On Purpose

~4~

I walked into Starbucks and waved to the woman who seemed to have the same smile on her face when I come in.
"Nice to see you again Mr. Stone." I raised an eyebrow at her when I made my way to the counter. To my surprise, it wasn't as packed as it usually was.
"How's it going Nicki? And I told you to call me Oliver." She rolled her eyes at me after I spoke.
"I'm doing good, my husband just got home from that two month trip from work." I nod slowly.
"How's he doing? I heard about his mom passing, how's he taking it?" She looks behind me, making sure a line isn't being formed and finally turned her attention back to me. Her dark blue eyes seemed to have gotten darker if possible.
"He's taking it hard, I had to beg him to go on the work trip. It was in Miami anyway, so he'd get to go to the beach and get his mother's passing off of his mind." I watch as she shakes her head with shame. Her Starbucks cap wasn't on her head this time, her brown hair was pressed and flowed down to her shoulders. I'm guessing it had just gotten done, so she wasn't gonna mess it up with a hat.
"Mr. Stone, I don't know what to do anymore. He doesn't really talk to me anymore. Especially after finding out she left him nothing. It all went to her boyfriend." I remember the boyfriend. He was young. In his late thirties.
"Why would she do that?" I asked.
"To please her boy toy I suppose." She sighs.
I nod and look up at the menu above her head, even though I order the same thing every day, I looked at it to show that the subject needs to be changed.
"I'll get it for you." She smiles.
"Thanks." She leaves to get my daily Caramel Macchiato.
I look around for a distraction. It was oddly quiet today. A man and a little girl sat across from each other. She nibbled on a muffin and he sipped his coffee, except, he wasn't paying her no attention while she talked to him. He tapped away on his phone.
"Here you go, Mr. Stone; one grande Caramel Macchiato." I take it from her and give her a twenty.
"Keep the change." She smiles warmly. "Thank you." I nod and walk out. I watched the man and his daughter, feeling slightly bad for her. If I were a dad, I'd give my kid my undivided attention, even if it's about a cartoon or something child like.
I pushed the door open without looking, lifting my plastic cup to my lips and going to take a sip, but I must've opened it too hard that it swung and smacked someone right in the face.
I turn my head to look at them as the door close behind me. My eyes widened. The girl held her nose in pain. I guess she was once holding a stack of books, because they were now disseminated on the ground.
"Ow!" She scrunched over in pain. She tapped her nose a few times to make sure it wasn't bleeding. Meanwhile, I couldn't help but take notice of a book on the ground.
I go and pick it up and hand it over to her. I held it out and took another sip of my coffee.
"My bad, you shouldn't stand in front of a door." I tell her. She snatches her book and glares at me.
Her nose wasn't bleeding, but the base of it was red.
"Maybe you shouldn't be swinging a goddamn door." My eyelids rolled down a little, glaring at her with a hard stare.
While she went to bend down to pick up the rest of her books, I say, "Want some coffee?" She stands up and looks as if she could snap my neck in two. And while that stare would frighten anyone, it made me smirk at her.
"Yeah, and I'll shove it right up your-"
"Hey, I was just trying to make up for hitting you with the door, but if you're gonna be stuck-up, I'll be on my way."
I watch as she shuffles the books right side up and lose her hard stare.
"You can make it up by apologizing." I tick my tongue and look at her while holding back a smile.
"No." I said into the silence.
"You're such an egotistical idiot." Now that made me smile.
"Wow, you must really know me."
"No, but I sure as hell don't want to."
I shrugged at that.
"And why not?" I asked.
"You hit me in the face with a Starbucks door on purpose." She said, which made me raise an eyebrow.
"And what makes you think I did it on purpose?"
"You won't apologize you dip-noodle."
I suck on my bottom lip to keep from laughing. She was cute.
Her hair was long and up into a ponytail that flowed down her back like a waterfall. The tips of her hair were a brighter brown than the rest of her hair and her eyes were this pretty light chocolate brown that made me keep staring into them.
She was short, so short that when she glared at me, it made me wanna put her in a head lock and ruffle her hair like my dad did to me over the years.
"If I did it on purpose I wouldn't be here talking about it, I'd just walk away." I said nonchalantly.
"No." She said, dropping her tone. "If you did it on accident, you'd be apologizing and asking if I'm okay."
I shrugged and held up my cup of coffee.
"I would but my mouth was full of coffee." I watch as that glare returned, darkening her eyes a bit.
"It's not right now, is it?"
I pull the cup to my lips and hold the liquid there.
"Ugh." She scoffed and pushed past me.
I turn to watch her walk away. I swallow the coffee I held in my mouth and call out to her.
"You don't want your apology?" She flipped a middle finger over her shoulder and kept walking.
I smiled to myself and went back to work....work!

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"I'm so sorry Mrs. Green." I say on the phone, I try not to show that I was out of shape on my line since I ran all the way back.
"I understand you're busy dear." She said, her voice old and raspy like a record that was never played. I wiped sweat from the side of my face and swallowed hard on my saliva.
"What is it that you wanna go over?" I held the phone tightly in my hand as I took a seat in my chair. She didn't answer right away, and I was willing to wait, just saying four sentences caused me to run out of breath.
"I wanted to talk about the payment. I had to pay for my husband's hospital bills, plus my house rent, so you think we can put my logo on hold for a while?" I felt a bit disappointed. I was very confident in the logo, and wanted it to be something I can see on a commercial and say, "I help make that logo."
I clear my throat and got my breath back. "Yes ma'am I am truly sorry about your predicament. Please call me whenever you'd like to resume our work." I heard a sniff and a long sigh.
"Thank you, Mr. Stone, thank you." And without giving me a chance to respond, she disconnects the line.