Saving Noah

chapter 2 - latte

The café above is sort of how I imagine the aesthetic of the café in the story :)

Noah - Present Day

I awoke panting, sweat dripping down my brow; and the suffocating feeling of not being able to breathe, my chest beating as if there was a hummingbird inside it. My head was pounding, and the rays from the nearby window seemed to be amplified, and the sirens and honks outside seemed more like nails on a chalkboard.

What the hell happened?

I groaned, cursing the light and sounds of New York City, and looked around my bedroom—at the elegant dresser in front of me, to the side-table beside me.

8:37am. Great.

I felt a rustling beside me, the sheets sighing at the movement. I turned, and for a moment I saw her; the dirty-blonde hair tousled from sleep, her piercing blue eyes staring back at me, and finally, the sleepy half-smile she gave always gave me every morning.

"Good morning," she said, but it wasn't the soft, velvety voice I was expecting. I blinked, and a girl with long, straight brunette hair was staring back at me. Her tawny eyes were sleepy, her full lips pulled into a sensuous smirk.

Right. I'd gone out to the bar to get away from this miserable existence, missing her and wanting to drown my sorrows in a bottle of vodka. Like I'd done the night before, and the night before that, and so on. I occasionally brought home a girl—mostly on the bad nights where the self loathing and pity felt like it was going to swallow me whole—and the next morning kicking her out on her ass, not caring about who she was.

Or if I could remember it the next morning, how good the sex was.

"Get the hell out," I said, but it didn't come out with the grit I intended it to have. She blinked, an almost surprised look flickering across her tan face. What was her name again?

"You seemed to like it last night," she murmured, but she got out of the bed and started looking for her clothing—she only had some lacy red underthings on—and when she finally found them, she started walking towards the door, but stopped and turned her golden eyes to me.

"Call me," she said, her lips again turning into a smirk. When I narrowed my eyes, she added, "trust me, you'll need it. From the looks of you last night, I can tell you're a mess. So if you want to talk—or not talk—I'm here." She turned her head away from me again, her long brown hair swaying with the movement, and walked out of the room.

I couldn't even remember her name—how was I supposed to remember if I gave her my number?

I got out of bed—my whole body aching at the movement— and went into the shower to hopefully get a clearer mind and try to recollect what I'd said and done last night.

"From the looks of you last night, I can tell you're a mess."

I must've been really shit-faced if she thought that.

When I got out of the shower, I put on some simple grey sweatpants and a black hoodie—not bothering to even do anything with my hair— and headed for the café in the city. I lived in a pretty nice two-bedroom apartment downtown, and it was convenient enough to have a small café and bakery a few blocks down.

"Damn, you look like you got hit by a bus," Alice said by way of greeting when I walked into the café. Alice was the daughter of the owner, and she often ran the shop by herself. I was a usual customer, and I'd come here a lot since the first time I'd met her when I'd come to New York a year ago, and she'd shown it to me probably because I was as much of a mess a year ago as I was now. Maybe more.