One Cup of You

Part 3

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This is a raw, unedited version of this book. You may see some grammar, spelling and continuity mistakes. One day, I might turn this into a paperback, but for now I just need to share my story !

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I was fond of my regular customers, but some more than others. Some of them I knew better than others, and only if they were the one to start the conversation first. For example, the old lady who came in every morning at seven with her yorkie in her purse had willingly given me every detail of her life. I knew about every grandchild, every heart medication, and every bingo win.

Other customers were less intrusive, but pleasant. If one of them hadn't told me about their life, I liked to make up stories about them to entertain myself. There was a man who came in every Monday afternoon for five loaves of sourdough bread. He never said much, and I didn't even know his name. I had crafted a back story for him involving having prisoners in his basement and only feeding them bread. It was the best bread you could get in town, so in my head he had a fondness for his victims. He just gave off that vibe.

There was one customer that I was particularly interested in as of late- Jamie Collins, the musician with a broken heart.

Jamie was vaguely handsome and looked a lot younger than he was. When I first saw him, I decided I liked his roman nose, and his icy blue eyes were definitely intriguing, but he wasn't particularly sexy in any way that I could discern. If he'd ditched the shaggy skater boy haircut for something a little more sophisticated, he might look more grown up, but I thought his hair suited him just fine. He had a scruffy beard that was a few shades lighter than his hair and he kept it trimmed down so it was just a stubble; my guess to compensate for how young his hair made him look. Most Sunday mornings, Jamie bought two coffees- one for him, and one for his girlfriend, Amber.

Often, he was the main act for the nights we had performances, and usually came out to support other acts like Poets or Authors doing readings. The first time he got on our little stage and played guitar, I swooned like a teenager. He had a deep, gruff voice and when he sang, he got very focused and intense. He transformed on that stage from an uninteresting coffee shop patron to a sex god. After I saw him play for the first time, I could not see him as anything less and I turned into a puddle of nerves when I had to serve him. Our relationship- or our interactions, rather, as I really couldn't define it as a relationship- had been friendly and warm, but definitely only surface level. We flirted innocently, but nothing ever came of it. Everyone has a workplace crush, or a customer that they like more than the others. Most people never act on it. Most people.

He came into the store the morning after I'd seen the video, looking like he had stayed up all night drinking or like he was coming down with the plague. The charming and bright air about him had shifted, and he was not himself. I could tell before he even got to the register.

"Just one today, Steves. Black. Maybe one of those croissant slash donut thingies, too. A cronut?" he said, tapping his debit card on the counter.

I stopped and looked him over. Our eyes met for just a second and it connected immediately. One coffee. Just for him. It felt deliberate, like an invitation to ask him what was going on. He looked incredibly sad.

I trod carefully. He hadn't mentioned a breakup, and all of our conversations had been strictly business. It was not my place to ask about his love life, nor was it in my nature to be up front about something so personal. However, the pulling feeling inside my chest was unrelenting and I couldn't let it slide.