?Taryn
As I workedmy way through the end-of-day protocols for cleaning up and closing down the Coffee Kiosk, I couldn’t decide if I was relieved or disappointed Danny hadn’t made good on his threat to catch up with me today. Since it was his first day of practice on a team he was trying to walk on to, his attention would be on his goals. I couldn’t fault him for that. In fact I should be happy he had something better to do than show up at my workplace.
The bell above the door jingled a last-minute straggler, and an involuntary sigh of resignation escaped me. Did people truly need coffee at ten minutes to eight on a Monday night? Especially on a day when my feet were having attitude about me working a double?
I glanced up from where I was washing the pitchers we made smoothies in and caught Danny’s eye. My hands stopped mid-scrub as his smile slammed me right in the chest. Hastily returning my attention to my task, I finished rinsing soap from the pitchers and set them in the rack to dry. When I turned toward the counter, drying my hands on the towel hanging from a bar below the coffee machine, he was already there. That grin said he was happy to see me, which of course he was. Next to some guys he’d probably met in practice today, I was one of the few people in town that he knew.
I couldn’t help but let loose a tiny smile in response to his killer one. “Hey, Slick. Are you sure you want coffee this late when you’re facing early-morning practice?”
“If I order a grasshopper steamer, will you talk to me?”
My brows came together. “Um, I talk to you all the time.” A voice coming from the peanut gallery in the back of my head reminded me I’d been avoiding him since he came home, but I ruthlessly ignored it. “In answer to your weird question, no. You don’t have to order anything if all you want to do is talk. But I’m in the middle of cleaning up and closing, so don’t take offense if I get distracted.”
His eyes took a tour of the otherwise empty shop and came back to me. “Am I adding to your work if I get that steamer?”
I relaxed a fraction. “Nope. I haven’t cleaned the steamer wand yet.” Reaching for the cups, I asked, “What size?”
“Whatever your fancy name is for medium.” A smirk played over his lips as he leaned a hip against the counter.
Shaking my head at his ridiculousness, I grabbed a cup, pumped some chocolate syrup into it, added a shot of mint, filled it the rest of the way up with whole milk, and held it to the steam wand. After two years of practice, I could tell by feel of the cup and a certain faint scent of warm milk when the drink was perfect. I slid the cup away from the wand, ran my clean washcloth over it, popped a lid on the top of the cup, and handed it to him.
“On the house.”
“You don’t have—”
Waving a hand at him, I cut him off. “It’s your first week on campus. Consider it a welcome to Mountain State present.” I grinned and went back to work wiping down the counters.
I could feel his eyes on me as he sipped his steamer, but since he was the one who wanted to talk, I decided to wait for him to initiate. It helped that I had something to do to keep my hands busy. Sliding my eyes to the clock above the menu board, I noted it was straight-up closing time. I tossed my rag into the sink and stepped out from behind the counter and over to the front door, turning the lock and switching the “open” sign to “closed.” Then I grabbed a broom from the closet behind the counter and started sweeping the floors.
All the while, he sipped his drink and watched me until finally, I caved.
“What did you want to talk about?”
“Why you’ve been avoiding me since I came back.” Was it me, or had his voice deepened at some point over the past year?
I stopped working to face him, one hand on the broom, the other on my hip. “Are you serious with that ego? In case you missed it, I don’t live at Mark and Ginny’s place anymore. I pop in when I can, but I live, work, and go to school here.”
The floor took the brunt of my tirade as I all but attacked it with the broom for a minute or two before a snort alerted me I might have given myself away with my snark.
“Kind of defensive there, T.”
“Whatever,” I mumbled as I finished my chore and went to work refilling the condiments station. After I completed that task, I moved on to restocking cups and lids. Only when I accidentally caught his eye over the mountain of cups did I catch that I’d gone on autopilot. Everything I needed to do to close up, except for emptying the till, was done.
“Look, we can’t talk in here, or someone might come along and think I’m still open.” Nodding for him to follow me to the office, I cut the lights in the front of the store, leaving only one strip glowing above the work area. “Wait here,” I said when he stepped through the office door.
I grabbed the bag for the till and wasted no time cashing out and filling the cash bag with the evening’s receipts. It was the part of the job that never failed to make me nervous.
Now that I was an assistant manager, I was often in charge at the end of the evening. Usually I had a co-worker with me, but Gwen had had to leave an hour before close tonight for some reason she didn’t fully articulate, and I’d foolishly let her go. Obviously, I had some things to learn in my new position.
“Face the door, please,” I instructed Danny when I returned to the office.
He shot me a knowing smirk but didn’t argue. I hustled to shove the bag into the safe and close it up. Then I untied my apron, tossed it into the dirty apron basket, and grabbed my wallet and keys from my locker.
“We’ll head out the back, okay?”
His eyes danced above his cup as he took another pull from his steamer. “Lead the way.”
Once we were outside with the shop safely locked up, I led the way right back around to a bench located at the front of the Coffee Kiosk.
