Scent (Scomiche)

I Mean, I Was Trying to Be the Bigger Person

I haven't heard from him for a week. It's actually kind of worrisome, but I figure he's probably just embarrassed, and since my boring week of unemployment has caused me to overthink, I decide to make the "first move". I show up at Scott's Scones craving anything with cream cheese in it. The chimes jingle when I walk in. He switched from an automatic bell to chimes. Weird.
There is no one behind the counter, but that's okay. The display case was all I really needed anyway. I examine each pastry, taking so long I glance to make sure nobody is behind me. Actually, there's no one even in this place. How could he have ever thought of expanding when he can barely sell enough scones to keep this one running?

Ah, strawberry cheesecake. Perfect. I ring the bell that's placed by the register, which is accompanied by a sign that says RING WHEN READY :).

Scott appears suddenly, and the soft smile on his face becomes a small frown. "Hey," I say, but his body language is already telling me I should leave.

"Hi." He wipes his hands on his apron, and I imagine that they must be clammy because he's nervous I'm here. Or maybe they're tense, but also covered in sticky sugar, and that's why he wiped them. As I said earlier, my brain is becoming very accustomed to overthinking. If this would've been two months ago, I could've just asked. But it's no longer two months ago. Everything has changed. Apparently so much so, I can't even ask him a question. "What can I do for you?"

"A strawberry cheesecake Danish, please." And it feels like a dream or something that I'd come in and tell him about the next day, like hey Scott, you'd never believe it, but I had a dream that when I came in you didn't even smile at me and he'd laugh and say now don't be ridiculous.

"For here or to-go?" He asks, tapping the screen to place the order. That question surprises me, although it shouldn't have. I've heard him ask other customers, but with me, it was always assumed I was staying unless I stated otherwise.

"Oh, uh," I stutter. "Well, I, t-to-go, I guess."

"Okay, that'll be $3.02."

I hand him a five dollar bill and place the change I receive in the tip bucket. He does not thank me. Instead he grabs a small waxy bag and slides on a glove. Then he slips the Danish inside the bag, folds the top of it to temporarily seal it, and hands it over. He didn't write anything on the bag. No "Mitch :)", no "Mitchie", no "Mitchell <3", not even "Mitch". Nothing. My mind can't help but drift back to better days when I'd come in and he'd have a huge smile on his face and if it was a peculiar day where I really did need to take it to-go, he'd beg me to stay. If I insisted, he'd doodle on the bag for me. Sometimes when I'd come in right at closing, he'd give me the leftovers for free on a paper plate that he'd doodled on with permanent marker. The fumes probably upped my chances of developing cancer later in life, but at that point I didn't care. As long as I was staring down at Scott's art, even while eating an infected donut, I was fine.
I must have seriously angered him last week when I pretty much told him to figure himself out. He's never been so unemotional for as long as I've known him. It stings that I made him this way.

All of that comes to my mind as I take that bag from him and pivot on my heel.

"Thanks for stopping in," he says from behind me, and this time there's a hint of a smile in his voice. Maybe not quite a smile. A smirk.

I keep walking (ignoring him), and I walk to my car, and I sit there without even starting it, eating my (delicious) pastry, getting increasingly more angry and hurt. I don't have to stand for this. So I slam down the other half of my Danish on the passenger seat and march right back into that god forsaken bakery. Scott isn't directly behind the counter, but he's still in sight.

He peers out when he hears the chimes jingle, his eyebrows furrowing deep into the bridge of his nose when he sees it's me again. It resembles what Lindsey looks like when she asks me to explain math to her. "What are y--"

"You have no right," I say, more confident than I truly feel. "You have no right to treat me like I'm the weird one for coming here after we haven't spoken for a week. And then after treating me like less-than-even-an-average customer, you say 'Thanks for stopping in' with a stupid smirk in your voice like you know something I don't."

I watch his eyebrows make a complete shift from buried to raised, creating creases on his forehead. No answer.

"I mean, neither of us has even been in contact with one another. At all. I'm not saying we have to be best--" I stop because he's looking amused now. Where did that anger disappear to?

"Come over for Thanksgiving."

"What?" I question fiercely, still agitated.

"Thanksgiving. Come over. Lindsey misses you, I miss these lectures, I know you like my cooking because of that dollop of cream cheese on your lip that you must be saving for later."

I immediately use my sleeve to swipe at my lips, embarrassed. My mind races for a comeback. The lamest, but also the best, proposition comes to mind.

"Only if you let me get Lindsey a haircut." It's still been two months since I promised her one, and I don't know why, but it's been on my mind ever since. She desperately needs a haircut. Soon those split ends will start having split ends of their own.

Slowly, he sticks out his hand, offering to shake on it. "Well, this is the strangest deal I've ever made."

"Not for me," I remark, accepting the handshake, earning an oddly concerned look from Scott. "Aren't you mad at me?"

"Furious. But you and I both know that this bakery is too happy of a place to argue, and I know we'll settle it by Thanksgiving."

"Why are you so angry at me, though?" But inside I'm singing because he thinks we're close enough to work out fights!

Without even flinching, he says, "Because you made me feel raw."

I let silence take over because I have no response for that. In an attempt to change the subject, I tease, "I meant today for that haircut, you know."

He grabs my wrist to look at the watch I'm wearing. "Better get going then," he says. "It's almost three."