Transparent Tuesdays

Issue 238

You guys,

I didn’t know much about her. So when I emailed and asked if there was a coffee shop she preferred and she mentioned we could go to her house instead, I responded, “Let’s go to the coffee shop!” just in case she was a serial killer.

We’d met two weeks before—she the cashier and I the customer. Just before entering the Hallmark store I bent down and looked at my toddlers and said, in my most upbeat voice because this was supposed to be an exciting after-school excursion, “Remember, you can’t touch anything unless you ask first and I say it’s okay.” 

We walked through the propped open door and I gasped. I do that a lot around my kids. I gasp at things I wouldn’t otherwise gasp at and follow it with an exclamation point—“Guys look, pumpkins!” “Wow, look at those balloons!” “Can you believe they have puzzles here?!” But today I gasped for myself, because even though it was late September the store was filled with Christmas.

I led them single file down the narrow aisle with Santa figurines lining the shelves. Some were resin, sturdy, while others looked made of glass and I held my breath as I kept tabs on George’s tiny, destructive fingers. We slowly made our way to the back corner of the store, where rolls of wrapping paper stood in rows. I needed it for Sam’s birthday and Dad’s retirement. I stared at my options, held the rolls in my hands. George got restless—he wanted to “hold something.” Then Layla wanted to hold something, too. Whether I needed two rolls or not—black with gold, thin lines for Dad and light blue with shimmery confetti for Sam, I don’t know, but each kid carried a roll and then we were on our way, the rolls twice their size as we walked, and I had to keep reminding them to not bang them into things.

I planned to bypass checkout and lead the kids to the front corner of the store where I saw Christmas tree ornaments hanging along the wall, but the woman behind the counter stopped us. She had a big smile, short, wavy, silver hair, and a certain command about her, like Judy Dench or a wise witch. She said hello to me and then directed her attention to the kids. They froze in place, and I did, too. There was something about the way in which she spoke that made us all listen. “Can I take those for you?” she asked them. The kids nodded and handed over the wrapping paper. 

“Thank you,” I said, ever aware of modeling manners. “We were going to keep browsing and take a look at the Christmas ornaments.” 

The woman leaned forward. “They can touch anything,” she whispered loudly, as if her comment was for me but she wanted the kids to hear, too. “If there’s a button, they can press it.” We left her with our wrapping paper and headed to the Christmas corner, where there were, indeed, lots of buttons to be pressed, and we did, indeed, press all of them. 

We eventually meandered back to the checkout counter and the woman rang up our order. She introduced herself to the kids. “I’m Charly,” she said. “I’m Charlie, too,” I told her. The topic of names led us to origins and Charly mentioned she was adopted. I couldn’t hide my delight at this, and Charly tilted her head. 

“Are you adopted?” she asked. 

“No,” I said, cursing myself for my lack of a poker face. “I’ve just always been fascinated by people who were adopted—their stories, their experience.” Charly leaned slightly forward, secretive. “We ARE fascinating,” she said. 

Now we sat across from each other at the coffee shop a few blocks from her house, drinking lattes she insisted on paying for—vanilla with 2% milk for her, pumpkin spice with whole milk for me—and she said she was an actor. She’d been acting most of her life and told me a recent story that took place at the local theater in town. One day Charly was backstage complimenting the costume designer, showing her appreciation for her talent and skill, when the woman said, “Charly, if you ever want to learn how to sew I’d be happy to teach you.” 

Charly smiled at her and said, “Honey, that’s sweet, but I’m on stage. If it ain’t in front of people watching I ain’t doin’ it.” 

I told Charly about my lifelong desire to be famous, how I shied away from it for years but now I was leaning in. She told me about her chance to perform on Broadway when she was eighteen years old. I told her I’ve been writing under a pseudonym for four and half years. She told me she took an expository writing class at Harvard and her daughter refers to that time as, “the sixteen weeks my mom cried every night.” I told her my biggest fear is looking stupid. She told me her biggest fear is being stupid. It was at this point I became aware that our conversation could be heard by other people in the coffee shop, and I suggested we go back to her house.

It was an old small house, with an old screen door, and upon entering my eyes were drawn up to built-in shelves full of books. On a table against the wall were more piles of books. The walls were covered with framed pictures of what I decided were historical artifacts passed down through her family tree. And there were little trinkets everywhere, most notably crocheted pumpkins with stems made of cinnamon sticks—her first ever Etsy purchase, she said.  

There was never a break in conversation, never a lull. We sat on her big comfy couch surrounded by books and she pointed to her mostly full latte and my empty one. “This is how I know I’ve been talking too much,” she said. “I’m going to say one more thing and then I’m going to shut up and let you talk.” 

It had been over two hours when I finally said goodbye. This was so fun, I said. It was lovely, she said. We should do it again, I said. We should do lunch at the house next time, she said. 

After we purchased the wrapping paper we said goodbye to Charly and left the store, but the kids didn’t want to go home so we walked hand in hand down the street, past more shops but none as fun as the one we were just in, and when I told them it was time to go home and George said he didn’t want to, I suggested we go back. 

We stood again at the wall of Christmas ornaments and Charly approached. I showed her George’s favorite—a Santa at the airport with a reindeer sitting on a suitcase as it goes around a luggage carousel. Charly turned to George and asked his favorite place he ever traveled to. “Hawaii,” he said. 

“You’ve been to Hawaii?” she said, then looked at me as she spoke again to George. “What does your dad do for a living?” 

Before I could answer Layla was speaking and Charly was bending down to hear her. “And my favorite is Puerto Rico,” Layla said. 

Charly stood up straight. “Puerto Rico!” she said, then turned to me. “Okay now I really need to know what you and your husband do.”

I told Charly the short answers—Sam’s an investor and I’m a writer. Her eyes widened. “You’re a writer? I love writers. And writing. And reading. And words… I work at a rare old book shop in town.” 

My eyes widened. “You work at a rare old book shop?” I told her I was on the hunt for rare memoirs, if she thought they carried any. She couldn’t think of any off the top of her head, but said, “Hold on,” and walked back to the register. She returned with a business card with her name and email on it. 

It was a friendship meet-cute; the first scene in our very own Hallmark Christmas movie. 

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Until next week,

Charlie