Chapter Text
It was a slow morning, as most weekdays were. A cold, rainy morning in the early days of October meant a slow trickle of people dragging their muddy shoes over the endlessly polished tiles of Mr Oldacre’s- the small coffee shop over the road from the Chinese takeaway that I called my place of work.
It wasn’t much, simply a small cafe with a few tables leaning against the floor to ceiling windows faced away from the wooden countertop where there stood a display cabinet of cakes, pastries and sandwiches. As the doors swung open in these kinds of mornings, the scent of fresh coffee mingled with the damp autumnal air and pleased the souls of those fortunate enough to pass by.
It was almost perfect.
I’ve been working at Mr Oldacre’s for a year now. I’d just finished teacher training and my degree in engineering, and I was looking for something to keep me on my feet whilst I searched for something that piqued my interests more than swirling foam in a mug for hours on end. I wanted to be an engineering teacher, but it just… didn't work out.
From my childhood, I had a passion for building things. For making things.
In middle school I would walk over to my friend’s and fix their broken bikes, mend a broken washing machine and be offered some cash by their parents. I always turned it down- I didn't do it for money.
In high school I moved onto cars. I loved working with cars- everything made sense to me in a way that things at school and in life just didn't. Every few weeks I'd get a call from someone new asking if I could come and fix up their parents' car because they’d crashed it into the neighbours wall after getting drunk.
And I did. It was my release, all the pent up stress of school I could take out on an old, broken engine. Something I was good at. They’d give me a few dollars and occasionally some food for my struggles.
Somehow that led me to where I am now.
I decided to do a degree in engineering once I left school, and I fixed cars on the side. It gave me a bit of cash, but it wasn’t taking me as far as I’d hoped. So I decided to take up a position at the coffee shop around the corner from my garage. Now, the early hours of my day were filled by the warmth of coffee whilst the long night hours were consumed by the drip of motor oil. It wasn’t my favourite, but it was secure.
“So,” his eyes narrowed, absentmindedly swirling the coffee in his mug as he spoke. “You’d leave this place… for a big engineering gig?”
“Yeah.” I paused. “Yeah, definitely.”
“I just don't get you.” Jacob, my coworker and almost-friend peered at me over the rim of his mug. “I like it here, its… cozy and domestic.”
“Cozy and domestic?” I leaned back against the polished wood of the counter and let out a small laugh. I hated domesticity. I’d rather be getting my hands dirty working.
“Yeah, like, it’s quite intimate, you know? Working with the same people at the same time every day in the same building making the same drinks.”
“No, that sounds weird.” Millie, my other coworker and almost-friend, craned her neck around the doorframe dividing the dishwashing station and the main cafe. “I don’t think intimate is the right word.”
The gentle hum of people in the cafe against the ‘carefully curated’ music that Jacob insisted on playing on early mornings to “boost morale!” did feel quite cozy. Watching the way the leaves fell from the trees through the condensation on the window and the smell of coffee made me feel a warmth inside that I thought I lost years ago.
“No, he has a point,” I gently pushed myself off the counter and drifted towards the window. “It’s very cozy here. But my problem is that… I don’t want… cozy. I don't want warm. I want to do something that makes me think. Right now I’m just pressing buttons on machines that do all the work for me. It’s just…” I trail off.
Jacob says what I wanted to. “Boring?”
“Yeah.”
“This is a stupid conversation.” Millie trails out of the dishwashing station, wet rag draped over her shoulder. “Can we just do our work?”
“Sorry.” Jacob and I say in unison before turning around and making ourselves look busy.
I remember my first day at the cafe. I remember how I came in, all nerves, looking like I got dressed in the dark, fumbling around like the idiot I was.
I remember how Jacob and Millie took me under their wing, helping me through the day with patience one could only describe as never ending.
I remember a woman, a very kind woman, my first customer. She was patient with me, and spoke to me about engineering. Something about her drew me in, and I had to talk with her more.
She ordered an iced americano- classy, collected. I took a liking to her immediately. She had a kind face, a very beautiful face, and she was incredibly clever.
She told me at length about her degree and what path she chose to go down. She told me about her aspirations to work for NASA ever since she was a little girl. She told me about her current job as a high school teacher and how it wasn't what she had envisioned for herself, but she found it nice as it gave her structure.
But she never told me her name. And god, how I wish she had.
Ever since that day, I’d thought about her. How much I wanted to talk to her again. I’d planned out possible scenarios in my mind and played them back to myself in bed every night. Millie even pointed out that if I saw her again, I’d probably get scared and run away, which isn't far from the truth.
I try to shake the thought from my mind.
The day drags on slowly as it usually does- people come and go, the rain passes by, the clouds hover low over the town but the thoughts in my mind never slow.
