The café sits just off the main road,
camouflaged by time and biscuits.
No sign out front, unless you count
the leaning Coke machine
and the F-250 parked like a weary sentinel.
(It still runs. Don’t ask how.)
Inside:
booth vinyl cracked like riverbeds,
sugar shakers with a halo of mystery dust,
and a speaker that plays country music
filtered through what might be a sock.
The old man’s plate arrives hot and full.
He didn’t order it. Didn’t pay.
Just raises his mug like it’s a prayer
he’s said so many times,
it no longer needs words.
Another elder creaks past—walker, oxygen tank,
eyes sharp as rusted nails.
The mountain woman,
blissfully incorrect,
calls out,
“Don’t go runnin’ nobody down now!”
laughing before the sentence lands,
already on to squirrels.
They spin, she says—whee!—
on her bird feeder carousel,
built to outsmart them,
which of course it never does.
The waitress—name tag faded to Li—
talks about her cruise to St. Martin,
where the water’s irresponsibly blue
and nothing smells like breakfast.
Rain starts whispering against the glass.
Just enough to remind you
there’s a world out there.
Just enough to make you
not want it.
The meal arrives like ritual:
gravy like a sermon,
bacon stacked with architectural intent,
eggs—two—blinking once
before vanishing for good.
The old world sits quiet in the corner,
behind a copy of last week’s paper,
watching everyone forget
to be in a hurry.
No one's pretending.
No one's trying.
And if you're lucky,
someone buys your breakfast
before you even know you’re hungry.