“Hello,” he greeted, smiling brightly.

“Hi,” she replied smiling back.

What could she have done? She was sitting at a coffee shop for more than two hours. She had already spent more than she anticipated to spend on cappuccinos. Her schedule was quite constant and probably predictable.

If she was not attending school, church, out with friends or buried in her bed; she’d spend the day sitting at a coffee shop with her eye mortared on a book.

That day, a guy with blue eyes, a pleasant cologne smell engulfing him, with spectacles and a beard came to greet her. He was carrying two cups of her favourite coffee, cappuccino.

“Your cup is empty,” he said handing over to her a cup of hot cappuccino. She already had three empty cups on top of her table.

“Is this how you ask to sit with me?” She jokingly asked.

“Ahm, yes. You’ve been sitting here for more than two hours, I concluded you’re not waiting for anyone.”

“You can sit. I’m quite sure serial killers don’t buy coffee for girls,” they both laughed at that.

“You’re reading The Alchemist?”

“For the third time. Yes.”

“So it is your favourite book?” He asked whilst taking his phone out of his pocket.

“Yes,” she answered, “it’s my favourite book. Is it yours?”

He showed her several emails from Paulo Coelho, the author of the book.

“Dude, really?! You’re literally having a conversation with my favourite author.”

They both had something in common, something very dear to the both of them. They both enjoyed the long conversation until the shop was closing. It wasn’t only reading books they had in common, they both were weird teenagers who delighted in jazz. They had already exchanged phone numbers to furthermore extend their talk.

They kept the lines of communication open and often met up at the coffee shop to chat.

“‘When love finds you, it will come like the greatest Asian monsoon, it will overwhelm you, like a hot summer’s day, it will thrill you, but above all this, it will give you life.’ That’s what my grandfather used to tell my father and my mother gave him precisely that,” said Brian looking at Anita.

It was three months after they first met at a coffee shop and this was one of their planned meetings.

“What you just said makes this feel like a date now.”

Anita was more like a tortoise, he couldn’t decipher her thoughts and intentions and couldn’t say whether she liked him or not. However, he was certain she loved coffee and books more than him.

“Your spot is clean lovebirds,” the manager had said when they entered the coffee shop.

Brian silently crept into Anita’s schedule and overtook her day. That day, Anita was listening to Brian’s voice as he read her a book. They spent the entire afternoon until darkness surpassed light.

***

Tell us: Do you think Anita loves Brian?