It's Just Coffee Jake Richards Logos staff writer My pulse is pounding so hard that I feel it in my throat. My hands tingle like they’re asleep, except the feeling is on crack. It feels like needles are line dancing over my digits. I try to gulp down some air and it hurts. My face turns to a sneer as the frog in my throat does a backflip. My tingling fingers are wrapped around my steering wheel as I coast down the busy street that immediately borders my house.

Oh, man. I am in so much trouble. I just keep driving. I need to get a grip. Breathe—wait—that didn’t work. Count, that’s right, let’s count.

One, and I know this isn’t working.
Two, and I know that I need to turn or I’ll pass my house.
Three, and I know I’m impeding traffic.
Four, and I know those sirens are for me.
Five, and I realize I hit the curb when I pulled over.
Six, and I think of making a break for it.
Seven, and I know it wouldn’t work.
Eight, and I unlock my door thinking it is the window switch.
Nine, and I see him bend down to meet my eyeline.
Ten, and I know I have to lie really well right now.

I mean, I have to. If I get a ticket, I’m gonna be in huge trouble. My parents already don’t want to pay my insurance because of my last accident. It wasn’t even my fault. I got rear-ended on the freeway. Ah, shit, here he is. The officer taps the window with the end of a flashlight. After I push the right switch and the window goes down I blurt, “What’s with the flashlight?” Here it is sunny and clear on a warm spring afternoon. “Never you mind that, sir,” he says with a scowl. He uses the flashlight to gesture towards my glove box. “Sir, would you please retrieve your license and registration?”

I pull my license out of my wallet and my registration out of the center console with a smirk. In my glove box I have a pillow for when I am too early or late to my destination, not my registration.
“Sir, have you been drinking this afternoon?”
“Nothing except water, sir,” I say innocently.
“Sir, please cut the theatrics,” he says peering over his mirrored glasses.
“Oh, right, I’m sorry, sir.” I look at his shiny boots. They look authoritative.
“Are you mocking me, sir?” the cop asks while his motorcycle helmet accidentally hits my car door.
“No, sir, I would never mock a man of your boots—I, umm, mean authority sir.” I look straight forward with both hands on the wheel at ten and a quarter to three.
“Sir, why were you driving so slowly?” he asks before mumbling into his radio.
“Slow.”
“Excuse me?” he asks.
“You mean slow. Slowly would mean that I myself was moving slowly as I was in the act of driving. Driving slow would refer to my speed.”
I sense he is officially at the end of his patience and I unleash. “I’m sorry, it’s just, it’s just that I just…”
I put my head in my hands and push my pinky fingers in my eyes. I pull my freshly reddened eyes open and start gasping. “My Granny May died last week, sir.”

I can see by his expression that, by his standards, I should be good and over it by now.
“She’s dead and buried and no one told me until I called her at the home this morning.” I start belting out in moans as I slam my forehead into my horn.
As the officer jumps he says “Well, I am sorry, sir, do you need medical assistance?”
“What? She’s the one who died!” I say letting some spit fall from my lips. “Poor Granny May,” I say with a hand gesture that reminds me of Jesus. “She was just walking her dog when, when. . .” I stammer and sob again. “It’s okay, sir, I am, uh, listening.”
“Shit!” I think. I was expecting him to let me leave it there. Since he wants more I decide to let it roll.

My words turn into stampeding wildebeests and my mouth is the edge of the cliff.
They all fall like Chicken Little’s sky.

“When her dog pulled her in front of a. . .a street sweep,” I say, proud of my ingenuity. “See, she had menopause and she didn’t sleep all too well and, and, oh, god.” I add a pause for dramatic effect. “She was mutilated. She was spun like a rag doll. Wrenched this way!” I say swaying to my right. “Then this way!” I say swaying to the left. The officer steps back because I nearly head-butt him. He does have a helmet.
“And that damn dog!” I say thinking of this coworker of mine who I can’t stand. “Always yapping.” I let out a harsh grunt. “That damn dog killed my Granny May, and it got away!” I say thinking about my co-worker’s promotion. “It was so small it just shot out!” I let out a grunt and I think that the Charles Schultz estate could sue me for stealing Charlie Brown’s “ARGGHH!”
“Sir, I am willing to let you off with a warning if you promise me that you’ll find yourself a safe place

off of the road to properly cope with what you’ve experienced before you drive again.”
“I, I, I suppose that’s a good idea,” I say with a weak sniffle. “I live right by here, sir.”
”Do you need me to escort you sir?” he says, cocking one eyebrow above the other.
“No, sir, I can make do” I say like the little cowboy getting back on his horse. “Thank you, though,” I say. “ It would have been a shame if something happened.”
“You’re right,” he says looking at me like I’ve made sense for the first time.

As he gets back on his steel stallion I put my hands over my face to hide my gleeful giggling. I wish I had the patience to count to 16. That’s how many times we said sir. I don’t know why I counted. I think it was to measure the time. Like counting Mississippis or maybe like pretentious rock bands “A oney and a twoey and a threey, let’s go!”

Why is starting the hardest part of the song? The daunting wailing guitar solo doesn’t faze the strung-out guitarist. It’s just getting things in motion. Oh no, setting things in motion. I can’t.

