Small Places : Nick L Belardes [59 of 128]

• Not this place with its stone floors, beat-up couch, young folk mingling at tables and a couple of women in power suits firing up laptops.
• Heads turn as we enter. Katie looks powerful in her pink coat. Her hair is flaming red and her eyes green and oceany, very mysterious.
• We get blended mochas. She licks the cream off her straw and is up front with her intentions. "What is it with you and Mulani?" she asks.
• "Nothing." That's my equivalent of "I don't know." It's evasive and Katie sitting there in her big pink frillydilly knows it.
• Katie: "I see how she looks at you. I'm not dumb." Me: "I never said you were." Katie sighs. "You turned me down, you know." Me: "I know."
• I think again, then say, "It wasn't that I turned you down. It was just..." Katie shifts in her seat. "Oh God don't say it," she says.
• We're 20 minutes into our 15-minute coffee break. Me: "Say what?" Katie: "That you love her. I'm going to make her jealous you know."