Tim Hortons at Dusk

The Tim Hortons is quiet at this hour. The fluorescents hum, the coffee machines hiss. The air smells of new coffee, sugar glaze, and the wet wool of coats hung over chair backs.

The clerk is new. Her hands are still learning the machines. Paper cups whisper against each other as she separates them, and steam rises past her face, briefly clouding her glasses. She asks what I want in broken French. I answer in accented English.

The man beside me holds a 7 Jours, his fingers yellow with bad habits. The pages crackle whenever he shifts his grip. He smells of cigarettes and winter air, though it hasn't snowed yet. Coffee, magazine, no words, then out the door; the same routine at this hour every evening for a week. I know because I've been here for all of them.

A couple sits at the table by the window. Headlights smear across the glass, red and white sliding over their faces. They lean in, hands almost touching. Between them a doughnut nobody has touched, the icing dulling under the lights.

In French, je t'aime is a promise. In English, I love you is something you say to coworkers on the phone.

The clerk hands me my cup. Too hot, and the sleeve doesn't help. I thank her in French and she answers in English, and for a second we share the small embarrassment of getting it right in the wrong language.

The man leaves. His chair scrapes against the tile, louder than it should be, and cold comes in behind him, stirring the napkins in their metal holder. The couple stays. Their hands still aren't touching.

I sit where he sat. The coffee is bitter at first, then I remember to like it.

Rain begins to stipple the window, softening the city beyond it.