I Wish I'd Seen the Cover

I’m at the coffee shop near my Jersey City home, first thing Saturday morning after putting my sheets in at the washer at the laundromat a block away. Old-school JC is nowhere to be seen here. Balthazar pastries compete with locally designed cup sleeves for my attention. Five-dollar coffee once seemed to have no place in my neighborhood, but this thriving shop opened the year I bought the house, and has since expanded to other branches.

There are two Jersey City police officers in the coffee shop this morning. Their squad car is outside and they are on break. They sit two tables apart. One stares absentmindedly at his phone, his thumb occasionally brushing the screen. The other is deeply engaged in a hardcover book, something with a scarlet dust jacket. He’s halfway through. His wrists peek out of his uniform sleeves, and they are covered in tattoos, something dramatic, flowerly, professional.

As I wait for my large oat latté, a family of three sits between the two cops. Bored cop tilts his head to stare out the window, THAT stare evident, you know the one where you’re trying hard to not eavesdrop but it’s really hard as the conversation is going on a foot away.

The tattooed cop keeps reading, deeply engrossed in his book.