Today he orders a second coffee.

He has never done that. Usually he drinks his espresso, stays twenty minutes, leaves.

Today he stays.

I bring the second, set it down. “Thank you,” he says, and then, after a pause: “Today I have time.”

I nod. “Nice.” And I mean it.

He opens his book. Doesn’t read. His eyes rest on the pages, drift now and then toward the counter.

Toward me? Or just into the room?

I don’t look. If I did, and he did too — what then?

So I stay with the machines, polish cups already clean, wait for him to leave.

But something in me counts the minutes and hopes that he stays.

written with Miran & Emil Lichtrand