Coffee

Coffee

The mess in the kitchen did not disturb him.  I filled one side of the sink with hot soapy water and dumped in the dirty dishes.  I turned on the coffee maker and the morning traffic report.  The highways were clogged.  Residual rain from last evening’s cascade interrupted people’s good judgment.  He never came home.

The coffee shop was a hot mess.  Bodies and cell phones, voices all speaking at once.  We squeezed our way to the back corner where there were no windows, no ventilation and hardly no room.  The vacant table had a sticky smear of cream and sugar.

“Are you filing?”

“We’re not married, Jackie.”

She looked at me as if shocked.

“I’m shocked.  You’re kidding, right?”

“Why are you shocked?”

“How did your family not make you get married?”

“When was the last time I was with my family, Jackie?”

“Oh.”

“How can you be shocked?  You knew.”

“No, I didn’t.”  She shook her head and stared.  “I just assumed you two had a quiet ceremony.”

“Yeah, that’s what we had.”

She leaned forward.  Her breath smelled like hazelnut creamer.  “How did he convince you to not get married?”

“He didn’t need to convince me; I talked him into it.”

Back in the day marriage was the foundational institution of a solid American family.  Men and women married to procreate and raise respectable citizens to populate the nation and contribute to society by paying taxes and by becoming a consumer.  The axis of a stable family nucleus revolved upon an enduring marriage.  Whether the union was good or bad doesn’t matter as long as it was stable.  

Grandma didn’t talk about Grandpa much.  I never noticed it until my preteen years.  Few pictures of him existed.  The best ones were displayed in frames on the mantle, but that was only two.  They had six children.  Uncle Charlie was divorced three times and on his fourth marriage when I graduated college.  Aunt Vanessa stayed married to the same man but criticized his table manners and snoring in public.  Mom and Dad were college sweethearts.  They supported each other until they began having kids.  Now they don’t do anything together.  

There’s a coffee house on the corner of 5th.  It’s bookish and old.  No Wi-Fi or mod light fixtures.  Wooden chairs were all they offered, but it’s quiet.  You could hear the percolator and the shuffling of feet, the pulling and pressing of knobs.  It’s my favorite place, but I try not to go there often.  For when I do I never wanted to leave.  I remembered the packed bag under the bed.

Grandma drank instant coffee.  Just enough powder to color her water a tepid brown.  She drank it because everybody else in her family drank it.  We sort of pushed her towards coffee.  She reluctantly complied.  

I poured a cup of coffee and added sugar.  Some people were more compliant than others.  I used to be.  Rarely was Grandma.  Like Jackie she would have been shocked, too.  The dish water lost its steam, and the bubbles fizzled.  Would it have been better the traditional way?  Would that have guaranteed we wouldn’t reach this crossroad?  

Grin it and bear it.  Does that mean it’s more noble to suffer in an unhappy marriage rather than finding your way out?  Was it less esteem-able to live happily with someone without a license compared to having a license and being miserable?  What determined marriage?  A signed document by a state official or your heart?  Are witnesses required to prove the existence and legality of your union?

We signed no document, and no one with a title signed ours.  Our hearts were in it when we came together.  I could leave, and I know that I will.  The coffee turned cold.  We met at the coffee house on the corner of 5th.  The barista gave me his drink and he mine.  I didn’t see it coming.  Grandma did and I so wanted to blame her.  

“What are you going to do?”

I stared at the cup in my hands.  I thought about this word for a long time.  I perused it and mulled over it.  I searched for other words but nothing seemed to do.  

“Quit.”