Starbucks 2.1 - Any suggestions for where I can write?

I am very disturbed.

To the point where I am having trouble falling asleep. Now, I don't want to keep you awake but I imagine you'll read this over AM coffee and boring work tasks. A little ruffling of feathers never hurt that regime.

Tonight I went to Starbucks to write. This time I opted for the 96th/Broadway fixture, with high hopes of avoiding the string of weirdos at the next express stop.

Well, apparently I need to choose a Sbuck (as I'll refer to it) at a local stop.

7:00 PM

As I happily type away on my computer, listening to the new Conor Oberst cd, which you should buy when you're done reading this entry, I watch customers come and go, talking of Michelangelo among other topics - usually not in English. I turn up the volume, drown out their noise, and carry on, thinking of smart metaphors and turns of phrase to aptly capture my subject.

Half-way through the CD, I hear a man's voice directed at me.

"What kind of computer is that? What is it? A fluff book?" He says, startling me.

"Um..." I am taken by his appearance. He is not ambiguously homeless, unlike Kenny. There is a direct, explicit quality about his homelessness that shines through his wooden teeth and stained clothing.

His stare demands a response.

"Um, it's a MacBook Pro." Why am I talking to him?

"Oh, what's the processor? A dual processor?" Interested in computers, I see.

"Uh, um." I am genuinely fearful of him, but remove only one earbud to indicate I intend to end this conversation sometime before the song I'm listening to ends.

"You don't know."

"No, um, it's dual processor. I don't know." Do I not know? Why I am talking to him is what I don't know.

"Okay." He waves his hand at me, saying, You're dumb and bought a computer you know nothing about.

I return to my music, shaken up, but he walks behind my chair to plug in his power cord.

7:30 PM

"I got to charge it up." He's talking about his laptop that he's pulled out of a Duane Reade shopping bag. I notice a few speakers in the bag as well. Capacious.

"Right." As he's moving behind me, he looks over my shoulder to read what I'm writing and makes a face at me, close to mine, then bends to insert his cord into the wall. He knocks my adapter out in the process.

"Oh! I'm SO sorry! That was so rude of me." Exclamatory is he. There's no need for embellishing on my part (!).

"It's fine. You didn't mean to do it." Stern at first, then soft, sympathetic.

"It's just so rude to do that. I really didn't mean to." He didn't mean to. He means to keep talking to me.

"Don't worry about it." Like we're old friends.

"What's your name?" Here we go again.

"Nicole." Genevieve should have been tonight's alias.

"Nice. Do you come here often? Yeah, you come here often. I can tell. You got a boyfriend?"

He knows so much about me. Already. "I come here every now and then" - intermittent reinforcement for his stalking - "and I don't have a boyfriend. That's probably why I'm here right now."

I laugh to myself. He doesn't think it's funny. He stares into me, through me with his big blue eyes. As we're "talking," a woman friend of his, with an equally horrifying dental situation, brings him a venti tea. He chides her for placing it on the table with his valuable hardware.

"I've been working in computers since 1983." So he knows a lot about them.

"Oh yeah?" I shut down my computer.

"Yeah, an insurance company I worked for. I could have sued them but I didn't. I'm not someone to do that. Know what I mean?"

"I do. It's a morality thing." Remove the adapter from the wall.

"Exactly. It probably wouldn't have made a difference to them, but for me, it felt like something I couldn't bring myself to do."

"I totally understand what you're saying." Adapter in the bag, velcro crunch, pocket sealed.

"You should listen to this song about changing the world. I wish politicians would follow it." He's one to follow the important issues.

"Oh, I will sometime. Thanks." Laptop in the bag.

"You like the band Tool? Nine Inch Nails?"

"I've heard of them." Zipper - zoot! - bag shut.

"There's this song I have on my computer. Let me play it for you." He opens the file and attaches his speakers to the computer. "They won't mind." He points to the baristas behind the counter who are chatting about their love lives.

"What's your name again?"

Genevieve. "Nicole. What's yours?"

"My name's only for friends, but I don't have any of them." Then who is the lady you're sitting with, buddy? "It's Tom." He smiles.

"Nice to meet you." A quick smile. I don't extend my hand or fantasize about blending it in someone's frappaccino.

My tote full of personal items is on the table, ready for lift off. The laptop bag is already slung across my chest.

"Sure, play it."

On his screen, Trent Reznor, ball of sunshine that he is, appears, suspended in a cloudy sky. Music wells around him. His dark precise facial hair contrasts his pale face. The camera cuts to a large bird with giant ugly claws and big blinking eyes. Then some woman, part of Trent's sexist fantasy, writhes on a couch, clothed or not. I am too lost in my escape plan to notice the minute details of this presentation. Trent sings something like, "I want to be with you. I want you."

During the two minutes of this spectacle, I've become increasingly anxiety-ridden, looking around at the people in the Sbuck, who all seem to think this is the usual for Tuesday nights.

"Nicole, this is what I want to say to you. What he's saying right now." He's referring to the NIN lullaby chorus about "wanting you."

Jaw drops, nausea begins. Luckily, a barista, done talking about her boyfriend, intervenes, telling Tom to turn the music off.

"You got this Enya crap going on in here. I don't know how you can stand it all day. What's next? Tony Bennett," he yells at her across the room as she sweeps the floor.

This is my opportunity to leave, so I grab it and shake it like an infant, run the hell out of there. On my trip home, I feel paranoid that Tom is following me. I am up tonight because I can't shake this man's stare.

Good night?