Faded Strangers

The café on the corner of 5th and Cedar was a place where time seemed to stand still. Its worn-out posters for jazz nights, the faint smell of old books mixed with coffee, and the distant hum of the city outside all blended into a background noise that let the regulars lose themselves in their own worlds. To most, it was just another forgettable stop on the way to somewhere else, but for Erin, it had become a sanctuary.

Every morning for the last three months, she’d sat at the same table, facing the window, her black coffee cooling as she filled her notebook with thoughts she didn’t want to say out loud. It was her way of finding control in a life that had slipped through her fingers. Since the accident, nothing had made sense. Her routine was the only thing she had left to hold onto, the only thing that made her feel real.

She would come, order, write, and leave. Always the same.

But today, something was different. As soon as Erin stepped inside, she felt it. The air was heavier, charged with something she couldn’t quite name. She moved to the counter, ordered her coffee, and went to her usual spot near the window. She hadn’t noticed him at first—the man at the table across from hers—but as she settled into her seat, her gaze fell on him, and suddenly everything else faded.

He was sitting there, head bowed slightly, reading a book. He wore a dark leather jacket that looked out of place for the season, his black hair tousled as if he’d just come in from the wind. But it wasn’t his appearance that unsettled her. It was the deep, gnawing feeling that she knew him. That they’d shared something—somewhere, sometime—but she couldn’t place it.

Erin blinked and quickly looked away, her pulse quickening for reasons she didn’t understand. She pulled out her notebook, the lined pages a safe escape from the strange tension building inside her. She tried to focus on her writing, but her mind kept drifting back to him. That sense of familiarity tugged at her thoughts, refusing to let go.

Have we met before?

The question whispered through her mind, unsettling her, like an echo of a dream she couldn’t quite remember. She wasn’t sure how long she sat there, her pen poised but unmoving. All she knew was that when she looked up again, he was staring directly at her.

His eyes—dark, intense, and searching—met hers, and for a moment, it was like the rest of the café disappeared. The usual clatter of cups and murmured conversations faded into a thick silence. There was something in his gaze, something heavy with meaning, as if he knew her too, as if he’d been waiting for her to look back.

Her chest tightened, and she quickly dropped her eyes to the table. But it was too late. The connection had been made. She could still feel the weight of his stare, even as she tried to drown herself in the pages of her notebook. The air between them felt electric, like something was about to happen, something irreversible.

Erin’s heart raced. She had come to this café every day to be alone, to escape, and now, without warning, someone had stepped into her carefully guarded world. She told herself to leave, to walk out and never come back. But her legs wouldn’t move. Her mind was a storm of questions she couldn’t answer, all circling back to the same haunting thought: Have we met before?

As the minutes ticked by, Erin’s tension mounted. She could feel his presence across from her, could hear the rustle of his book as he turned the pages, each sound amplifying her anxiety. Finally, unable to stand the suffocating silence between them, she took a deep breath and looked up again.

He was still watching her.

This time, he didn’t avert his gaze. Instead, he closed his book, set it down on the table, and leaned forward slightly, his elbows resting on the edge of the wooden surface. There was a quiet intensity in the way he moved, as if every action carried weight. Erin’s throat tightened. She should leave. But she didn’t.

“Do I know you?” he asked softly, his voice low and unfamiliar yet somehow deeply familiar at the same time.

Erin froze, her fingers tightening around her pen. She opened her mouth to respond, but no words came out. Her mind was racing. Did he feel it too? That strange, inexplicable sense of recognition?

“I don’t know,” she finally managed to say, her voice barely above a whisper. “Have we met before?”

The man’s eyes flickered, as if her question had triggered something deep within him. He tilted his head slightly, studying her with a furrowed brow, as if searching for something just out of reach.

“I think we have,” he said quietly, his voice steady. “But I can’t… place it.”

The words sent a chill down Erin’s spine. She swallowed hard, her heart pounding in her chest. She knew she should be cautious, that talking to strangers—especially one who felt this unsettlingly familiar—wasn’t something she should do. But there was something about him, something that made her feel like she had to stay.

“I’ve been coming here for months,” she said, her voice hesitant. “I don’t remember seeing you before.”

“I just got back to the city,” he replied, his gaze never leaving hers. “But I’m not talking about here. I feel like we’ve crossed paths before. Somewhere else. A long time ago.”

Erin’s pulse quickened. His words echoed her own thoughts, her own confusion. It was as if he was speaking aloud the very things she had been feeling but hadn’t dared to say.

