After the two guests leave the
cafe
she feels light. Rather than smiling faces and hungry attentions she is greeted by empty cups with
beet stains
and
coffee stains
at the bottom.
Imogen Howe
doesn't enjoy having random people from her old life crawling into her current one. Which is odd because she does like having random people she's never met appear. That's why she likes hosting events.
But when someone she's known shows up, it stresses her. She feels like she's holding two people's thoughts inside her one head. It grows too much for her. But she can't just tell people to fuck off can she?
This time around her guest was just a friend of a friend. So it wasn't so bad. They were on a
roadtrip
. Looked like a the kind of couple where the two are together mostly because they wouldn't know what else to do at this given moment of their lives... but they weren't meant to last. That kind of thing. What kind of phase of life is that? Is there a name? These are her thoughts as she notices the stains at the bottom of her cups. She takes them to the kitchen and rinses them under semi warm water before placing them into the dishwasher.
Anyways, a couple. Roadtripping through the country. Her cafe being interesting enough that they want to stop by. She doesn't know what
Jeannie Hammond
told them but it must've been a good story to whet their appetites. Imogen wonders what could've been the sell but gives up wondering after admitting that it was probably not that they found her interesting that they stopped by but that they were so bored driving across highway horizon after horizon.
She had driven across the country before. You started losing track of the feeling that you were even in a car anymore and you became something else. Took the automobile going 80 miles an hour for granted and the open highways became like a room you spent your days in.
"Wow a road trip across the country?" her coworker Mikayla was much more enthusiastic about the idea of driving across this continent. She was romantic about it.
'Hey! Maybe you and I should go on a roadtrip ourselves?"
Imogen smiled to that. She didn't think that was such a bad idea. Not that she was suddenly changing her mind on roadtrips inherently but she thought it would be nice to get away and do something with her coworker and soon to be roommate.
"Where would you want to go?"
"You know, everybody wants to go to
California
. But I'm kind of boring. I'd want to just go around these small towns and stay at these local Bed and Breakfasts."
"That's not a bad idea. California is very far away."
"But don't you think that would be boring?"
"No. Would you?"
"No."
"Then why do you keep calling it boring?"
"That's just what I figured other people would think if you told them you were stopping by XXX,
Indiana
and whatnot."
"Well, I wouldn't think that's boring." Would be a lot cheaper too Imogen thought. They hadn't made concrete plans but she was already looking forward to this trip. She was also looking forward to them moving in together next month.
"Are you excited to live together?" Mikayla had a way of always asking what was on Imogen's mind. Such questions felt more difficult to respond to. She always felt like she was giving canned replies, but they weren't.