Caffeine (OC Based HP story)

Part 1 Chapter 5

Part 1 Chapter 5

He went to Bean There even earlier on Tuesday, thankful it was a 24 hour coffee shop that allowed Emily to have a shift that ended at such an odd hour for most people's working schedule. She brought him another coffee, one which he barely touched due to the fact they were talking so enthusiastically during the half hour they had time free to chat. He carried the rest of it to work with him and drank slowly.

At lunch he was asked to the offices bi-yearly bowling game on Saturday night. He answered with a maybe, he'd let them know by Thursday lunch giving the excuse that he needed to find someone to look after Raven. It was an excuse, he really didn't want to go.

Especially since Jayden seemed overly-eager about it and was chatting with his dudes in his cubicle about who he was thinking of bringing as his extra for the event.

On Wednesday he ordered a piccolo instead of an espresso and hated it. Maybe he was just biased towards his normal coffee. No matter if it were an espresso or piccolo he always felt pretentious sipping on the tiny take away cup for 20 minutes.

Emily delivered him another espresso when she came to sit with him and he quickly swapped the piccolo with it. She seemed to ignore that he swapped the two.

"So, how's your daughter?" she asked about five minutes into the conversation.

"Oh, Raven's not my daughter, she's my little sister." He clarified, taking a small sip of his coffee.

"My bad." She says, barely seeming shocked, continuing to tear apart her muffin into bit size pieces to pop in her mouth. "So are your parents as cool as you two?"

"I liked to think so." He says awkwardly, taking another sip of his coffee in a hope to move on from the topic,

"Liked?" she asks, curious to that particular wording. Of course she had to ask he thinks.

"They're dead." Is all he says, Emily clear her throat awkwardly.

Thursday was pre-decided action day. Pre-decided ask-Emily-out-day. Maybe dinner at the nice restaurant close to his house. That's the plan.

And so he puts it off.

5 minutes, he tells himself when she sits down, I'll tell her in 5 minutes.

10 minutes pass.

They talk about work, Griffin carefully skipping over what he does just so he can hear her passionately talk about what it's like to work as a barista. They huddle close together so she can quietly tell him about how she doesn't like Adrienne and that she's a total bitch and careful; she's still on shift, Griffin!

20 minutes pass.

He asks her what he should try instead of an espresso, just so he can get something with more liquid, so he doesn't spend so much money on a tiny fucking cup (also so he can ignore the fact that he told himself he would ask her out).

25 minutes pass.

They talk about Emily's cat for a bit.

And then their 30 minutes are up. And he still hasn't asked her. And he still almost doesn't. But as she is pulling on her scarf he builds up the courage.

"Hey I was wondering if you wanted to go out on the weekend?" he asked.

"What?" she asked, her head snapping up to meet his eye, she seemed horrified, disgusted even.

Uh oh, back pedal, abort. Abort! He screamed mentally. He changed tactics.

"My office is having a bowling thing this Saturday. I can uh... take someone and it seemed like your kind of thing." He needed to be more convincing he decided, and added "Plus Amanda will be there and I think you guys will get along splendidly."

"Oh, thank god." She said with a relieved smile. "I thought you meant, like, a date and, I don't know but just-" instead of articulating words she simply mimed vomiting. "It'd just be weird." She said simply said shrugging. Griffin pulled his blazer on so she couldn't see the hurt in his eyes.

That went well.