Missed Connections

**

You, the Toasted Coconut donut that was sitting on the windowsill of Dough in Bed Stuy. Me, the silly, naive girl walking out of the shop with only a coffee in hand because I swore that today was “diet day.” I couldn’t help but look back at you, my emotions all glazed and confused, but even though I wanted you, I had to keep my word. The cashier made it worse. “They’re all new,” she sang. “Made just this morning.”

Of course I was tempted, but I’m leaving it up to fate: if you’re still in that windowsill tomorrow morning, I’ll take a chance and break my promise.

**

L Train. Manhattan bound. I was sitting next to a couple who was arguing about whether or not they should have bought that “stupid chair that looks like a robot” from IKEA.

At this exact moment I had the greatest idea ever dreamed up in the history of a brain, perfect for the short story that I had to submit for my creative writing class in exactly two hours. My unreliable iPhone battery bailed on me so I couldn’t write the stroke of brilliance down. As Murphy’s old school Law would have it, my pen was out of ink. As soon as I got out of the L to transfer to the R, I got distracted by a band playing on the subway platform and just as quickly as it had appeared, the idea was gone. Poof.

Where are you? Will we meet again? Please come back.

**

You were the boy in Paris that all my friends from home said I was bound to meet abroad. I was lost, and as if on cue in some indie rom com, you appeared — tripping clumsily — right in front of me. We laughed, then talked, then walked. You walked me for thirty minutes to the restaurant where I would meet my friends. I asked if you wanted to join us, but as soon as you saw them drinking and laughing and carrying on, you wavered.

“Um, I don’t think so,” you said. “They look a bit…untamed.”

If I ever get to see you again, I would address your pungent body odor and call you a dick.

Written by Jessica Jacolbe

Image of Marilyn Monroe shot by Michael Ochs in New York, 1955