“Try me,” she said as I pulled up in front of her house.
“It’s a long story.”
“If we had more time, would you have shared?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, Mr. Andrew West, you have your reprieve. To be continued?”
“Yes, to be continued,” I promised.
I enjoyed Tabitha’s company and our conversations and would share my reasons for not being able to tell my dad. James already knew. I wouldn’t mind letting Tabitha in … cautiously.
7
Andrew
As new faces bustled around, my eyes moved around the coffee shop. I stood by the merchandise shelf and was floored at how steady the business had been since we opened at four thirty this morning. We were located in downtown L.A. on the corner of the financial district.Would this be the kind of business we could expect Monday through Friday?If so, my dad and I should be kicking ourselves for not having done this sooner.
Brandon walked toward me wearing his black Henley with the Three Brothers Coffee logo on it. I’m so glad that he and Salem talked me into trying some different styles of shirts for employees. Neither of them liked the look of the polo shirts. Salem suggested Henleys for the guys and V-neck t-shirts for the ladies. Brandon carried a box and set it on the floor. He had brought out things to restock the merchandise shelf—things had never flown off the shelf this quickly in our other locations.
“Thanks, Bran. Hand me some things, and I’ll help,” I told him. After we restocked the shelf with the bagged coffee beans and stainless-steel travel tumblers, two women dressed in business attire came over.
“Hello,” I greeted.
“Good morning,” one of them said while the other one smiled and nodded at me.
“We’ve been walking by each day since the signs went up in the window.”
“Yeah, we work over in the Harris Real Estate building and have been dying for good coffee close by.”
“Wonderful, I’m glad to hear.” I took a step back so they could get a closer look at the merchandise shelf.
“Jamie, we should take one of the tumblers to Maria.”
“Yeah, get her two,” Jamie replied. They had six travel tumblers in their arms.
“Do you guys fill these?”
“Absolutely. Each time you bring them in it’s just one dollar to fill the small size and two dollars for the large size.”
“Awesome! You know, with the plastic and paper shame game.”
I agreed with them, and as they turned to get in line, I thanked them for stopping in.
“Oh, you’ll see us this afternoon too. We go to the Patio Café for lunch.”
“And we used to walk two blocks in the other direction to get a terrible iced coffee at the convenience store.”
“Yeah, we require iced coffee for our afternoons.”
“Great, then I’ll see you this afternoon,” I said.Regulars already.
Brandon came back with more tumblers for the shelf.
“Dude, business is going great and it’s not even seven yet,” Brandon murmured.
After the shelf was stocked up again, Brandon went to stand by the door, and he greeted everyone as they came in and handed them our flyer with the specials for the week. I had a full staff on hand and began to wonder if we would eventually need more. The best thing to do was give it a few weeks to see if business would settle down.
