I have a habit of making friends in cafes. Amid the pandemic, I miss the characters | Nadine von Cohen

One morning many years ago at one of my favourite cafes, I became enamoured with a customer I’d not seen before. She was an older lady, with a sleek, silvery-white bob and giant turquoise reading glasses. Her outfit was humble but screamed style.

She began frequenting the cafe and we slowly became friends. We’d sit at adjacent tables, each with a copy of the Sydney Morning Herald open to the puzzles page, each doing as much of the crossword as we could before trading answers. She always got more than me.

Antonia, surname then unknown, didn’t talk about herself