Pug Hill by Alison Pace Page A

think about it, for Columbus Bakery. To be so disorganized and stressful and chaotic that your very existence can make a Manhattan Starbucks seem peaceful, even serene? I imagine though that the Columbus Bakery people, clearly an oblivious lot if ever there was one, do not care about things like this.
    Serenity though, just like solace, can be quite fragile. It’s a lesson I seem to be learning and learning again a lot lately. As I approach the counter, in the instant that I make eye contact with the Starbucks person, I get so confused I’m not sure what it is that I want. I just don’t know and, on top of that, I have forgotten what everything means.
    Is it a grande that I want or a venti ? And then, just like that, regardless of what I’ve been telling myself all morning, regardless of what I’ve been telling myself for all the months leading up to this morning, I miss Evan. Or maybe I just think that I miss him, but, really, I don’t know what the difference is. As my eyes start to sting, I think, maybe not for the first time, that I am insane. I tell myself that I don’t really miss Evan, that I’m just really bad at change. I forge ahead, I order a tall coffee, and a moment later, when it is handed over to me, it looks so small.
    “Can I have a large coffee?” I say. “Please,” I add on hastily, because the Starbucks person, the barrista (I think barrista is what they’re supposed to be called) does not look pleased.
    “You ordered a tall,” she tells me. She points this out in such a way that I do not feel she is inclined, on her own, to simply pour the small coffee into a larger cup and then add some more. Yes, of course the obvious here is that I suggest this to her, but there is, I fear, the looming possibility of a horrible, “that’s wasting a cup” scene, or something along those lines.
    I stare for a moment at the small coffee in front of me. Starbucks is such a ubiquitous part of normal city life, and I’ve just completely missed it. It’s like working at a place where there are conference rooms and water coolers and clients, where coworkers go out at night for drinks together. It is everything that is normal and everyday about living and working in New York, and I, for the life of me right now, just don’t get it. I don’t want, after everything else, to be a Starbucks cliché. And this might already be obvious, but to tell you the truth, I have a small (tall?) problem with confrontation.
    Instead of anything else, I look up and say, “Okay, then, could I please have another tall, too?” and I kid you not, the Starbucks person, the barrista , she rolls her eyes at me, just like Evan. I wonder if maybe it’s all so I don’t get too overwhelmed with things so suddenly being so different. I wonder if it’s all just so I feel a little bit like nothing has really changed. It occurs to me that lately I have been spending a lot of time wanting to believe that everything is a sign. It also occurs to me that, like it or not, I don’t think the world actually works that way.
    “Thank you,” I say, at the arrival of my second coffee. I walk away, two coffees in hand. I stop at the coffee preparation station, add Splenda, skim milk, twice; I look at my watch and I don’t have that much time. I hurry out the door, hurry across Central Park, double-fisting coffee and hoping a little bit against hope that there might be some pugs.

    There’s one. One pug on her own. I see her owner out of the corner of my eye. He’s this guy I recognize from other times; he’s got these bright white Tretorns on every single time I see him. It always makes me wonder: where do you even find Tretorns these days? It’s not like I wouldn’t like a pair for myself. But more than that, I wonder if this guy has like a million pairs of Tretorns at home, and does he wear a new pair each time he comes to Pug Hill? Or does he just have one pair and wash them after every wearing? And, most importantly, does it never