There was coffee at home. I want to make that clear.
There was a bag of beans in the cupboard, milk in the fridge, and a perfectly functional kettle. I just didn't want to make any of it. I wanted to put on a jacket, walk somewhere, and pay too much for a drink somebody else had prepared.
A modest ambition for a Saturday.
I left my apartment a little after ten. The forecast said cloudy, so I brought a canvas tote instead of an umbrella. This turned out to be a poor interpretation of the word cloudy. By the time I got to Kensington Market, the rain had graduated from tiny dots on the sidewalk to the kind that makes you wonder if your jacket was ever waterproof.
I ducked under an awning to wipe my glasses with the least wet corner of my shirt. The result was worse. Now I was looking through a combination of rain and shirt lint.
The café I had in mind was full. Not almost full; completely full. Every chair was occupied by a person, a laptop, or a tote bag the size of a small suitcase. I stood near the doorway long enough for everyone to know I wanted a seat and for nobody to develop a sudden desire to leave.
I ordered a coffee to go.
The person ahead of me had ordered four drinks and was describing a fifth with the level of precision normally reserved for construction permits. I had plenty of time to regret going out.
When my coffee finally arrived, the lid wasn't quite on. The first sip landed on my thumb. Not enough to burn, just enough to make me stand in the doorway inspecting my hand like something medically significant had happened.
Outside, the rain got heavier.
A few shops down, a secondhand bookstore had its door propped open. I went in for shelter and because browsing books is an activity that allows you to look busy without knowing what you're doing.
There was a handwritten sign asking people to leave wet umbrellas by the door. I didn't have one. For once, my lack of planning caused no inconvenience to anyone but me.
The shop smelled like old paper and somebody's lunch. A radio played quietly behind the counter. The owner was trying to untangle a roll of receipt paper while telling a customer that, yes, the price sticker really was the price. I wandered toward a shelf of cookbooks.
I don't cook enough to justify owning many cookbooks. I do, however, enjoy the confidence of people who wrote them before anyone could comment underneath their recipes.
One book had a photograph of a very serious-looking chicken on the cover. Inside, someone had written notes in pencil. Next to a soup recipe: More lemon. Beside a casserole: Don't bother. On page eighty-three, simply: NO.
I stood there laughing at a stranger's extremely specific disappointment.
The book cost five dollars. I bought it, mostly because I wanted to see what had happened on page eighty-three. The owner put it in a paper bag and warned me that the bag wasn't going to survive the rain.
“Neither am I,” I said.
He nodded as though this was the correct answer.
I waited another ten minutes under the awning. A cyclist rode by slowly, one hand on the handlebars and the other trying to keep the hood of their raincoat from blowing back. A woman across the street inspected the sky, made a decision, and stepped into the rain with no umbrella at all. I admired her confidence for about three seconds, until a bus sent a little wave of water toward the curb.
Eventually I gave up waiting and walked home. The coffee was lukewarm. One corner of the paper bag had turned soft, so I carried the book under my jacket and looked, I imagine, as if I were smuggling a hardback novel.
My roommate was in the kitchen when I got back.
“Good coffee?” she asked.
“Fine.”
“What's under your jacket?”
“A cookbook.”
“You went out for coffee and bought a cookbook?”
“Technically, I bought both.”
I showed her the penciled notes. She wanted to know what was on page eighty-three. It was a recipe for baked tomatoes with a long list of ingredients and an alarming amount of gelatin. We agreed the anonymous reviewer had a point.
The book is still on the kitchen table. I've read more of the margin notes than the recipes. My roommate has drawn a little arrow next to one of them and added, in pencil: Needs cheese.
We haven't cooked anything from it.
I probably need to go grocery shopping tomorrow. If it rains, I'm taking an umbrella.