sunday scrap.

Sunday. 12:15 PM. 92 degrees.

The sun feels palpable--like you'll reach your hand out from beneath the shade, and a molten ray of light will kiss your skin and leave you red with blisters. It's a different kind of heat that bites the back of your neck and hugs the inside of your pants, clinging to your trousers. Kisses you between the legs, leaving you damp, hot, and desperate for reprieve.

The apartment I share with a gay yoga teacher from Miami reeks of sweat (a culmination of both of us) and cat piss (a culmination of his tabbies, Evian and Eden, that conveniently miss the litter box each time). He works from home today (meditating for two hours in the living room), so I sneak past him.

I meander the seemingly empty streets of Greenpoint, heading to my favorite coffee cafe to escape the heat and piss from my apartment, only to embrace the heat and piss on the streets. I love it here. My father calls me to gripe about the politics of NY, beg me to come home, confirm (and reconfirm, to no avail) a date for him to visit, and sprinkle in a few more carps about how liberal my lovely sweaty city is.

I arrive at Basia, a Polish cafe with wall outlets, oat milk lattes, pierogies, and AC. Truly the dream. Alina, the elderly cafe owner, waves from the counter and motions for me to seat myself. I situate near a window, in direct space of the AC. A sea of quintessential Brooklyn people surround me, talking over their nonfat oat milk lattes.

I notice a man with a red Moleskine journal sitting across the cafe, intermittently glancing at me. I squint and see that his shirt reads in red embroidery: ‘all my exes live in williamsburg.’ I grimace, thinking about what he had to go through to create that shirt (it was obviously handmade), and decide to wear it in public.

He looks up at me, then down at my shoes. He pauses for a moment. My feet twitch in last season's loafers. He writes. He looks up again a moment later and swoops back down into his journal. His pen starts moving again. He's like a gopher, head bobbing up and down, studying me and writing down his findings. He’s intent on handwriting. I realize he’s writing about me.

Fine, I think. I can write about you, too.

He has no idea what I’m writing on my laptop here. He probably thinks I’m working, I’m studying, I’m writing. Surprise, surprise, buddy, you’re also going down in my journal.

I imagine he’s writing me down to cast me as another Brooklyn girl he can hate that probably reminds him of an ex. I’m not anything original–I’m sure I remind a lot of men of a girl they once loved and hate. I assimilated into the subculture here, flirting without completely crossing the line into hipster territory. I tote canvas bags, shop at thrift stores, and trim my bangs every Sunday night. I read Penguin Classics and attend yoga thrice a week. I write in coffee shops and attend poetry readings every Tuesday night. However, I secretly love pop music and reality TV, and, honestly, Zara. Don’t tell.

I'm admittedly insufferable to my core--but so is he.

He’s also very like everyone else. He has thick wire glasses and a folded Carhart beanie, a mustache grown and groomed and trimmed to frame his lips. He wears carefully cropped corduroys and the newest NB x ALD collab sneakers. I know him. I know a him. I know a few of him.

We’re in the same boat, you and I, sir. We’re both everyone combined. An amalgamation of what we wish we were but not quite are. We are nothing special.

He appears to be scribbling more intently now, his head bopping up and down, out of his journal and in my direction. I start to get mad. Couldn’t he have more couth about this? This is what he wants, I think, to get under my skin, to make me feel small, to make me feel how he wishes he could’ve made his ex feel. That’s why he’s so obviously handwriting in a journal and not using his notes app on his phone like a normal person.

He wants to get caught.

The caffeine from my latte gives me an intrepidness I don’t quite recognize but fall into with full force. Alina must've accidentally doubled the espresso shot as she so often does. I get up to approach him. My limbs are stinging with adrenaline. I cross the room, weaving between the wooden tables and chairs, a sea of me's and him's situated with their coffees, perogies, and laptops. I sit across from him, lacing my fingers on the table before me.

"Like what you see?"

His brows furrow—he looks at me, bemusement coloring his face. He's playing dumb. I whisper, slowly, tasting each word: "I can see you writing about me from across the room.”

His gaze softens. A slight smile pulls on his left cheek. He places his pen down–red ink? You monster. He chuckles. “Bit full of yourself, huh?”

My face heats--from anger? The caffeine? Damn, Alina. I scoff and grab his journal.

“Hey! Personal property,” he yells, all coolness vanishing, his body lightly lifting from his chair. He’s serious. So am I.

I look down.

“What the fuck is this?” Broken poetry lines are scattered across the page, doodles of pierogies with eyeballs and limbs filling the margins. One pierogi is holding a pickleball racquet. Another is smoking a cigarette. One is wearing heels.

“A poem. It’s sunny today, and I’m writing a poem about the day. I don’t even have my glasses, I can’t even see you from that far away. I was just looking outside.”

I look down again to read it. It’s bad. He rhymed bikes with hikes and coffee with ‘so free.’ I push it slowly back towards him, pat the cover closed, and walk back to my space.

He gathers his things, being sure to send a death glare at me every few seconds —unless he’s glaring out the window behind me, who can really know now?

He gets up and walks up to me as he’s about to leave.

“NOW I’m going to write about you.”

I smile to myself.