“I… I don’t know,” she murmured, her fingers trembling slightly as she set her pen down. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

He leaned back in his chair, his eyes narrowing slightly as he watched her, as if trying to unravel a puzzle. The silence stretched between them, heavy and tense, until finally, he spoke again.

“What’s your name?”

The question was simple, but it felt loaded with meaning. Erin hesitated, her mind racing. She didn’t know this man—at least, not in any way she could explain. But the pull between them was undeniable, as if something far deeper than chance had brought them to this moment.

“Erin,” she said softly, her voice barely audible over the hum of the café. “My name’s Erin.”

For a moment, his expression changed—just a flicker of something that passed across his face too quickly for her to read. But then it was gone, replaced by the same calm intensity.

“Erin,” he repeated, as if testing the name on his tongue. “I’m Kian.”

There was another long pause, the tension between them building once more. Erin could feel it pressing down on her, the weight of something unspoken, something she couldn’t quite grasp. She wanted to leave, to run from the strange connection she felt with this man, but at the same time, she couldn’t bring herself to break the moment.

“Do you believe in déjà vu?” Kian asked suddenly, his voice soft but insistent.

Erin blinked, caught off guard by the question. Déjà vu. Of course. That’s what this was. It had to be. That strange, dream-like feeling of familiarity. But déjà vu was fleeting, a momentary lapse in the brain. What she was feeling now… this wasn’t fleeting. It was deeper. Stronger.

“I guess,” she replied slowly, choosing her words carefully. “But this… this feels different.”

Kian nodded, as if he understood exactly what she meant. His eyes searched hers for a moment longer, then he leaned forward again, his voice dropping to a near whisper.

“Do you believe in past lives?”

The question sent a shiver down Erin’s spine. Past lives. The idea was absurd, wasn’t it? People didn’t live multiple lives, didn’t carry memories from one existence to another. It was something you read about in books or saw in movies, not something that happened in real life. But the way Kian asked the question, the way his eyes bore into hers, made her wonder if maybe—just maybe—there was something more to this.

“I don’t know,” she said slowly, her voice barely audible. “I’ve never really thought about it.”

Kian’s expression softened slightly, as if he’d expected her answer but wasn’t disappointed. He leaned back in his chair once more, his fingers absentmindedly tracing the edge of his book.

“I didn’t used to believe in that sort of thing either,” he said quietly. “But now… I don’t know. I’ve been having these dreams. They’re… vivid. Almost too real. And you—” He stopped, hesitating for a moment, then continued. “You’re in them.”

Erin’s heart skipped a beat. Dreams? What was he talking about? She didn’t even know this man. And yet, as he spoke, she felt a strange flicker of recognition deep within her, as if a long-forgotten memory was struggling to surface.

“I don’t understand,” she whispered, her voice barely audible over the steady hum of the café. “How could I be in your dreams?”

“I don’t know,” Kian replied, his voice soft but steady. “But every time I see you in my dreams, it feels like… like we’ve known each other before. Like we’ve been here, in this moment, more times than I can count.”

Erin stared at him, her mind racing. This was insane. It had to be. And yet, the way Kian spoke, the way his voice carried a quiet certainty, made her doubt her own disbelief. Could it be possible? Could there be some deeper connection between them, something that went beyond the here and now?

Before she could respond, Kian spoke again, his voice low and hesitant.

“Do you ever feel like you’ve lived before, Erin? Like there’s more to you than this life?”

Erin opened her mouth to speak, but the words wouldn’t come. She wanted to tell him that it was all nonsense, that he was just some stranger she’d met by chance in a coffee shop. But deep down, in the quiet corners of her mind, she couldn’t shake the feeling that he was right. That they had known each other before.

“I—”

Before she could finish, a loud crash shattered the quiet of the café. A waiter had dropped a tray of cups, the ceramic smashing against the floor in a violent clatter. The sudden noise jolted Erin from her thoughts, and when she looked back at Kian, something had changed. The intensity in his eyes had dimmed, replaced by a look of quiet resignation.

“I should go,” he said, standing abruptly. “I didn’t mean to—”

“No, wait,” Erin interrupted, reaching out instinctively, her fingers grazing his wrist. She didn’t know why she did it, but she couldn’t let him leave. Not yet. “I— I don’t want you to go.”

Kian hesitated, his gaze dropping to where her hand rested on his arm. For a moment, time seemed to freeze, the noise of the café fading into the background once more. Then, slowly, he sat back down, his eyes meeting hers once more.

“Alright,” he said softly. “I’ll stay.”

And so they sat there, in the quiet of the café, two strangers bound by an inexplicable connection, trying to make sense of the unspoken echoes between them. Neither of them knew what came next, but for now, that didn’t matter. For now, they were together, and that was enough.