After we made love early on that cold Saturday morning, I went into the well decorated kitchen and made her a cup of instant coffee. Juliet did not own a regular drip coffee percolator. It was not about her inability to afford a fifteen dollar Mr. Coffee machine. It had something to do with those two semesters that she spent out on the western coast of Portugal. There, she came to view American coffee as dull and absent of flavor and where she came to appreciate the elation of instant coffee.
Such was Juliet. From head to toe, her skin shined of irony. It took me a while to find the sugar. Juliet took her coffee with two tall teaspoons of unprocessed organic brown sugar. Juliet took her coffee without milk. She was trying to avoid those unnecessary calories.
Finally, I found it hidden behind the tall bottle of Kosher salt. Juliet’s cabinet was full of food and yet, I could find nothing to eat for breakfast. I made myself a cup of instant as well and came back to bedroom holding on to two green ceramic mugs that displayed foreign letters on their sides.
“You are such a sweetheart,” She said, “You really did not have to bother. I would have eventually gotten out of bed and made you some coffee.”
But she did not and therefore I did.
“Did you put two sugars in my coffee?” she asked.
“Yes, I did.”
“Did you find the organic brown sugar?”
“Yes, I did.”
“David, you are such a sweetie, I can just eat you up alive.” She smiled. The magnificence of her olive oiled skinned unfolded from within her sheets as she warmly readjusted her body in my direction.
How I ever finagled my way into the heaven of her thighs must have somehow involved some sort of divine intervention since I was in no way worthy of such fortune.
“Tell me David, do you agree with David Hume’s assessment that the very supposition that the future resembles the past, is not founded on arguments of any kind, but rather, is derived entirely from habit?” Juliet was the worst kind of a woman for someone like me. She was truly gorgeous and at the same time genuinely intellectual. What she found in a philistine such as myself was beyond me.
I tried to hide my ignorant shame and resorted to a long mindless sip from her green mug. The sweetness of the brown sugar provided me with childish reassurance. I took to adolescent strategies. “I don’t know, what do you think?” I replied.
While she presented her well developed analysis of the multidimensional correlation between reality and one’s own assertion of what reality is, I thought about the last thing that Juliet whispered in my ears seconds before she shivered in climax.
While I was not familiar with David Hume, Emmanuelle Kant and many other of the names that Juliet liked to discuss, I was quit familiar with the female cliterous and with Juliet’s in particular. A man had to choose his area of expertise. I chose the physical over the cerebral.
I picked myself up from the bed and headed towards the balcony where I lit a morning’s cigarette. A cold winter air roamed threw the side streets of my city and warmed me up with its sense of familiarity. From the other room, I could hear Juliet as she was singing along with the radio.
Minutes later she announced that she wanted me to take her out for brunch. She was in the mood for poached eggs and bacon. I had thirteen dollars and sixty eight cents in my pocket and thus argued that I was not particularly in the mood for eggs. We ended up at that same bagel place where one could get a full ledged breakfast for under five dollars.
When we walked into the place, Juliet was thrilled to run into her friend Denis from her interpretive acting seminar. While the two of them engaged in thespian dialogue, I excused myself towards the city street where I would purchase another pack of smokes.
Surveying those fashion magazine covers, I noticed dozens of beautiful women who were smiling at me in synchronization.
All of the women looked way too perfect to be walking amongst us all.
They all carried that cold persona of careful consideration and financial ambition.
And no man of my low status was worthy of their company and no man of my low status was worthy of their flesh.
And yet, earlier on that Saturday morning, she wrapped her teeth around the tender lobe of my ear and in pure ecstasy she whispered, “promise me that you will not finish until I am completely done.”
And so, I did not.
In every large ocean, one small wave rides my name.
In every sky there is a star that shines in my direction.
In every forest there is a single tree that knows my story.
In this small and lonely world, I found my Juliet. David Hume may have been right about the past and he may have been wrong when it came to the future. But such matters were of no consequence to me. The present was all I knew and it essence was captured in her smile.
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