Got time for a story?

Along with tasting notes, our coffees come with memory notes – a mouthful of words to contextualize what you’re drinking.

The Calm Before the Storm

Along the north and south coasts of South Africa, summer heat leeches under the skin like butter melting in a pan. Being of the sub-tropical type, the climate is different to the more postcard-ready beauty of Cape Town with its winter rains and dry summers. This kind of heat sits, seeps, swelters. 

On such an afternoon, the day’s thunderstorm slowly gathering strength in the distance, a woman lies in the shade of a late-to-bloom jacaranda tree, strains of Strawberry Swing reaching her from the veranda. All the couches were dragged into the garden for what an American would call a barbecue, and what the woman would call a braai. The guests are gone, only their crumpled napkins and sticky beer bottles remain.

Contemplating the swelling belly currently blocking the view of her pedicure, the woman – let’s call her Frances – wonders at the characteristics of her incoming baby. Spooning raspberry sorbet into her mouth, Frances returns to her favorite and most fervent silent prayer: let her be more sedate than her brother. A jacaranda flower sinks through the air and onto her dress before tumbling down her side. I’ll take that as a yes, she thinks. 

These last days of the summer holiday stretch like dogs on the kitchen floor. Soon, this house and its seemingly endless supply of beach towels will be locked up and left until Easter. Frances sighs and heaves herself off the couch at the first growl of thunder and rustling breeze. There are figs in the fridge, and she and the baby have an ongoing arrangement about them: one for you, two for me.