, thank god!) and invites him. When he arrives my heart is thumping I’m so nervous.

We hit it off, and after dinner we pair up and go out for coffee with the others. He sloshes some in the saucer which leads to a hilarious, yet tragic story of the time he spilled boiling hot coffee in his lap while waiting to see a movie at The Angelika. I can’t help laughing when he describes the triage nurse’s panicked reaction after he limps his way to the Emergency Room at St. Vincent’s.

A few nights later I would find out for myself he made a full recovery.

It was a short lived affair. He chose to focus on an old college girlfriend to mask the pain of his father’s recent death. Still, I pined for him until he finally told me straight up that he didn’t want to see me anymore. Did he have to do it at 5 o’clock in the morning after we just had sex? Probably not. Sh*t happens.

He’s back with coffee and settles into his chair. I start off by telling him he looks good and I’m happy to see him. We chuckle over the last time we spoke on the phone. The years have smoothed out the pain.

We get started on the catching up. Some of it I already know from Facebook. We’ve been “Friends” for years, but it was only a couple of weeks ago that we got back in touch. He posted something about a restaurant near my apartment, and said he had moved into the neighborhood.

I’m married, he’s divorced, so I got my husband’s, and therapist’s okay before I sent a message asking him out for coffee. I was happily surprised by his response, “I’d love to.”

After some preliminary conversation we get to what’s really been going on in our lives:

Him: I’ve had several tragedies.

Me: What?

I’m not sure I’ve heard him right. Did he say “tragedies?”

Him: Yeah, a string of bad things happened. We had a fire and lost everything, C’s mother AND grandmother died months apart. We were close with the grandmother, the mother not so much. Then I had a bad bike accident and now my leg is held together by pins. I had a nervous break-down.

Finally, something I can relate to!

Me: So did I!

Him: I was in the psych ward.

Me: So was I! What hospital?

Okay, so we were in two different hospitals, but I’d heard his had a good program. The way he said nervous break-down made me think he was locked up for a while, but it was only a week.

Me: Yeah, I was there for 8 days. I just got really overwhelmed by my son’s special needs. It was a positive experience for me. I didn’t have to take care of anyone and all my needs were met…

He never elaborated on the nature of his nervous break-down and I didn’t ask. He was living with his girlfriend now, hence the new neighborhood, and she made him really happy.

I’m happily married, but I felt the old anger rising within me. WTF? He can get divorced, have all these terrible things happen to him, and then just leave it all behind for a shiny new relationship, in MY neighborhood?

Him: She’s a tenured professor; out of my league…

Me: I had a miscarriage during my five rounds of IVF. My husband lost his job right after our son was born, and it took him two years to find something else. My parents are old and slowly waiting for death, but I had a falling out with my mom so I don’t see them very often.

I feel this need to make him see I’ve had “tragedies” too, but I never thought of them in those terms. Crappy set-backs? Hell yeah; tragedies, no. They’re a part of me I can’t walk away from, even if I do joke with my husband that I’m leaving at least once a month.

Him: I’m really sorry to hear that.

Me: I’m doing fine now.

Him: I say this in a completely non-flirtations way; you look beautiful.

That makes up for things a little bit. We know it’s time to go and get back to our not-so-tragic lives. A couple greedily hovers over our table as we get ready to leave; putting on our winter gear.

Out on the street we hug good-bye and agree that it was nice seeing each other again. He walks toward the downtown train while I walk uptown to my apartment. I don’t turn around to watch him go.