Who was she?
—-
Night rolls around as I least expect it. The cafe is empty now, chairs upon freshly cleaned tables, all our coffee equipment tucked away messily in the cupboards, and blinds shut, letting only the faint dribble of moonlight through.
“Any luck on the job search?” Millie pats me on the shoulder.
“I haven’t properly looked yet. I feel like I shouldn't."
“Why not?”
I shrug. “I have other things to worry about.”
Jacob chimes in. “Just do what makes you happy. If the coffee shop isn't making you happy, that's okay.”
I don’t want to think about it too much. I simply nod and stare down at my shoes as the other two saunter off, now deep in customer gossip.
I sigh and pull my coat over my shoulders, feeling the warmth of its embrace as a sharp contrast to the gentle chill of the cafe.
Millie and Jacob wave me goodbye and begin making their way home- it's always my job to close up.
My fingers fumble with the cold metal of the lock as the keys jingle in the breeze. Eventually, I manage to lock the large doors- the same way I've done for the last year or so.
I’ve fallen into a simple routine working at Oldacre’s. The same things happen at the same time every day with mostly the same people each time. Everything feels like it has a purpose- integral to the structure of my day. I find myself, at times, going through the structure I have made and imagining what it could be like at my new job.
But that doesn’t matter right now.
Because there is no work for me in the garage today. I feel incomplete.
My house is warm when I get there. With an exasperated sigh I hang my coat up on the hooks next to the door and toss the keys absentmindedly across the wooden cabinet across the hall.
My stomach rumbles with the regret of not grabbing a Chinese. I groan, and toss whatever I can find in the freezer into the oven- fries seem to do the job.
Whilst I wait for my food to cook, I grab my phone and respond to the ‘Home safe?’ message that Millie sent me with a little thumbs up. I smile.
Then something crosses my mind again.
Job.
Jacobs' words echo in my mind, “Just do what makes you happy.”
I decide to quickly browse any website I can find for a vacancy, but every time there’s nothing, or it’s just too far away to be reasonable. I am definitely not in the financial state to move house.
I place my phone face down on the countertop and stare at the ceiling. This is starting to become pointless
The oven beeps.
Dragging myself to the living room with my sad plate of fries and ketchup in hand, I sit in the corner and pull my laptop from my weathered leather satchel, pretending to do something productive.
When really, I'm trying to find my escape route from this job.
As I pry it open, something comes over me.
I just can't put my finger on what it is. It feels like guilt, like regret, but I just can’t figure it out.
I dreamed about finding a job, leaving the cafe, doing what I really loved all the time. But it just wasn’t going to happen, I told myself. I just wasn’t a coffee person.
I ignore it, and resume searching for engineering job vacancies nearby. As the search whirls and buffers, my fingers remain rested upon the shining keyboard as I stare dazed into the television, something droning on in the background that I must’ve flicked on without fully realising it.
The screen keeps buffering for around 10 minutes, at which point I lose all hope. With a scoff, I slowly close my laptop, screen shutting off almost instantly, and I tuck it into my bag again.
Another unsuccessful attempt.
I sigh.
It’ll happen eventually.
My plate of food sits there, untouched, probably cold by now.
“Man.” I sigh to myself, raising a cold fry to my mouth and taking a small, disgusted bite.
-
The next morning at work, it was abnormally busy. I’d served around 30 people in the last hour, strange for a cold, rainy weekday.
Jacob’s questionable selection of music was once again humming through the speakers. It was quieter than normal due to the increased humdrum and warmth of the building. Rain slowly ran down each of the windows, the soft patter against the panes made me smile.
I felt better than I did yesterday, more optimistic to say the least. Maybe it was just the caffeine, or maybe it was the fact I had forgotten entirely about last night's unsuccessful job search.
I’d given up hope. Maybe the universe wanted me to stay a barista forever.
Jacob approaches me with a nervous grin half way through the day. “I have something I need you to help me with.”
“Oh? What’s up?” I turn to face him.
“I think I broke the coffee machine.”
“Jacob!”
“I know, I’m sorry… but you’re good at… cars. Surely those skills can transfer to something smaller and less deadly.”
“Yeah, I’ll give it a go.”
Jacob kept close by, the line of customers all gone now, watching as I twisted different screws and pressed different buttons, hoping desperately that he hadn't completely ruined our thousand-dollar coffee machine.
After five or so minutes without any interruption, Jacob taps me on the shoulder frantically.
“What?” I crane my neck around to look at him.
“Look.” He gestured vaguely towards the door, where someone is now walking in.
A woman.
A customer I recognised.
Someone I’ve seen before- which isn’t unusual- we have our regulars. But there’s something about her, something about the way she carries herself, something about the way her hair is pulled back carefully into a ponytail, something about the way she’s dressed so professionally yet so casually. So classy, so collected.
