A table by the window
There was a small table by the café window, the kind that wobbles a little when you breathe too deeply. I found it on a late afternoon in the middle of a trip that had already blurred into train times and ticket stubs. The glass was clouded at the edges from years of fingertips and steam, and the light that slipped through it arrived softened, like it had read the room and decided to be gentle.
Outside, traffic hummed and shoes clicked past, but at that table the loudest sound was the slow clink of a spoon against a ceramic cup. Somewhere behind me, dishes were stacked, a radio murmured something half-understood, and a barista laughed the way people do when they are finally past the lunch rush. Time loosened its grip a little.
What I remember most is a tiny sugar packet someone had folded into a paper boat and left on the saucer. It served no purpose at all, except to say: someone else was here, and they were paying attention too. I turned it over in my fingers, then set it back, like a note I didn't quite know how to answer.
The place stays with me because nothing remarkable happened. I just sat there, at a wobbly table by a fogged-up window, and felt my life slow to a human pace. Little by little, that feels like enough.
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