Our hero Stephan leaned forward in his leather jacket and rested his elbows on the counter. From his lips dangled a fancy cigarette, half-smoked. The girl behind the soda fountain would be back any moment now to refill his coffee, and he had the composition ready.

An old man laughed loudly somewhere behind the soda fountain, causing Stephan's heart to pitch with sudden fear. How long had he been at this- writing sly love poems to unknown women... bearing his soul to the nearest beautiful face? What compelled him so? It had grown into a strange obsession. Perhaps he should stop himself this time; but it was too late now, she rounded the corner and, fixed on his cup, came forward with the coffee pot. Stephan looked down while she poured and his hand trembled as he raised the cigarette to his lips. She noticed.

"You sure you need more?"

stephan coughed.

"Yeah... I need it to stop the shaking."

"Oh."

"Do you have a moment? This is for you." He slid the poem across the counter top toward her. She looked him dead in the eye with a look of suprise-always surprise. Time passed.

"I wrote it for you... it's a poem,..." Stephan continued, because she was speechless.

"It's just a poem, it won't bite or anything. Stephan was not used to such long pauses and began to become flustered. His cigarette shook on the way to his lips.

"I know what it is," she began, "I've already read it... I read it the last few times I poured your coffee, only, I guess you didn't notice," she paused, "I didn't realize it was for me.

This was new for Stephan, who was usually a step ahead at this point. But somehow she had gotten a step ahead of him. What should he say? What should he say!? Should he say something? He opened his mouth.

"I'll take it." she said, and snatching the sheet, marched off behind the soda fountain. But she had left the coffee pot in front of him, and she returned smiling in embarrassment.

Stehan was embarrassed with her. He was used to this sort of embarrassment, after all- it came with his obsession. Stephan loved an embarrassed look on a woman's face. It was a tiny revelation of her; and the huge gratification for him. This was the small piece of heaven that Stephan's obsession was all about. It was relief, the affirmation he worked for- the flush in the cheek, the slight waver in composure.

"You forgot the pot." he uttered weirdly, as he realized the obviously ridiculous nature of the statement. But she laughed.

"So I did!" she exclaimed, grasping the handle.

Stephan wanted to ask, "do you like it, the poem, I mean?", but he was spellbound by her beauty and the thought of asking such a question made him feel foolish and boyish.

She stopped and looked at him and calmly read his mind.

"Yes. I like it. Thank you." she waited a moment, "where did you learn to write?"

"Places like this I guess. He nodded himself, "Yeah, places like this one."

She laughed, and he left feeling bewildered; but she smiled and waved to him on his way out the door and he had a rise of hope in his gut. He doubted if he would ever come back. It was all too perfect. No one can make a decent sequel to what is perfect! How could you follow that up? No, he should let perfection remain sealed in time, a perfect memory. But he began to wonder: what was her name?...

He turned on his headlights and pulled the ancient Pontiac back into the stream of night traffic. A mile down the interstate he began to work at his jeans' front pocket, where his pack of cigarettes were. By contorting his body into a bizarre position, which increased the pressure on the gas pedal, He managed to wrestle the package free. He fired one up and drifted the car onto the exit ramp.

Back inside his dreary apartment, Stephan shed his clothes and began the usual self- harassment that followed his obsessive episodes. "Why didn't you do this, say that, smile then, ask her that, etc..." He did not know how many silly notes he had written- how many absurd poems or letters written to women in all sorts of odd locations. He did know that there had been many, too many to count, anyway. He tired of this tired regurgitation and soon wound up lying on the floor trying to focus on whatever emotion his mind wandered toward.

He could hear a couple talking on the street below. They were laughing and speaking in French. Stephan associated the France with smoking and cigarettes-among other things-and picked up his box of Gitanes. As he held the pack over his head, attempting to let one cigarette slide out and fall into his mouth, he abruptly stopped. Everything, in fact, stopped. The couple outside stopped, there was a lull in the night traffic, and he could no longer hear the ticking of the clock. Then it all started up again, but Stephan's eyes stayed riveted to the cigarette case. On it was written: Lisaveta 381-7526