most original piece of Magick I’ve ever read. I would love to have mochas with Stephanie while harassing strangers in parks when we are both senior citizens.
An award-winning speechwriter, competitive performer and actor, Stephanie studied and interned as an assistant teacher at the Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute in New York City. While she lived in New York, Stephanie also worked professionally in two Off-Broadway plays. Stephanie has been writing fiction professionally since 2011.
Stephanie Writt’s inspiration for this story was born from the potential of an empty chair. “I love the idea of a person alone at a café table. What stranger could sit down at their table and change that person’s life, their world, forever? And why and how? (chuckles) Makes me want a mint hot chocolate and a blueberry scone every time I think about it.”
Geriatric Magic
Stephanie Writt
To drink coffee from a straw meant the first step in a downward spiral of social self-degradation. To treat a well-brewed, quality beverage in such a way, well, blasphemy. Insulting. As the consumer, embarrassment to the very core. Of course, if my damn hands would stop shaking long enough to take a sip without giving myself, my table, and the entire outdoor café a dark roast shower, then I would not have to lower myself in such a way.
Praise be that spring had returned to my city. The winter compounded my already growing list of aches and hurts. Sunlight, golden liquid relief, shone down between our city towers, past window and ledge, past worker and homemaker, between tree branch and budding leaf, down to set my white tablecloth to glow and my body pains to ease.
Table size square pools of white light edged the sidewalk, fenced in with a knee high border of wrought iron and tasteful potted plants to protect the café patrons from the riff-raff that wondered aimlessly through the park. Anyone entering the café located in Central Park, New York City in our grand country of the United States, must first pass through the gatekeeper. A pleasant hostess to redirect those who did not belong back into the world. Standards, everyone should have them. Standards kept the world from falling into chaos.
So, when the pretty hostess (Jacqueline, even the names are of higher quality here) led me to my usual table, edged closest to the park side on the outside pavilion, to see my table rose had lost petals, thin velvet wafers the color of fresh blood, well…to say disappointment would be an understatement. A wilted flower allowed to remain on one of their tables? A lowering of standards. Quite devastating.
Of course, they did allow me to drink my coffee through a straw, so I did not immediately seek out a new venue. Near ten years of patronage in my retirement years alone. If anything, I felt a desire to assist. However, once I had decided to lend my said assistance, the morning rustle bustle had poor Jacqueline hopping, and, by my usual request, I had been left alone once coffee (violated by straw) had been delivered.
The wilted flower looked at me. Like me. Once beautiful in its prime, now a withered remnant, a stain on the world to be swept away once the chance arose. Melancholy and morose a picture, yes, but I call a stone a stone. An old man an old man. And a wilted flower…well, sad.
My finger shook violently as I reached out to touch the last few petals that clung to a stem that drooped in a tired curve. All expectation lent to the final petals scattering on the table by my destructive shake. I hoped I would not knock the thin clear vase over, spilling water on the pristine white tablecloth. But I wanted to feel the soft pure velvet of a petal, the last vestige of its youth and life. The fallen petals lay too close to the base of the vase to grasp without surely knocking the vase over.
A steadiless reach, and I touched the petals. Which moved. I thought by my touch, which tingled with a pull sensation I had never felt before. But
An award-winning speechwriter, competitive performer and actor, Stephanie studied and interned as an assistant teacher at the Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute in New York City. While she lived in New York, Stephanie also worked professionally in two Off-Broadway plays. Stephanie has been writing fiction professionally since 2011.
Stephanie Writt’s inspiration for this story was born from the potential of an empty chair. “I love the idea of a person alone at a café table. What stranger could sit down at their table and change that person’s life, their world, forever? And why and how? (chuckles) Makes me want a mint hot chocolate and a blueberry scone every time I think about it.”
Geriatric Magic
Stephanie Writt
To drink coffee from a straw meant the first step in a downward spiral of social self-degradation. To treat a well-brewed, quality beverage in such a way, well, blasphemy. Insulting. As the consumer, embarrassment to the very core. Of course, if my damn hands would stop shaking long enough to take a sip without giving myself, my table, and the entire outdoor café a dark roast shower, then I would not have to lower myself in such a way.
Praise be that spring had returned to my city. The winter compounded my already growing list of aches and hurts. Sunlight, golden liquid relief, shone down between our city towers, past window and ledge, past worker and homemaker, between tree branch and budding leaf, down to set my white tablecloth to glow and my body pains to ease.
Table size square pools of white light edged the sidewalk, fenced in with a knee high border of wrought iron and tasteful potted plants to protect the café patrons from the riff-raff that wondered aimlessly through the park. Anyone entering the café located in Central Park, New York City in our grand country of the United States, must first pass through the gatekeeper. A pleasant hostess to redirect those who did not belong back into the world. Standards, everyone should have them. Standards kept the world from falling into chaos.
So, when the pretty hostess (Jacqueline, even the names are of higher quality here) led me to my usual table, edged closest to the park side on the outside pavilion, to see my table rose had lost petals, thin velvet wafers the color of fresh blood, well…to say disappointment would be an understatement. A wilted flower allowed to remain on one of their tables? A lowering of standards. Quite devastating.
Of course, they did allow me to drink my coffee through a straw, so I did not immediately seek out a new venue. Near ten years of patronage in my retirement years alone. If anything, I felt a desire to assist. However, once I had decided to lend my said assistance, the morning rustle bustle had poor Jacqueline hopping, and, by my usual request, I had been left alone once coffee (violated by straw) had been delivered.
The wilted flower looked at me. Like me. Once beautiful in its prime, now a withered remnant, a stain on the world to be swept away once the chance arose. Melancholy and morose a picture, yes, but I call a stone a stone. An old man an old man. And a wilted flower…well, sad.
My finger shook violently as I reached out to touch the last few petals that clung to a stem that drooped in a tired curve. All expectation lent to the final petals scattering on the table by my destructive shake. I hoped I would not knock the thin clear vase over, spilling water on the pristine white tablecloth. But I wanted to feel the soft pure velvet of a petal, the last vestige of its youth and life. The fallen petals lay too close to the base of the vase to grasp without surely knocking the vase over.
A steadiless reach, and I touched the petals. Which moved. I thought by my touch, which tingled with a pull sensation I had never felt before. But
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