Maria always came to the café at two o’clock on Thursday afternoons.
The table at the far end by the window. From the moment she first sat there, it had quietly become her place. She always ordered an Americano, no sugar. Ed the master never asked. He simply brought it.
She and her husband Thomas had started coming here together — more than twenty years ago now.
This was where they talked about getting married. Where she told him about their daughter. Where she learned he was sick. — From his own lips.
It has been three years since Thomas passed.
Maria still comes every Thursday at two o’clock. She gazes out at the people drifting by, takes a slow sip of her Americano. Each time, the chair across from her feels just slightly warm. She knows it’s her imagination. She has decided that’s all right.
That afternoon, when she settled into her usual seat, there was an unfamiliar young man sitting at a nearby table. He had a sketchbook open in front of him, drawing something. After a while, he noticed Maria and gave a small nod.
“Excuse me — may I draw you?”
She had no reason to say no. She nodded.
About ten minutes later, he quietly set a single sheet of paper on her table and left.
In the drawing: Maria sitting by the window, cup in hand — and across from her, the faint suggestion of a presence. Just an outline. A soft, lingering shape.
Maria looked at it for a long moment.
Ed came over and refilled her coffee without a word, then slipped away.
Outside the window, the young man was walking off toward the Marché, sketchbook tucked under his arm.
The afternoon in Sunny Side City moved on, slowly, as it always did.
