SQN - Sine Qua Non - Issue Two - Journal - Page 102
SINE QUA NON
and somehow it seemed wrong to just throw it out.
Then, one night, you walk down to The Lambrose Diner where the coffee is bad and
the tuna melt is amazing for an amazing tuna melt and a bad cup of coffee. That’s when you
see the girl. Not the girl who walked out. Not the girl with the backpack full of belongings
and the trail of debilitating debt left in her wake like the detritus of storm-crushed Carnival
Cruise. The other girl. The girl.
The part of you that studied philosophy a long time ago starts to compose sentences
about the archetype of girl, about the whole Platonic Girl Ideal, although the ideas you have
about this girl are not wholly platonic. She sits with a man and she smiles when she talks, so
you try not to stare, but that is not easy. That is not easy at all.
She wears those boots that women wear, the ones that come up above the calf but not
quite to the knee, the ones that make you think of Amelia Earhardt and, for no reason that
you have been able to figure out despite discussing it in therapy, of Louise DelMacher from
third grade who came very close to kissing you in the cloak room before the bell rang and she
ran back out to the class. She also has a fingerless glove on one hand, like the ones hackers
wear in refrigerated rooms full of bleeding-edge computers in movies from the late nineties;
she doesn’t wear the one glove to be quirky. She does it because she’s taken off the other one
and set it aside so she can wrap her bare hand around her coffee cup. But the unintentional
quirkiness is better than any intentional quirkiness could possibly have been anyway.
What the man looks like doesn’t matter. She matters. Only she matters. With hair the
exact color of perfect girl hair. She sips her coffee and her lips squeeze in as she swallows and
then widen into a smile. Her eyes almost catch yours before you go back to not seeming as
though you’re staring, but when you glance back it seems as though she might be not seeming
as though she’s staring at you just as much. It might be a flickering projection of your film-fed
imagination. She might actually not be staring at you, but the more you think about it, the
more it seems as though she might be not seeming as though she’s staring at you intentionally.
She is beautiful. She is too beautiful. She is much too beautiful.
You can only eavesdrop in moments when the sound dies down in the diner, but from
what you can gather, she something, something, something, forty-three pages in and then she
had trouble finding a something. Also, the something has been making a funny noise but she
doesn’t know anyone who knows how to fix those. You wonder if those are something you
might know how to fix. You turn sadly inward for a moment, realizing just how short that
particular list is likely to be. You wonder if she’s forty-three pages into reading or into writing
something. You wonder if she’s trying not to look as though she’s staring at you right now as
you look at your coffee, trying not to look as though you’re staring at her.
Eventually you are out of tuna melt and have had too much coffee. You get up and walk
home in the chill night air. You notice on the way that you are cold and wonder if that can
be an indication that something important is happening or has just happened or is about to
happen. Then you realize three things. Thing one is that you have left your jacket at the diner.
Thing two is that you do not want to be perceived as forgetful or bumbling by this beautiful
girl-haired girl whom you have begun to think of as the girl. Thing three is that you have not
turned around to retrieve the jacket because you would rather walk home cold and lose a
favored article of clothing than risk having her perceive you as forgetful or bumbling.
You get home and you will not realize until later that you do not ask the stick in a vase
how you’re feeling. You know exactly how you’re feeling. You’re feeling chilled from the night
air, but a little sweaty nonetheless. You’re feeling excited and intrigued and beguiled. You’re
feeling jittery, although you suspect that’s from all the coffee, and you’re feeling a little bit
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