Every writer’s toolbox can benefit from a bistro table and a latte. I call it ‘casting for characters’, and an urban cafe is a fertile range.

Photo by the author: Kevin S. Moul

Just beyond the window, a man leans on a malacca crook cane. The curved top of the walking stick scratched, a patina of the clash between the softwood and the thick silver ring that spins on his emaciated finger. His knee-length coat hangs open; it’s missing a button, and a flat cap compresses wiry gray hair.

The curve of his spine, almost doubled over, is interrupted by the upward tilt of his head. Eager for physical dignity, each step is an accomplishment. He smiles, unconcerned that he has no audience — or does he sense I am watching? His artificial white teeth push against thin lips.

Photo by the author: Kevin S. Moul

A young woman in skin-tight black Lululemon pants holds the door for him. She looks upon him kindly, but his smile falters. It requires a choice between making eye contact and concentrating on his balance.

Or do his eyes linger on her shapely legs and the curve of her figure? In his day, this would have been a scandalous outfit. Not the sort of girl you would take home. He may not have been that sort of boy either.

He declines her offer and steps back to let her pass.

The cane steadies him as his right hand slides into the slit pocket of his wool dress pants. There is a flash of silver as his fingers wrap around an object. I wish I had a camera to capture this anachronism playing out in front of me. A wizened old man in timeless clothing about to make a call.

I watch as he raises a thin silver cell phone. I imagine an even greater photo if his thumbs were splayed in the mudra of a person texting. If he were to make a cell phone call, the image would bridge eras and generations. The metaphor of aging deepens with the shapely young woman beside him.

He doesn’t glance down; the contours of the phone are familiar to his hand.

The tendon between his thumb and forefinger tightens, and a silver case flips open. It isn’t a phone. Instead of a screen and keyboard, pale white tissue paper cylinders line up in rows, a cigarette case. My anachronism is now just a man from another time.

I want to see if they are hand-rolled, the pride of a lifetime smoker, but then I catch sight of tightly pressed filter tips. I can visualize the dexterity required of his arthritic fingers to load the case. Unnecessary, but he cannot abandon the holder just because it is old.

Photo by the author: Kevin S. Moul

With his left hand, he places a cigarette against his lips, the cane rocking on his wrist. A careful choreography follows as he returns the case to his pocket, transfers the cane to the other hand, before reaching into a left vest pocket to produce a silver lighter. I can’t see it, but I know there is a callus on his thumb from pressing the coarse wheel that grinds against the flint.

With a deep inhale, his cheeks sink under the angular bones that cradle shadowed eye sockets, and the tip of the cigarette flares. Blue-gray smoke rises around him. A look of reproach from the sole patron on the patio softens as they identify the old man. It is the ‘grandfather clause’ in its most personal form. No one would deny his right to inhabit this space.

His pursed lips hold the cigarette; he wheezes like an engine warming up and begins a slow shuffle down the sidewalk and out of the frame but onto the page of my manuscript.

Additional essays and the original version of this post by Kevin S. Moul may be found at: https://medium.com/@kevinsmoul