Yesterday I stopped by a café for coffee — and froze at the doorway. That song was playing. The one I listened to seven years ago in a completely different context, with completely different feelings and a completely different person beside me.

The person has been gone for a long time. The song remained.

I got my coffee, sat by the window and allowed myself to listen to the end. It's strange — how three minutes of music can bring back the smell of that summer, the tactile memory of someone's hand, the feeling that only good things lie ahead.

Romance, I think, lives precisely in such gaps. Not in planned candlelit dinners (though there too), but in moments that happen on their own. A song in a café. A stranger's accidental smile. The smell of rain that arrives exactly when you need it.
I sat and thought: it's good that I can notice this. That I didn't walk past, didn't put in earphones, didn't bury myself in my phone. That I allowed myself three minutes in that summer — and then came back to this one.

Solitude sometimes sharpens perception. You feel the beauty of small things more acutely — because there's no one to nudge by the sleeve and say "look, look." You look yourself. And you see more.

The song ended. The coffee went cold. I smiled at the window and moved on. It was a good break.