Prompt: A hella gay fic where Joji is a street preformer that plays his guitar, sings and shit. And he does it outside this coffee shop because why the fuck not. Then Ian, who's a worker, always sits outside on his lunch break and watches him preform.
1.2K words
Creds to @cum_in_my_rice for the prompt
"Baby, could you be a little bit stronger? Baby, 'cause I need a little longer. You're an earthly comfort, yet so divine, yet so divine, I never see you anymore."
The lyrics paired with guitar were faint through the walls off the coffee shop, yet still sounded beautiful. Every now and then, Ian would hear it a little more clearly when a customer would walk through the door.
The singing man sat on a bench right outside one of the windows of the storefront. Ian worked at a coffee shop in a not-so-busy area of Manhattan. It's nothing special really, it barely has enough seating and workers to run it, and there were almost no tourists who showed up.
So they made the decision to not make it into gaudy, touristy, basic shop, and keep it authentic. Which is normally what draws in more random stragglers from the street.
The guy outside's been playing on random days for the past two weeks. At first the manager wanted to say something, because he was worried that he'd fuck up their business. But surprisingly enough, he drew in customers by bringing attention to the store.
So they let him stay there. Occasionally he'd come in for a cup of coffee or a snack, and then laugh about being broke. Which worked out well, because everybody working there loved hearing his music.
It was around 3:00, and there was barely anybody there. Ian made him a cup of coffee, what he usually got from them, and also grabbed a cookie that they'd have to throw out the next day. He wasn't really sure why he was doing it. Maybe he was being nice, or maybe he just wanted an excuse to talk to him.
He didn't even bother to take off his gloves when he left with the items and quietly stood in front of the musician. The man stopped playing abruptly and looked up with a grin.
"You didn't have to do that." He said.
"Oh, don't worry too much, this cookie has to be thrown out tomorrow and the coffee... well, it's just a regular coffee, but don't tell my boss that." Ian winked.
The musician laughed, accepting the items. "What's your name, anyways? I'm out here often enough, should probably know someone in there."
"Legally it's Ian, but you can call me anytime." He laughed some more, giving Ian a smile that made his stomach twist.
"Alright anytime, I'm Joji, pleased to meet you."
Ian had to go back to work after that, so he left Joji to his playing and listened from behind the counter.
As time went on, Joji eventually got a sense of Ian's shifts, and would always come in to get something. It had gotten to the point that the second Joji walked in, Ian was already making his coffee.
Ian and Joji had also ended up learning small things about each other. For example, Joji learned that Ian once picked up a squirrel from the street with his bare hands, and kept it as a pet for a week. And Ian learned that one time, Joji was playing a game with his friends and lit small fireworks under his nuts, after losing a lettuce eating race.
It came to the point where they were totally unofficially dating. Ian's coworkers had started referring to Joji as "Ian's boyfriend," and he had given up correcting them after a week.
But one Friday night, Ian was working late, and was expected to work until closing. He had cleaned all the equipment, turned everything off, locked up anything that needed to be, practically everything except for a bit of cleaning.
It should've been pretty obvious to anyone on the streets that they were closed, considering all the chairs were on the tables and almost all the lights were off. So Ian almost flipped his shit when he heard somebody walk in the store.
"Listen, I understand if you've had a long day, but we're closed, alright? No story you come up with is gonna change that, so go find another coffee shop-"
He stopped talking immediately when he saw Joji leaning against the wall with an extremely amused smirk on his face. "Alright, if you say so." He said, putting his hands up and pushing himself off the wall.
Ian rolled his eyes and walked over so that he reached Joji just as he was at the door. "We can be open another minute. So long as you help me sweep."
Ian handed Joji a broom and walked away as he did a little more cleaning. "Wow, what marvellous customer service. You'll definitely be getting five stars on Yelp."
The only response he got was a barely audible scoff, and even though he technically didn't have to do anything, Joji started helping him sweep the floor. "Holy hell, why's this place so dirty?" He asked Ian.
"Because of people like you bringing your filth in." Ian teased.
"I beg your pardon? I'm the cleanliest man on earth, possibly the entire universe, definitely the whole galaxy."
"Whatever you say, filthy..." Ian stopped sweeping as he thought. "Filthy... Frank?"
Joji started cracking up as he walked over to Ian. "Frank? Really? I sound like your alcoholic stepfather."
"I'm sorry, I couldn't think of anything. I doubt you could do any better." Ian replied.
"Totally could." Joji muttered. Ian noticed that Joji was giving him a certain look, though he couldn't place it.
"What?" Ian asked, furrowing his eyebrows. He continued to get the look and was still extremely confused. "What!? Joji, why are you-"
Joji stepped closer and placed a hand on Ian's cheek, his lips less than an inch away from Ian's. "Can I kiss you?"
Ian was sure his face was getting red, so he didn't even answer, just moved a bit so that he closed the gap and kissed him slowly.
They pulled away after some time, and Joji tried to kiss Ian again but he pushed him off. "Not until I finish closing."
"Well shit, hand me a broom my man." Joji said, taking the one that Ian had dropped.
"Did you just call me that? Did I actually just hear you say that with my own two ears?" Ian asked, his expression one of extreme shock.
"Oh, but I did."
Ian had to clean tables so he couldn't come up with any witty remarks. There was a while of silence where the only sound was the somewhat busy street and the occasional joke.
"Can I ask you something?" Ian said after twenty minutes of quiet wiping and sweeping. Joji looked over at him as a sign that he was listening. "Wanna go get dinner once we're done, my man?"
"I thought you'd never ask."
Am I the queen of regular updates?? Most definitely.
Sorry though, school's been taking up most of my time, between clubs and homework and shit, plus lots of friend drama. Thanks for reading regardless, you're all beautiful and amazing.
