“Oh God, I’m so sorry!” The man sprang to his feet, nearly knocking me over. I pulled a rag from my apron and frantically tried to mop up the spill. I smiled meekly at the stranger, “I cannot believe I just did that.”
“Yeah, well, neither can I,” he said, snatching a sketchpad off the table. There was an ugly tan stain spreading across the page, causing the precise lines and shading to bleed and fade. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve been working on this?” He held up the dripping notebook accusingly. “Is passing out cups of coffee really that hard?”
“I really am sorry. I guess I was just lost in thought,” I fumbled, collecting the pieces of the broken mug.
“Oh, I’m sure you’re just full of riveting thoughts,” he huffed.
“I didn’t do it on purpose. And I apologized. A decent person would accept it and move on.” I was now solely focused on the rude customer, forgetting the coffee that had begun to drip from the table onto the polished concrete floor.
The coffee house used to be a gallery in the 80’s. One of many artist-run galleries that showed up in the East Village at the time. But, as the neighborhood grew, most of those places shut down. The space had changed hands countless times in the past decades. Each new owner trying to make something relevant and unique in a city where everything from the lamp posts to the people feels like copy and paste. For the last three years the space had been owned by a French woman who spent most of her time on the Upper East Side. Mademoiselle Durand, the daughter of some rich French art collector, only deigned to drop in to collect rent or if the rumor mill had churned out the name of some avant-garde artist coming back to relive their glory days.
On an unremarkable Tuesday such as this however, it was normally only Maggie - the other barista, Connor in the back doing dishes, and myself. The three of us spent our days dealing with tourists, regulars, and worst of all, pretentious artists who thought they were the best thing since Andy Worhal. The lean, tan, unshaven man in front of me seemed to be one such person. And judging by the way he was glaring, I had just spilled cappuccino on the next great American masterpiece.
“What makes you think I’m a decent person?” he said with angst and self importance. The glint in his eyes and set of his jaw as he looked at his sketchpad was infuriating. Who does this guy think he is? Is he too good to make eye contact with the help? Glaring up at him, pale blue eyes finally met mine.
“Well, don’t worry,” I said, wiping up the last of the ruined drink, “I won’t make that mistake again.” I turned on my heel and marched back to the counter, dumping the remains of the cup in the bin. I settled in next to Maggie just in time to see the man strut out the door.
“Whoa Talia. What was that all about?” Maggie turned to me, clearly having witnessed the whole tragedy unfold.
I loosed a heavy sigh and leaned back against the counter. “I spilled a drink.”
“Yeah, obviously. I mean what was that?” Maggie bobbed her chin towards the door. She was wearing the same look she did any time she spotted a guy across a bar, or ‘fell in love’ on the train. “You guys had a whole … energy.”
I ducked under the counter to grab clean mugs and to hide the growing blush on my cheeks. “What you were feeling would be loathing.”
“I thought I felt a bit of a spark.” She peered at me with a smirk.
I scoffed, “Are you kidding me? I could never have a spark with someone that self absorbed.” Setting the mugs aside with a little more force than necessary, I started wiping down the espresso machine. From the amount of shaky energy in my hands, you’d think I had just had a double shot.
“Who cares if he’s self absorbed when he looks like that!” Maggie’s eyes shot back to where the man had disappeared from the shop. “He is like the definition of tall, dark, and handsome. Except instead of handsome he was Straight Up Sexy.”
I crossed my arms and stared down the street outside the window, as if I could still see him in the crowd. Admittedly, she wasn’t wrong. Aside from his horrifying personality, the artist was exactly my type. He had messy hair that was so dark brown it was almost black. His strong jaw complimented his broad shoulders. Straight Up Sexy was the perfect name for his strong, lean muscles and long legs. But none of that was an excuse for being an asshole.
“Apparently I ruined his life’s work.” I put on my best important artist voice.
