He poked at the map, sipping the coffee, then ordering another from the Greek’s son, who hadn’t yet figured out that he was a regular and so sneered at his laptop with undisguised contempt. “Computers, huh?” he said. “Doesn’t anyone just read a book anymore?”
“I used to own a bookstore,” Alan said, then held up a finger and moused over to his photo album and brought up the thumbnails of his old bookstore. “See?”
The Greek’s son, thirty with a paunch and sweat-rings under the pits of his white “The Greek’s” T-shirt, sat down and looked at the photos. “I remember that place, on Harbord Street, right?”
Alan smiled. “Yup. We lost the store when they blew up the abortion clinic next door,” he said. “Insurance paid out, but I wasn’t ready to start over with another bookstore.”
The Greek’s son shook his head. “Another coffee, right?”
“Right,” Alan said.
Alan went back to the map, realigning the laptop for optimal reception again.
“You got a wireless card in that?” a young guy at the next table asked. He was dressed in Kensington Market crusty-punk chic, tatts and facial piercings, filth-gray bunchoffuckinggoofs tee, cutoffs, and sweaty high boots draped with chains.
“Yeah,” Alan said. He sighed and closed the map window. He wasn’t getting anywhere, anyway.
“And you get service here? Where’s your access point?” Crusty-punk or no, he sounded as nerdy as any of the Web-heads you’d find shopping for bargains on CD blanks on College Street.