As he speeds away he bleeps the siren twice. I stop and wonder were they to say “Psy-cho,” or “Get f---ed?” Whichever, I am now officially suave and debonair. Now I can get back to- oh god!

Eleven, and I know I need to go home. I arch my back. It soothes the muscles that are tired from shaking and hunching at the same time. I pull out into traffic and hope that some irresponsible oaf will tear through my tiny car like a bit of wet tissue paper. Then I wouldn’t have to worry about it.

How could I let this happen? I mean I’m the nice guy. I didn’t try to do this. Did I? I mean it’s not like I killed anyone. I won’t go to prison for this, will I? I don’t want that at all. Obvious, right? I try to shrug off the whole thing. But suddenly I feel what I suspect robot bees would feel like bouncing in my brain.

Oh, no.
Devastation.
I like someone else.

See, me and my lady have been together for, well long enough for me to be unconcerned with how long. I have always been faithful. I have always been kind, polite, loving, sexual. I’ve never failed as a boyfriend. The problem is I met a girl in line for coffee who I used to like in high school, but who had a boyfriend. She told me that he split and I thought to myself, “What a wonderful world!” So she and I go out to coffee. The safe date. The justifiable date.

“It’s just coffee,” I can say. There is no baggage with it, just ground beans and hot water. I buy, which makes absolutely no sense. She has gift certificates to the place. But I pay. No big deal. I am just a nice guy. It’s only money. It doesn’t mean anything.

I smile the whole time. I use cute little banter. I build trust. I think of how trustworthy I am. But it’s only coffee. It’s just coffee.

I stretch conversation from words to dialogue, from dialogue into time, into minutes, into whole hours. The time is tangible. It is so loaded with this nostalgic attraction that I could literally fold the moments and put them in my pocket. When it’s all over I walk her to her car. I shove my hands deep into my pockets. Not to hide an erection or anything. It’s to keep my hand from clasping hers. That would be bad. No, it’s just me helping her get to her car. It’d just be. It’d just be great.

She thinks about other people. Like when we screw. But I don’t know if it’s in a like way. Oh, god, why am I saying like? Am I in middle school? Well, it isn’t love, is it? No, it isn’t. Yet. Wait, no, I can’t think like that. I am the good boy!

So here I am driving around my block for the third time because I’ve missed my house each time because I’m so deep in thought. Am I happy in my relationship? Those flaws of hers, what are they again? Are they enough to break things off? I still love her? Right? It makes sense doesn’t it? I mean, it’s not that I am displeased, I am just not as pleased as I could be. But is this a rough patch or is it going to get better? But what if it doesn’t and I miss my chance again? What if it is and I, well, ruin it?

It was just seeing her again. It was just seeing her smile. It was just her laugh. That’s all. It wasn’t like, it was nostalgia. Y’know, a lot of divorced couples get together later in life. Is this my later? We were never even together. I just liked her a lot and watched her a bunch. Not in a bad way, though, don’t worry. It was just seeing an old friend. It was just the same as if I’d seen a guy friend. It was just, well—it was just coffee. Is it really all that bad that I like her? Yes. I’m not a whore. I am a good person. Well, kinda. I don’t like listening to people so I don’t do it all that often I just count.
One, and I don’t care.
Two, and I don’t care.
Three, and I still don’t care.
Four, and I think to myself I could double over and say I have an ulcer.
Five, and I just lie and try to leave.
Six, and they walk with me.
Seven, and I feel my hands twitch.
Eight, and I wonder how bad prison really is.
Nine, and I decide it’s not worth it.
Ten, and I’m done being polite.

“I’m sorry, I’d like to listen but I just don’t care. Toodles.”

I need to speed up. People are starting to honk and the sound is blocking my voice out. Oh my, did I just say that out loud or in my head? How is it I can do that but I feel bad for my attraction? I am the monogamous guy. I am the guy who gets cheated on. I am the nice boy who nobody suspects of anything. I am too nice to hate them.

Oh god, if this gets out I’m screwed. Then people will think I am bad. I’m not bad, am I? Well, yeah, I’m bad, but it’s secret. It is switched parking tickets so mine gets paid and theirs gets, well, not.

What am I gonna do, man? You tell me. Who are you? Why are you here? Are you in my head or are you, like tangible? Tell me! Jesus, don’t just sit there. Or stand there. Wait, are you Jesus? I bet you’d like to think so. I need medication. A prescription strong enough to make me devoid of emotion and complication, and convert me into an automaton robot of, yeah.

No. Now I am bad, and crazy. This is bad. Now I feel myself rocking back and forth. My bottom lip starts to tremble. “Oh man,” I think. “I am gonna be in so much trouble.”

I jerk forward like I’m possessed by a burning eagle. My head hits the roof of my car but my hands stay at the wheel. The mechanical bull is getting revenge. My spine arches, and then whips forward. My steering wheel turns into one big pillow. It burns my hands. Has that taste of blood always been there? Why was I going 15 in a 40? Why is the burning gone? Why don’t I feel anything? Is my body just asleep?
It was just an accident.
It was just pain.
It was just life.
It was just coffee.