“Do you think he’ll include you in his autobiography? ‘Many people tried to stand in my way, but I overcame adversity to be where I am now.’” Maggie waved her hands around with an over dramatic flourish.
I couldn’t help but laugh. My sour moods never stuck around long when I was with Maggie. We had both started at the shop around three years ago and were attached at the hip from day one. At that time there had been a handful of other baristas. All young hopeful types, who moved to the city with big dreams and family money. Some of them had actually achieved those dreams. Others had failed, given up, or moved on. Most baristas at Le Petit Haricot didn’t stay for long. This was just a pit stop. A way to live until they caught a break. It had been the same for me and Maggie when we first started. Maggie was going to be a singer. She even had a weekly slot at a jazz club a few blocks away. These days she was still going to auditions and open calls. But, in whatever free time she had left, Maggie would record covers to put online. I had plans to be an author. When I first came to the city I thought I would become an editor at some big publishing house. Instead, I received rejection after rejection. In the meantime, I was ghost writing for any journal that would have me and curating a blog for tourists. Even still, we never left The Bean (you know haricot/bean, you get it.) This was the place that brought us together. Even when dreams seemed like a waste of time, we could come into work and remind each other why we kept trying.
The rest of my shift passed rather uneventfully. People came in, I gave them coffee, some were even pleasant enough to smile and tip. But my mind kept going back to S.U.S. I would trip and think about his rude comments. I would be doodling on an old receipt and remember his overflowing sketchpad. After cleaning the espresso machine and sweeping the floors, Maggie and I started our standard Friday night march to the only true dive bar in the area. Sitting at a sticky high top table, we drank and laughed and made up stories about the people passing by on the street.
“Okay, he is on his way to see his mistress,” Maggie said, pointing at a classically handsome man in his 40’s. “He is running late and she’s not going to wait forever.” Just as she said the words the man checked his watch, straightened his tie, and picked up his pace causing us to giggle stupidly.
I spotted the next target, “Ooh, her.” I pointed to a woman on the other side of the street. She looked around 28 or 29, only a few years older than us. As she walked, there was a ghost of a smile on her lips. But she wasn’t walking. The woman was gliding across the pavement. I mean it literally looked as though she wasn’t picking up her feet between each step. Her whole body just flowed past the other pedestrians, like a stream over time worn stones.
“She just fell in love. She met a man, and he is kind and respectful and funny and strong. For the first time in her life she feels seen and known. She is weightless and grounded. She found him and now she knows what the rest of her life will look like.” I finished with a sigh. Then I felt Maggie’s eyes searing into the side of my face. Turning to look at her I saw her teasing smirk and knew what she would say before she even opened her mouth.
“You really are a hopeless romantic.” I started to protest but she cut me off with a flip of her auburn curls. “I don’t care how long you try to deny it. I know you too well at this point. Talia, it’s like you’re waiting for the whole world to fall in love. When are you going to decide it’s your turn?”
I thought for a minute. All my life I had loved the idea of love. Watching people fall into it with their eyes closed and hearts open. Like running into a field of wildflowers, not thinking about the snakes in the grass. Those people always seemed so brave to me. The way they could give themselves to someone before they really knew who that person was. But what happens when the floor falls out from underfoot and you can’t trust them to hold you tight and not let go? Then you end up broken and bleeding. Trying to piece back together who you are without the person that made you whole. My wounds were still raw. There were places in the city that I could not go, songs that I couldn’t bring myself to listen to. I had been irrevocably changed. From the person with everything planned, to flying through life, terrified about what tomorrow would bring. HE changed me. I didn't know if I could find the person that I used to be.
But the world needs people like that, who trust others implicitly. I guess holding onto that idea of love seemed safer to me than going out and actually finding it.
“Tease me all you want Maggie, but my story was better than yours and you know it.” I smirked at her then took the last sip of my third old-fashioned. I gazed down the street after the woman. My revelry was short lived however, because walking the opposite way was the man from the coffee shop.