A Cup of Coffee

c h a p t e r 2 2

Adam

"You should try their buffalo fries" Katie suggested as she sat across me at booth we sat at. We decided to eat at the nearest restaurant we could find and after making sure the cupcakes were in the cooler for the tenth time, Elizabeth finally followed us in.

"Oh and you should try their cheese fries too, it taste really good." Katie piped up once again, her eyes never leaving the menu. Elizabeth caught my eyes as she entered the doors and grinned at me. I scooted over once she approached the table and gave her space to sit beside me.

"Why don't we order both?" I suggested, skimming through the menu and deciding on baked rice with sausages.

"Really?" Katie beamed and clapped her hands. Once we settled our orders, we put the menus aside and started chatting away.

"So Adam, what do you do?" Katie propped her elbow up on the table and rested her chin on her fists. She eyed Elizabeth playfully as if they were conversing through their eyes.

"I'm currently finishing up school to get my degree in Computer Science and I've been a photographer for almost three years now. What about you?"

"Ah, that's really cool! I'm not really sure what I'm doing. To be honest, I was planning to drop out of college." She looked down and the jovial Katie disappeared almost immediately. I stared at her, not knowing what to say next. Elizabeth shifted uncomfortably on her seat and reached out to hold Katie's hands.

"What do you mean?" Elizabeth asked, a worried expression plastered on her face.

"I just don't feel like this path is for me. I'm not happy. Let's talk about it later. Please Liz," Katie pleaded with Elizabeth as they stared at each other for a while.

"Okay. I'm sorry you feel that though babe," It was pretty awkward for a while but soon Katie was back to her happy self. We talked about her past boyfriends and Elizabeth was cracking up at her best friend's stories. She would speak up at certain times but allowed Katie to do all the talking.

Our food arrived and it smelled simply amazing. Elizabeth have a steaming plate of rice and chicken chops while Katie have a huge pile of pasta in front of her. We had a few side dishes and the servings here was incredibly large. The buffalo fries were definitely to die for and so was the cheese fries. It had spring onions and chilli peppers sprinkled on it which gave it a little bit of a kick.

We completely devoured our meals and our side dishes. For the first half of our meals, our table was dead silent and us trio simply focused on finishing our food. Katie ended up paying for our meals and I tried to pay multiple times but the look Elizabeth and Katie gave me, was enough to stop me.

We dropped Katie off back at the dorms and we headed to the orphanage at the next town. It was almost two in the afternoon by the time we reached the small run down building. There were drawings of children pasted all over, thus basically covering the entire window. Elizabeth rang the doorbell twice and an elderly lady about Phoebe's age greeted us with a warm smile on her face.

"Hello Eliza, we missed you sweetheart!" She pulled Elizabeth into a tight hug and exchanged a few words with her before turning to me with a wide smile on her face. Her silver eyes searched mine for recognition.

"This is Adam, Phoebe's grandson."

"Hello Ma'am," I offered my hand to shake hers as my other held the cooler.

"Hello Adam, Phoebe talked about you a whole lot. My name is Wanda," she shook my hand and eventually we were asked to come in. There was another door we had to enter before we got to the room where the children were.

"Lizzy!"

"Bethyyy!"

"Liz!"

The children in the room erupted with excitement as each of them saw Elizabeth. She's got multiple names here apparently.

"Eliza, the children had been asking about you for weeks now. What do we tell her?" Wanda turned to the children. They were about three to eight year olds.

"Thank you for visiting us!" They all cheered and gathered around her and gave her a big bear hug as a group. Wanda smiled and left the room as she said she still had some paper work to catch up on.

"Who is he?" The youngest of the bunch asked as she tugged at my pants.

"It's Lizzy's boyfriend! Who else?" A little girl in jumper pitched in, her pigtails bouncing as she skipped around me.

"But you said you didn't have a boyfriend Bethy," cried a little boy who was hugging Elizabeth's legs.

"Yeah, she said she was waiting for her soulmate!" Another child chirped in.

"Speaking of soulmates! Let me see your wrist, Rufus." Elizabeth smiled and approached a timid looking boy who was standing at the back of the group. She gently pushed his sleeves up and ran her finger on his wrist.

"You okay?" She asked softly and Rufus hugged her as he whispered a few words to her.

The children started to form a crowd around me and bombarded me with questions as to whether I liked Elizabeth and why I was there. After much interrogation, Elizabeth thankfully stepped in to distract the children.

"Guess what! Adam here helped me baked some cupcakes for everyone," she announced as the twenty or so children started excitedly squealing in delight. After sternly telling the children to behave, she handed out the cupcakes and then took out a book from the shelves. Automatically, the children shifted and faced her as she sat herself down on one of the chairs behind her.

I proceeded to sit at the very back of the group and started snapping pictures of her as she read to the kids. She made up funny faces and exaggerated parts of the book to keep the children's attention on her. Watching her in her element was so different. Elizabeth's happiness was so genuine and you could feel the positivity in her body radiating to everyone. We took turns reading to children and playing games with them. We even had dinner with them and helped the older ones as they washed their dishes. It was only nine in the evening but the children were already exhausted and were all in bed by the time we were heading out to leave.

"Did you enjoy today?" She asked quietly as we walked to my car.

"This was honestly the best date ever,"

"That's really good to hear. Thank you for coming along and helping me a whole lot,"

"I think I need to thank you for introducing me to such wonderful people. They are so pure."

"They are the sweetest. I'm sad that they haven't been adopted. They're good children."

"They are,"

"They are so adorable, I missed them so much but exams were just all over the place," she spoke and I could hear guilt in her voice.

"I'm sure they understand. You're beating yourself up too much,"

"I know I try not to," she replied, looking down at her nails.

"I heard you were waiting for your soul mate?" I wanted to mentally smack myself on the face because that was some smooth transition.

"Well he's here now so the waiting is over for me. Poor Rufus though is pretty terrified."

"What's happening?" I asked as we ended up sitting at the bench near the parking space.

"He's terrified at the thought of meeting his soul mate. He came from a really rough childhood and these things take a toll on him when he remembers things of the past. The whole soul mate situation is a bit touchy for him,"

"That's really devastating, he's barely six,"

"Yeah, but he's a tough one, just really young. And soul mates aren't necessary bad. I think they make life better."

"You really think so?" I turned to look at her but she was already looking at me.

"Yes, because you made mine better in the short time you're with me," she whispered, smiling at me. And in that moment, I could feel myself falling. 

Falling in love with her.