A Love Note - and a Confession

Hi,

So I guess it's time I came clean. I thought this last year and a half had put enough distance between us for me to be able to look at you objectively, for what you are, and smile formally and walk past you. I couldn't do it. One look at you and I knew I was a goner - like I'd always been with you. You'd known all along - right from that moment we'd parted...right from the moment, in fact, that we first met. I'd been the one pretending it was all over. Oh, who was I trying to fool anyway? You know, now, that you're my weakness, so I might as well tell you the truth.

Do you remember how it all began? I do, like it was yesterday. It was something new, just like my new job and new flat. Everything began together. I still remember walking into Barista on my third day at work, just before I left for home. That's when I first saw you. I remember hesitating before I walked up to you...

All I remember after that is how I sought you out whenever I could. On a good day when I felt sunny, on Mondays when the thought of the week stretching ahead left me blue, when I was confirmed after probation, every time I was low or exhausted or simply irritated with a boss who could do little else but find fault, you were the one I sought out. I'd come running into the coffeeshop and find you there, waiting. And I would smile. In you, I found something to smile for, something to cherish and dream about most of my waking hours. I found myself losing myself in your nature - such a beautiful blend of opposites. Crusty and business-like on the outside, you sometimes had me fooled even when I thought I'd got to know you reasonably well...but all doubts vanished when we sat under the stars and whiled away time before I had to go home. That was when I was reassured by how sweet and soft you have always been inside. You've always been nutty - but then it's who you are, and I wouldn't change anything about you for the world.

Which is why it was so difficult to say goodbye when I resigned after I was accepted into this school. I remember my eyes misting over as I beheld you one last time, allowed myself those last few minutes of happiness, that last delighted smile. We could meet again if I chose to...but I chose to end it there. The Barista outside the office was where it all began, and that was where it would all end. It made sense, I thought. It had been going on far too long. You had become an addiction...and you know how my defences are about addictions.

So I don't know why I stepped into the Barista on Bungalow Road this evening on a whim. It's been a year and a half, like I said, and I thought I'd gotten over you. I wasn't even expecting you there (although, on second thoughts, why shouldn't you be?). But there you were, sweet and warm and waiting, like always. That was it - there was no turning back. I stood at the door, transfixed, and I knew in a moment of epiphany that I had only been harbouring needless illusions all this time. I never really got over you. I don't think I can. So I walked up to where you were, and my eyes must have given me away, because the man behind the counter smiled politely and said, "Good evening, Ma'am. Would you like a brownie?"

Mr. Fudgee the Brownie, I love you. I always will.

Yours, always,

Crossworder

P.S.: I wish Barista had named you something else, though.