It was entirely possible, if not probable, that Sheena had gone crackers. She crumpled and smoothed-out her crossword puzzles with alarming regularity (a double-digit run in the five minutes I watched her, high teens), her lips pursed then stretched into a wide grin, pursed then stretched, a lasso of pinprick age-lines evident in the former, lipstick- and coffeee-stained chompers in the latter. She gurgled too, Sheena did, emitted an off-putting blend of groans and deep-diaphragm burps at intervals that synchronized exactly with a pair of wiggling rat-trap eyebrows; it was a routine that seemed ignorantly suggestive, a strange intestinal rumblings-as-seduction gambit as ill-mannered as it was hypnotic.
She was a foul creature, certainly: a shiny sash the colour of beef’s blood wrapped her neck like a noose, its tint imbuing the capillaries of her cheeks like a creeping infection; four haphazard yellow pendants of questionable quality had been hastily affixed to the front flap of her misaligned overcoat that recalled a mislaid brick wall or, when she slouched, a post-earthquake Easter Island; miniature shards of mangled bandages dotted her prematurely-withered hand-backs, some buckling over thin veins, others hiding in creases, others still lifting at the corners like ancient linoleum tiles. Sheena was indeed repellent… but there was more to it, to her, than that. I found myself strangely attracted to her, pulled unconsciously into her orbit of non-sexual allure, an anti-libidinous sensation that flirted with my curiosity, teased my wonder, and aroused in me a priapism of interest.
I waved the coffee-boy down and demanded a refill. This was a token gesture, of course, as I was sated already, drinking in the almond-flavoured cappuccino of Sheena’s nuttiness, another coffee but a necessary indulgence for me to retain my spot across from her. He was a demented sot, the coffee-boy was, a pean to mouth-breathing idiocy and dyslexic aggression. His face was one drawn with malice, shaded with cretinism, digitally-enhanced with acne-scarred cheeks, ever-widening pores, and singular incidents of ear-hair grown to inappropriate lengths. He was a gawker, too, an imbecile staring like a lobotomized cow, his bottom lip hanging so low that he kicked it as he walked. Finally, though malignantly, he stood over me.
'Coffee, please?' I asked, looking cautiously into his vacant eyes. It was unclear whether he was aware of the uuuuuuhhhhhhh escaping from his throat, but he seemed angry regardless. I tapped the mug with my finger, indicating its fairly-obvious emptiness, but he only glanced at the mug and continued boring into me with his fantastic stupidity. I peeked past him at Sheena, sweet Sheena, and found her stabbing her crossword puzzle with a fork, raining upon it the triple-tined blows of a dull utensil, and it then became imperative that I get my coffee ordered before that grasping free hand of hers took hold of another destructive implement, for I wanted to miss nothing.
'Glugh,' said the moron coffee-boy, frowning. I tapped the mug again, craning my neck to maintain eye-contact with Sheena‘s doings. 'Coffee,' I repeated. 'Would you get a me another cup, please?' My voice had taken on a drastic quality, plaintive, and though I had steeled myself in anticipation of this encounter, his hovering idiocy was making me dizzy.
'Unuther coffee?' he asked, and I watched his eyes cross from the effort. I nodded and began to shoo him with a flick of my wrist, anxiously waving him away until I was plainly slapping him in the belly with the back of my hand. 'Move!' I said, as Sheena yanked a butter knife from the table with astonishing alacrity, half-standing and hefting the blade above her head, poised to strike. She hollered, an eeeeeeeeyyyyaaaaaaaahhh that contrasted mightily with her docile body language, and plunged her knife into… what? I wasn’t sure, for just as Sheena reached the apex of her insanity the coffee-boy slumped his weight one foot to the other, fatally blocking my view. I stood and shoved the stupor-addled coffee-boy aside, desperate for a glimpse of the action, but all I caught was the aftermath: a plate rattling seemingly of its own volition, a single-serving sugar-packet split down the middle, and placid Sheena staring fixedly at her footwear, a shoe that had somehow made its way onto the table.
Devastated, my chin fell against my chest and I fell back into my chair. My eyes despondently surveyed Sheena for some clue as to what I had missed, but they did so only half-heartedly: the most exhilarating aspect of Sheena’s lunacy was the immediacy of it, and the world of difference between seeing her go batshit and having it recounted was the chasm between joy and pain. I looked to the brain-dead coffee-boy, still slumped where I had shoved him, and I tapped my mug again sadly.
'For the love of all that is holy,' I said, quietly, 'would you please go fetch me a refill?'
Unexpectedly, inconceivably, miraculously he turned without rancour and ambled off in the general direction of the coffee pots, dragging his impotence behind him like a leashed glow worm. That he didn’t take my mug with him was inconsequential, as my unobstructed view of Sheena attempting to touch her elbows together more than made up for any lack of coffee. I sighed, and a smile hijacked my lips as she tied her tabletop shoelaces into a latticework of doilies, bent spoons and her own hair before leaning back to admire her work despite having braided it to her head.
I looked from Sheena attempting to put her foot in the shoe inextricably intertwined in her bangs to the coffee-boy chatting with a stack of plates behind the counter, and my optimism returned. 'Nragh,' said the knuckleheaded coffee-boy, and the plates agreed silently, as did I with a contented nod. Nragh indeed, nutty, nutty coffee-house; nragh indeed.
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