The café sat between a laundromat and a half-finished condo building, easy to miss if you weren't looking for it. Its sign was modest hand-painted letters slightly faded by the sun and the glass windows were usually fogged from the clash of Manila heat and overworked air-conditioning. Inside, it smelled like ground coffee beans and rain-damp paper.
Mara liked it that way.
She chose the same table every afternoon the small one by the window, just far enough from the counter to avoid the noise, close enough to watch people come and go. Her laptop was open in front of her, cursor blinking on a half-written sentence that had been unfinished for days. She sighed and leaned back, fingers wrapped around her mug.
"Okay," she murmured to herself. "One paragraph. Kaya mo 'to."
The café was quiet in the way she liked not silent, but soft. The low hum of conversations. The occasional clink of ceramic. The barista humming under her breath while wiping down the counter. Outside, jeepneys passed in bursts of color and noise, but in here, time moved slower.
Mara had been coming here for almost a year. It was the only place where her thoughts felt less crowded. At home, her mind was full of expectations unfinished drafts, unanswered emails, relatives asking when she'd finally publish something "real." Here, she could just be a woman with a laptop and a cup of coffee, trying to turn thoughts into words.
She typed a sentence. Deleted it. Typed another.
Across the room, someone pushed the door open.
The bell above it rang softly.
Ethan paused just inside, as if taking a breath before stepping fully in. The café was familiar now the uneven wooden floor, the chalkboard menu with its neat handwriting, the corner shelf stacked with donated books. He nodded at the barista, who greeted him with a cheerful, "Hi! Usual?"
"Yes, please," he replied, smiling.
He waited by the counter, backpack slung over one shoulder, eyes drifting around the room out of habit. He liked noticing things how spaces felt, how people occupied them. It was something he'd picked up from years of reading. Stories had taught him that details mattered.
That's when he noticed her.
She was seated by the window, hair tied loosely, strands falling into her face as she stared at her screen with intense concentration. There was a notebook beside her laptop, its pages worn and folded, filled with handwriting too small for him to read from here. She looked familiar.
Not personally. Just in the way characters sometimes did like someone he might've read about before.
Ethan looked away when the barista handed him his coffee.
"Salamat," he said carefully, still practicing.
She grinned. "You're getting better."
He laughed under his breath and moved toward his usual table, two seats away from the window. Close enough to read, far enough not to intrude. He pulled out a book from his bag, one with a minimalist cover and an author name he didn't recognize.
He liked books like that. Stories that hadn't been polished smooth by popularity yet. Writers still brave enough to try something different.
Mara glanced up at the sound of a chair scraping lightly against the floor. Her eyes flicked toward him for just a second before she looked away again, heart doing a small, unexpected stutter.
He was back.
She didn't know his name. They had never spoken beyond polite smiles and the occasional shared look when the café got too loud or when the barista played the same song twice in a row. Still, she'd begun to notice his routine without meaning to.
Always in the afternoons. Always with a book. Always coffee, never tea.
She told herself it didn't mean anything.
She returned her attention to her screen, but the words came easier now, as if the presence of another quiet person made the space feel more alive. She typed slowly, deliberately, letting the scene unfold.
Ethan settled into his chair and opened his book, but his eyes lingered on the first page without really reading it. He'd seen her here before often, actually. Always writing. Always pausing like she was listening for something only she could hear.
He wondered what she was working on.
A novel, maybe. Short stories. Essays that never left her laptop. He knew that feeling too, even if he expressed it differently. Loving stories without knowing how to write one himself.
He read a few pages, then sipped his coffee. The afternoon light shifted, casting soft shadows across the floor. Somewhere outside, thunder rumbled faintly.
Mara stretched her fingers and finally leaned back, satisfied for the moment. She closed her laptop partway, eyes drifting to the window just as rain began to fall.
She noticed his book then.
Not the title but the way he held it, careful, like it mattered.
She hesitated, then reached for her notebook. On a whim, she tore out a small piece of paper. Her hand hovered, unsure.
Don't be weird, she told herself. Still, she wrote a single line, folded the paper once, and stood.
As she passed his table, she slowed just enough to place the note beside his coffee.
He looked up, surprised.
"Sorry," she said softly, already feeling her face warm. "I just um. I thought you might like that."
Before he could respond, she walked back to her seat, heart racing, rain tapping steadily against the glass.
Ethan unfolded the note.
If you enjoy discovering new writers, you're in the right place.
He smiled.
Outside, the rain fell harder. Inside, the café remained quiet holding the beginning of something neither of them was ready to name yet.