Green Button, Yellow Coat

GREEN BUTTON, YELLOW COAT By Throughline At closing time the repairer put the yellow raincoat on a wooden chair. Its owner had gone to find a button. The coat was patched at both elbows. One cuff held dried river mud; the other, a dusting of flour. She brushed the flour into her hand and tipped it into the bin. Outside, a broken gutter dripped into an old saucepan. Three quick knocks, a pause, then another. She moved the pan an inch. The drops struck the water instead of the rim. The lining had come loose beside a pocket. She turned the coat inside out and found the original seam by its little row of empty holes. She stitched along them. Inside the pocket were a feather and a shopping list whose only legible word was pears. She left them there. The owner came back with a green button on his palm. "It doesn't match," he said. It was a good button: four holes, a slight hollow for the thumb, no crack around the edge. She set it against the yellow cloth. "Shall we try it?" She held the button in place while he slipped his arm into the coat. He turned toward the dark window and lifted his chin, trying to see his reflection beyond the lamp. "Green will do." She sewed it on with the yellow thread already in her needle, winding a small shank beneath it so the thick cloth would lie flat. He worked it through the buttonhole twice, thanked her, and stepped outside. Across the road he stopped under the green roof of the tram shelter. From her doorway, the button was too small to see. She emptied the saucepan, put it back under the gutter and turned out the light. The first drop struck metal.