---
title: "Story: “Where not to touch the table”"
description: "Afternoon tea slides from one cup to the next, wrists steady, the table taking each small tremor. Bread is cut slowly; crumbs gather and are wiped away with the same careful hand, until the forgotten cups look clean enough to leave."
url: https://avelinemoorwen.com/story-where-not-to-touch-the-table/
date: 2026-02-07
modified: 2026-03-23
author: "Aveline Moorwen"
image: https://avelinemoorwen.com/wp-content/uploads/quiet-love-stories-about-closeness-time-and-what-remains.webp
categories: ["Short Love Stories"]
tags: ["Short Love Stories"]
type: post
lang: en
---

# Story: “Where not to touch the table”

A quiet love story about closeness, time, and what remains:

## Where not to touch the table

They sit at the small table by the window because it is the only place where both of them can put their elbows down. The table wobbles, but they have learned where not to touch it. A folded receipt is tucked under one leg. The print on it has faded to a gray blur.

The afternoon light comes in sideways. It reaches the wall, then stops. Dust moves in it. Neither of them comments on that.

He pours tea from the chipped pot. He always pours too much into her cup and then waits a second before adjusting, as if deciding whether to take some back. He never does. The tea runs close to the rim. She notices, but she doesn’t move the cup. She wraps her hands around it and lets the heat stay there.

Outside, a bus stops and starts again. Someone laughs, sharp and quick, and then it’s gone.

The table has been tightened more than once. One screw no longer holds properly. When someone leans too hard, it answers with a small shake. They both know when that will happen.

She checks the time on her phone and places it face down again. He sees her do it. He does not ask why.

On the counter behind them, a loaf of bread waits in its paper bag. It was bought this morning. The crust will be hard by evening if they don’t cut it soon. She knows this. He knows this too. Neither of them stands up.

He asks if the tea is too strong.

“It’s fine,” she says.

He nods, like he has been told something important. He sips from his own cup and winces slightly. He likes it stronger than she does. He always has. He does not say anything else.

There is a mark on the table where someone once pressed a hot pan down without thinking. It happened before they lived here. They used to talk about it, guessing how it happened, inventing a small story for the people who came before. Now the mark is just there. When she wipes the table, she goes around it without noticing.

She reaches for the bread bag and tears the top. The sound is louder than she expects. She pauses, then continues. He gets the knife from the drawer. It is not very sharp. He has sharpened it many times, but it never stays that way.

They cut the bread without looking at each other. The slices are uneven. One of them is much thicker than the rest. She slides that one toward him without comment. He hesitates, then takes it.

He butters his slice and hers, though she could do it herself. He does it slowly, making sure the butter reaches the edges. He has always done this. Once, long ago, she asked him why. He shrugged. It wasn’t an answer, but it was enough.

They eat. Crumbs collect near the receipt under the table leg. One falls onto the floor. Neither of them bends to pick it up.

She tells him about a woman she passed on the stairs earlier, carrying a box too big for her arms. The woman dropped it, and everything inside slid out at once. He listens. He asks what was in the box.

“Books,” she says. “Mostly.”

He nods. He can picture that. He can picture the stairs.

He starts to say something else, then stops. She waits. He clears his throat.

“Do you remember,” he says, “the place with the green door?”

She does. It takes her a second, but she does. They went there once, only once. The coffee was bad. The chairs were uncomfortable. They stayed longer than they meant to.

“Yes,” she says.

He smiles, just a little. It doesn’t last. It doesn’t need to.

The light has shifted. It no longer reaches the wall. The room looks flatter now, quieter. She stands and takes the cups to the sink. He stays where he is, his hands folded on the table. He watches her back as she rinses the cups. He watches the way she stacks them to dry, one inside the other.

She leaves one cup out. She always forgets it on purpose. He will put it away later.

She comes back and sits down again. There is nothing left on the table but crumbs and the knife. He moves the knife aside. She wipes the surface with the cloth, careful around the old burn mark. The table wobbles. She adjusts the receipt with her foot.

They sit without speaking. The bus goes by again. Someone calls out a name that neither of them recognizes.

After a while, she reaches across the table and rests her hand near his. Not touching. Close enough that he feels the warmth. He does not move his hand closer. He leaves it where it is.

A chair scrapes somewhere in the building below.
Neither of them looks up.

Aveline Moorwen