1 Degree
I'd ordered a latte, but the barista steams the milk too long, and it ends up mostly foam.
"If you want to wait for the foam to go down," she says, "I'll add more. Unless you don't like a lot of milk."
"That's fine," I say. I don't want to piss her off. She used to be mean (so mean, in fact, that I assumed she had to be the owner) but now she seems to like me. Her lattes are always awful, but I tip her anyway. She reminds my of my high school English teacher.
Every table is occupied. I don't wan't to ask someone if I can share, so I end up sitting outside. It is cold and dark. Only the smokers and socially inept are desperate enough to brave the cold.
I decide to wait to see if Ben will show up, as he said he might. We'd shared lunch this afternoon and told each other about some of the bad things in our lives.
Next to me a Hungarian and a Serb talk about how they came to the United States.
"I was officer in army," the Serb says. "During the war — you know about the civil war? — I was ordered to kill Croat family. The Croats, they attack our village but we are strong, we survive. Now they tell me to kill Croats, but I do not. Next day I am in concentration camp. I work with International Red Cross after the war and they bring me here."
I remember a line from Lermontov about a fatalistic Serb. "Он был спокойно и холодно. Он был хабр." He was calm and cold. He was brave." He is later killed by two drunk Cossacks.
"My family left Hungary in 1957 after the Soviets came," the Hungarian says. He speaks without an accent. "Do you know Hungary?"
"Yes, it is beautiful country. I have been to Budapest. On Danube it has 26 bridges."
"Europe is not like here," the Hungarian muses. "If they don't like you, they'll kill you."
"Maybe it is not so different here," says the Serb.
By now the foam in my latte has fallen, leaving a half glass of burnt espresso and rapidly cooling milk. The saucer is already cold. Inside my jacket my cell vibrates. My mom is calling from Denver.
"Are you OK?" she asks. "I was worried about the road. I don't know why I get so paranoid about my children."
We talk about the snow for a bit and then say goodbye.
The Serb and the Hungarian have gone inside, leaving behind a barista in shirt-sleeves and a beautiful woman in a fur-lined coat. They both have cigarettes in hand.
"It's so fucking cold," the barista says. The woman just nods.
"I forgot what winter is like," he sighs. "I always forget what winter is like."
"I try to forget," she offers.
She walks over to the trash bin and tosses her unfinished cigarette in. "It's too cold for this," she says and walks inside.
The barista nods in agreement. After one last deep drag, he throws his cigarette into a snow bank and gets back to work, leaving me alone outside.
I watch a post-Suburban monstrosity with a Bush-Cheney '04 sticker attempt to parallel park in the snow. It rams the car behind it. A grey-haired man jumps out of the monstrosity and motions for the driver (his wife?) to guide the car in place. She gets out and they walk down the street.
There is a clock on the building across the street. I stare at it for a while and imagine I can see the hands slowly moving. I decide to wait fifteen more minutes for Ben and then start the drive back up the mountain.
I leave after only five.