A Single Flower

Psychedelic house tunes, emerging from a spray-painted ceiling speaker, suggest that I should forget my worries and make a peace sign, while outside cab drivers and bus conductors are showing each other slightly different hand gestures, mouthing something that resembles the words "fuck you", and then think about the formula one careers that they failed to pursue because their racing spirits led them to pregnant teenage girlfriends they met at the local pub, which, of course, now they tell their unwanted kids to stay away from. 

A sip of cappuccino and the frothy heart forms into a ying and yang symbol, beige and brown, coffee cream and chocolate powder. A little girl with curly hair walks by and looks at the colourful flowers displayed in the big window in front of me. Her mother is gone ahead while the girl hesitates, fascinated by the flora, unnatural in the grey city she is so used to. Observing her I have to smile, at the little girl, the innocence, the times when the image of a single flower was more powerful than any yelling mother on earth. 

The girl readjusts her focus and smiles at me. She makes me laugh and then waves at me with her tiny little fist. I raise my hand and see a dimple in her rosa cheek as another hand grabs her arm, and suddenly she's gone. I need a second to understand what just happened. Sometimes, I think, the glory of a day is hidden in a very small glimpse, an instant of merely a few moments. A peace sign, a flower, a smile or a dimple. I take another sip of my perfectly balanced coffee and wish her a lifetime of happiness.