Page 18 of I’m Dreaming of a New York Christmas

I put my headphones on after my drink and croissant arrived, and rummaged about in my bag for my laptop. I might as well get an hour or so of work done while I had the chance – and the space.

A draught from the doorway made me glance up after a few minutes. A guy who looked about my age wandered in, unwrapping a scarf from his neck and waving to the barista, who leaned over the counter and greeted him with a fist bump. Without ordering anything, the customer – who was obviously a regular – looked around for a spot to sit, before his eyes settled on the only available chair: the one opposite me.

‘Is it okay if I…?’

Or at least that’s what I assumed he’d said, as my headphones were still firmly in place. I smiled and nodded, shifting my laptop and crockery closer to me to create extra space on the tabletop. He slipped off his extremely cosy-looking quilted jacket and pulled off his beanie hat to reveal thick, sand-coloured hair that immediately fell over his light green eyes. He swept his floppy fringe back, using a pair of glasses as a makeshift hairband while he opened his backpack and extracted a laptop and his own set of headphones – which were the same make and model as mine. With three of his fingertips, he pressed the outer casing of the cushion over his right ear, which I knew meant he’d activated noise-cancelling mode. I grinned to myself at the immediate insight this swift gesture gave me about this stranger. The very attractive stranger.

I tried to focus on my work but I couldn’t help but notice that the man opposite seemed to be struggling with whatever he was working on. After a while, he slipped his glasses down over his eyes (well, hello, Jude Law from The Holiday – minus the unseasonal tan), and rested his forehead on the heel of his hand, closing his eyes and shaking his head gently. I knew that feeling well: the right words weren’t coming to him.

His coffee arrived shortly after and he removed his headphones to thank the barista while stretching, the bottom of his rust-coloured shirt rising slightly to reveal the tiniest glimpse of a solid, toned midriff.

Stop perving, Flora.

I turned up my white noise a smidge and got back to trying to figure out how the CEO of the soapy start-up might be able to talk about financial projections without relying on cringeworthy rhyming couplets. I was deep in the suds of soap-based puns when a hand touched me on my arm out of nowhere, causing me to physically recoil so intensely that I simultaneously flailed my arms and stood up, forcing my chair to topple to the ground. My mug of coffee met a similar fate, the dregs of my drink heading directly towards my sticker-covered laptop.

Thankfully, the owner of the hand that had triggered my over-the-top reaction – the cute stranger opposite me – managed to whip my computer out of the way before the liquid reached it. The entire coffee shop – now completely silent – watched on. I removed my headphones and opened my mouth to apologise, but the stranger got there first.

‘Woah, I’m so sorry to scare you like that.’ He grabbed some napkins from the counter and began absorbing the puddle of coffee while I picked up the chair. ‘I know how annoying it is when that happens.’ He was talking quickly. ‘I once had such an intense startle response that I ripped the book I was holding in half.’

I swept off the flakes of croissant that were covering the entire front of my body – the presence of which was unrelated to my embarrassing overreaction – and sat back down.

‘You tore an entire book in half?’

‘Well, it was more of a novella.’

The barista arrived with some paper towels, mopping up the remainder of the spillage and taking all the evidence of the incident away.

‘Hey, Cory, can you make another coffee for…?’

The red-faced but smiling stranger looked towards me, his green eyes wide with a question.

‘Flora.’

‘Another coffee for Flora, please. On me, obviously. I’m Ethan, by the way.’

He looked like an Ethan, even though I’d never met one before, nor imagined what one might look like. But his name just… fitted.

‘I bet you wish you’d never sat here,’ I said, our fellow patrons getting back to their own business now the peak of the drama had passed.

‘Not at all. We all need a bit of adrenalin at the start of the day, right?’

Little did he know I’d already had enough adrenalin pumping through my body in the last twenty-four hours – and in the last six months – to last me a lifetime.

‘We do. Umm, so what was it you wanted?’

‘Huh?’

‘When you… touched my arm. Did you want to tell me something?’

‘Oh yeah, ha. I was going to ask if you could watch my stuff while I took a quick bio break.’

A quick what? Apparently, my confusion had externalised itself.

‘Sorry, you probably don’t say that in the UK. It means I need to use the bathroom. Bio as in… “biological”.’

I snorted involuntarily, clapping my hand over my mouth to mute it.

‘Okay, now you’re making me realise that it’s a very weird thing to say.’