Stanley's Grandmother

Short Fiction by Denise McCabe

He was sitting outside the Starbuck’s with his friend when I parked my car to go to the cleaners. He gave me a wide smile, full of white teeth and deep dimples, and I smiled back, thinking I must know him somehow, but how could I have forgotten such a face? I kept my cool and took care of my dry cleaning, and then on a whim, decided to stay and have a flat white.

“You came back,” he said.

“I did.”

I went inside to order my drink and when I glanced out the window, he was talking to his friend, his back to me.  He looked Israeli or maybe Iranian. Dark curly hair, swarthy skin, dark eyes. The dimple was sort of an anomaly, but it made him much more interesting.

It was a full five minutes before my drink was ready and I was nervous that he would be gone by the time I got outside but he was there, and he looked up when he saw me. That dimple drawing me again.

He patted the seat between him and his friend.

“We got an extra seat here,” he said, and his voice was pure New York.