Page 75 of Latte Girl
I wasn’t planning on it, but now that you mention it, a change of scenery might do me some good. If I have to look at one more Pinterest board today I think I mightjustsnap.
I pack up my computer and take it with me over to the cafe. I still have a few more hours to put in today, but my creative juices are severely depleted and need to be replenished bycaffeine.
I think about Matt the Tinder Guy’s words of wisdom as I ride the bus. I hadn’t seen my turning him down as ‘refusing to settle’ but I realize now that it’s kindoftrue.
I don’t want the cardboard cut-out version of Mr. Right. I don’t want to go into a relationship with a checklist and choose to be with someone just because I can tick off every box. I want something that shatters every formula and algorithm, something that works even though it doesn’t make sense. If nothing else, my time with Jordan has left me with impossibly high standards even he himself ended up being unabletofill.
Luckyme.
The bus pulls up at my stop and I cross the street over to Cuppa Joe. This part of the city has evergreen boughs decorated with big red bows attached to all the streetlamps. Strings of white and green lights hang between them. Mina and Mel have gotten into the holiday spirit too, and the windows of Cuppa Joe are filled withpoinsettias.
There’s a large white sign set up among all the red flowers, and as I get closer I try to make out what the black lettering says, figuring it must be some kind of festive message or a new promotion. When I finally get near enough to read the words, I stop dead in my tracks in the middle of thesidewalk.
They’re instructions, and they’re for me: ‘Hailey,scanthis.’
Underneath is aQRcode.
I peer past the sign into the cafe, expecting to find Mel standing there laughing, ready to explain whatever joke this is, but I can’t see anyone. Stepping back, I look around the street. There’s nothing here butthesign.
I shift my purse around and pull my phone out with the caution of someone being held at gunpoint. After scanning the code, I’m brought to a blank webpage with a few sentencesoftext.
Just wanted to make sure you had a QR code scanner. This could have ended up being really anticlimactic if not. Come inside. There’s something else for youtosee.
I feel as dazed as if I’ve just woken up from a coma. Part of me wonders if I might even beina coma. Everything has the shifting uncertainty of a dreamrightnow.
I pull open the cafe door and hesitate in the doorway. The entire store is empty. There isn’t even anyone at the counter. I step inside, feeling like the sole survivor of an apocalypse. My footsteps echo over the soft sound of some female folk singer coming from the stereo systemoverhead.
“H—Hello?” Ifalter.
That’s when I notice the second sign, propped up on one of thetables.
‘Hailey, scan this too,’ it reads, with an arrow pointing down at anotherQRcode.
Seeing as it’s the only clue I’ve got as to what the hell is going on, I do what the sign says. A new webpage opens up. This one is almost as empty as the first, except that instead of a few sentences, there’s an outline of a box with a few puzzle piecesunderneathit.
A little bouncing arrow points to one of the pieces. I tap my finger down on it, and another arrow pops up pointing inside the box. Getting the idea, I drag the puzzle piece upwards and it snaps into place in the left-hand corner of the box. A pop-up appears on thescreen.
I think people’s lives are like puzzles, it reads.You’re born with all these pieces and a vague picture in your head about what you’re supposed to do with them. Then you spend the next several decades trying to fit them alltogether.
The pop-up fades and an arrow points to another puzzle piece. I drag it up to the box and a second messageappears.
Most people have to work the puzzle out on their own, cramming pieces where they don’t fit and hunting around for the corners and edges, all while trying to create that perfect picture they’ve got in their mind. Sometimes you get stuck. Sometimes the final image looks nothing like how you imagined it in the beginning. I know I sound like a motivational poster right now, but I kind of think that’s what life is all about: trial and error, figuring things out foryourself.
I continue putting puzzle pieces into place, reading through the pop-ups as they start to tell a story that makes my chest tighten and my hands shake as I clutch myphone.
My own life didn’t go quite like that. I wasn’t building the picture in my head; I was building the picture in my dad’s. Every piece I was handed already had a carefully assigned place. There was no risk. There were no mistakes. I did well in school. I got into a good university. I continued to do wellthere.
Sometimes I dreamed about making my own path, about smashing all those pieces up into dust and starting from scratch, but there was always something that stopped me: my mom. Since I was a kid, my mom has had problems with her blood pressure and her heart. She’s been dangerously sick a few times and needs to have a very stable life. I was always told that following my parents’ plan for me was important for keeping herhealthy.
I realize now how insane it is to tell a little kid that he has to study for his test or his mom will end up in the hospital, but after being told time and time again that I had to make her happy if I wanted to keep her safe, I believed it. Sometimes I wasn’t even allowed to see her if my father decided it would make her upset. During the time I did get to spend with her, she was frail but caring in a way my dad never was, and I loved her more thananything.
I never really got a lot of chances to be creative growing up. Everything I had to do was already planned out. When I went away for school I had a lot more freedom. I realized how much I liked technology and design. I just couldn’t get enough of it. The control my father had over me wasn’t as strong anymore. So far away from everything I’d left behind, his threats about my mother’s health didn’t seem to beasreal.
I had new puzzle pieces now, ones that didn’t fit in the picture I was building. I decided it was finally time to build my own. I turned my back on my dad. I left everything behind, and for the two semesters I spent at design school, everything was fine. It was better than fine. I was finally doing something for myself. My father was furious and I was sure I’d disappointed my mother, but despite that, her health was the same as ever. As long as she was okay, there was nothing my dad could do to make me changemymind.
Then I got a call. My mom had had a stroke and her life was on the line. I flew back to see her that night. She was unconscious the entire time, but I sat and held her hand for hours. I tried to stop myself from believing it was all my fault, but the guilt crushed me. I still feel it every day. When it became clear she’d recover to at least some extent, my father had her moved to a private recovery centre. He hasn’t let me see her. I’m still not sure where she is. He said the only way to ensure she got better was to keep her away from me, and that the only chance I had at seeing her again was to come work for the company and fulfill the plans my parents always hadforme.
So I did it. I took every piece he gave me and I put them intoplace.
