A meeting at the wrong table

Management · Original fiction

Sol arrived at the café with a folder labelled GARDEN PLAN. The woman at the window waved him over. She had a folder too: READING GROUP.

For ten minutes they discussed chairs, space, and how to welcome people who might only come once. Then Sol unfolded his sketch of raised beds.

“I was expecting the librarian,” the woman said. Sol looked at his message. He was supposed to meet the gardener next door.

They laughed, then kept talking. Both projects needed a place where someone could arrive without knowing anybody. Neither had written that requirement at the top.

Before Sol left, they exchanged a page of notes. A month later, the reading group held its first outdoor session beside two unfinished planting beds. The gardener brought three folding chairs.