I just can’t put my finger on it.
Her eyes flick over to me. Deep, brown eyes.
And she smiles. I walk up to the counter.
“Hi, what can I get for you?”
“Uhm, just an iced americano, please. Oh, and a croissant.”
I recognise her almost instantly.
The woman from my first day.
“Okay, wonderful, that’ll be… $5.50.” I keep my composure. My facade of professionalism doesn’t slip, despite my internal nervousness.
She taps her card with a nonchalance and grace that I can’t comprehend. She saunters off to the side to wait for her coffee.
“Jacob,” I whisper, swivelling quickly around on my heel. “That was the woman.”
“I know.”
“From my first day.”
“I know.”
“She wanted a croissant. Can you do that for me?”
He nods and gets to work. I approach the only other functioning coffee machine, sighing. God, it really was her.
As I’m making it, I see in the corner of my eye that Jacob is now deep in conversation with engineering lady. My stomach sinks- an almost jealous feeling. What were they talking about?
I walk over and casually slide the coffee over to her with a smile.
She walks off, unaffected by that interaction, coffee in hand.
I remember what she told me. I remember her coffee order. I remember how she smiled as I spoke. I remember how her hair was loose across her shoulders, and how she wore a dark blouse that complemented her deep brown eyes. I sigh, watching as she walks over to the same table in the corner that we sat at together all that time ago.
Jacob comes up behind me again. “She was telling me about how her motorbike had recently broken and that she hadn’t had the chance to take it to a mechanic because she was too busy.“
“Oh.” I feel my stomach drop again.
“So I told her you were a mechanic.”
“Okay.”
“And that you could fix her motorbike.”
I didn’t reply.
He just stared at me.
“Okay,” I started. “Did she say when would be good?” My heart pounded in my chest.
“She said she might come by tomorrow afternoon.”
Almost in sync, we turned our heads towards where she was sitting, then back at each other.
“Okay.” I breathed out. “Should I go and talk to her?”
“Absolutely! Maybe you can finally discover who she really is.” He high-fived me.
“She’s a real woman, not a cartoon supervillain.” I laughed, inhaling deeply, and I began to take myself over to her table.
It won't be that bad, I reassured myself. Why was I scared? She was a very lovely woman. I wanted to get to know her more. I chose to talk to this woman.
Approaching her table nervously, I brushed myself down and she looked up at me, mouth full of croissant.
“Long time no see.” She laughs. Light, warm, reassuring.
She remembered me. I take a deep breath.
“Jacob said you needed a mechanic?”
Her gaze softened, and she smiled. “Yes! Desperately.”
I nod. “May I sit?”
She gestures to the empty seat opposite her. “Oh, you’re my saviour. I would’ve just done it myself, but…” She laughs, warm and full. “My priorities lie elsewhere.”
Our eyes meet. “Like where?”
“I’m still teaching physics and chemistry at the high school a few streets over. I’m a busy woman.”
“That adds up.” The anxiety I felt just moments ago dissipates as I lean against the table, listening fondly to what she has to say.
“Most of the time I’m completely lost in paperwork and grading, but I do enjoy my job. It’s great, being able to inspire so many young people.” She smiles softly.
I don’t know how to respond. The anxiety hasn’t fully gone away.
“It’s a wonderful career. It’s strange to think that just years ago I was waiting for someone to inspire me…” She shakes her head, and looks me in the eyes again. “Sorry, I didn’t catch your name…?” She leans forward inquisitively.
I introduce myself with great caution.
“Nice to meet you. My name’s Christina.”
“Christina.”
That felt right. A lovely name for a lovely woman.
“So, about the motorbike…” She tilted her head to one side.
“Yes, yes.” I sat up straighter, feeling particularly vulnerable from her gaze. “I’m free to help most days, it really depends on when you’re free. I know you’re quite busy.”
“Would tomorrow work? I get off work at 4:30, so I could be there for… 4:45?”
“Yeah, of course! Sounds alright to me.”
“Perfect.” She glaces down at her watch- which I didn't notice was there. Very classy. Very Christina. “God, I really have to get going again. I have a meeting in half an hour.”
“Understandable… It was nice to talk to you again after such a long time.”
“You too. Oh, and also…” she grabs a napkin and scribbles something down on it.
A phone number.
“Just message me if anything changes. It was great seeing you again! I’ll be back another day!” She calls out as she walks out the door, waving.
I stay sat at the table for a little while longer, trying to comprehend what had just happened to me. Her plate sits there dauntingly, and a faint ring of coffee stains the wood of the table, a reminder of what just was.
“Christina…” I say to myself under my breath. “See you tomorrow.” I smile to myself, and stand up to clear the table.