And absolutely ridiculous.
His hands flail high, hitting one of the hanging lights.
“Shit.” He holds it, stopping it from spinning, and I lose the battle with myself and laugh. “Are you laughing at me, Natalie?”
That somehow makes me smile wider, and my laugh carries louder. “No,” I add between a laugh and a snort. A snortle, as Cara calls it.
What in the actual world?
The song ends, and he tiptoes back to his seat on a catwalk.
“Now, that…that was ridiculous,” he adds, both of us laughing now.
I prep a coffee for him silently, chuckling at the absurdity of the past fifteen minutes, and set it in front of him. “On the house today, for the laughs and the grace.”
“Oh, Natalie, darling. I’m more expensive than a coffee.” He takes a sip. “No matter how good it is.” With a wink, he sets his laptop on top of the table.
“You watched me first, and you don’t see me here asking for payment, sir.”
“You should… That was magnificent.”
Aaaaand I’m blushing.
I know I’m blushing. And if I know it, he can definitely see it too.
"It’s usually slow on weekdays around this time, and it’s raining, so people stay in their homes. You know Floridians and driving in the rain.” I let out a sigh and sit in my chair, continuing to explain to this man why I was singing and dancing as if I was home. “I can’tnotdance when that song plays, and well, I let go too hard."
His hand rests under his chin, a soft smile on his face, and his eyes crinkle in the corners. “Why does it feel like you’re apologizing?”
“Because I am.”
“Why?”
“Because this is a bookstore, not a dance studio.”
“So?”
I shrug.
“I don’t see the flowers apologizing for blooming.” His praise wraps around me like a blanket, but I try not to read too much into it.
“Thanks,” I mutter.
He hums and gets to work on his laptop.
We spend the next few hours like this, each of us with a coffee in hand, quietly doing what we are supposed to be doing.
“I saw him,” he mentions, breaking the silence.
“Who?”
“The hypothetical man we talked about the other day.”
What is he talking—oh. This is one of my favorite things about this job: connecting with people beyond selling them some goods. It’s the little chit-chats in between coffees. or the fact that he kept his promise and came back. He knew I’d want to know, even if he barely knows me.
“Can I ask how it went?”
“Do you really want to know?”
