Work Text:
This Thursday is unending. I have watched the sun slide across the wall of the cafe since I got here at 11, just waiting for the clock to strike 5:30 so I can go home. At 5, my worst nightmare walks in the door.
“Hi! I’m doing an exposee on the inner workings of cafes and the lives of their employees, would you care to give a comment?”
The man leans against the counter in the exact same way that he has every day for the past week. He’s holding his phone out like a microphone in my direction and grinning at me in a way that I can tell is supposed to come off as trustworthy, but I don’t buy it for a second. Plus, he’s American. I wouldn't trust him as far as I can throw him, even if I was a baby with zero upper body strength.
“No, thank you. Can I get you anything?” I put on my best unimpressed face. I hate the way he grins when he sees it.
“Maybe your name?”
Barf . As if he couldn’t get any more annoying.
“Not on the menu. Now, order a drink or I’ll ask you to leave.”
“Fine! Fine,” he holds up his hands in surrender and it makes me trust him even less than I did two seconds ago. “I’ll have whatever tea you recommend. I’m normally one for coffee, but when in Rome, or rather, England…” He trails off and looks at me expectantly. As if I would react with whatever sort of nationalistic opinion I’m supposed to have towards tea, just because of that statement. Idiot.
I put his order in as peppermint tea, because that's my least favourite, and customer-service-smile at him. “Will that be all?”
“Unless I can get you to dish the dirty details of the service industry to me?”
How long does he have?
“Well, I’m nearly positive that our campus sources its tea leaves and coffee beans from companies that use child labour or, quote unquote, indentured servitude. Is that dastardly enough for you?”
“Fair enough, barista, fair enough.”
He shuffles down the counter to harass Trixie while she makes his tea, asking if she would be willing to ‘let him behind the counter’ so to speak. His innuendo is almost bad enough to make me pity him. Then I remember he will probably show up again tomorrow with an over-eager grin and all possible sympathy vanishes.
I am, as I always am, exhausted upon returning home from work. The coffee smell is embedded in my hair and my pants are stained from where Trixie knocked over the half full pot of decaf.
I feel a thundercloud forming over my head and that makes me feel even worse. Simon must sense the pressure change because he straightens on the couch and pauses whatever action-comedy-plotless movie he was watching.
“Rough day?”
He offers this tentatively, to test the waters which takes all the wind right out of my sails. If only one thing is true, it’s that Simon Snow will never cease to make my day better. Don’t worry, I don’t get it either.
I collapse onto the couch next to him. “ He was back again today.”
“The American stalker?”
“Yeah. Today he tried to use Trixie to get closer to us. Thankfully she wouldn’t budge.”
“Maybe you should tell someone about it?”
“And say what? There’s a guy and I find him personally annoying, but, no, he hasn’t done anything wrong and actually he usually tips pretty well despite the fact that he has worn the same outfit everyday this week and his phone is at least 10 years old?”
I can tell that Simon is trying not to laugh at me at this point. He does a miserable job, and I should take this opportunity to remind him of all of the ranting I have endured in our friendship. Bt, I'm tired, and I promised at some point to try and let that go, and he is being generally supportive.
“I guess it doesn’t sound great for you when you say it like that.” He backpedals, recalibrates, and tries another tactic. “Do you want to watch a movie and take your mind off it?”
“I wish I could, but I still have to iron out the outline for that bio research paper.”
“The fish paper?”
“Yes! And don’t even get me started on why it’s relevant that I know how unpredictable weather patterns affect the reproductive cycle of salmon when I want to be sending people into space. I hate Bio!”
“Right… Well, um, good luck?”
I let out one last groan at the unfairness of university for expecting my studies to be well-rounded and stand up, planning to hunker down in my room for the next two to three hours.
Simon interrupts my huffy exit. “Oh, Pen, I was supposed to ask you earlier but I forgot. Are you coming with Baz and I to Dev’s birthday party?”
“When is it?”
“This Saturday. I think it’s supposed to be chill. Like the closer friend group and some board games and drinks.”
I mull it over for a moment. I’m off of work on Saturday, so I’ll be able to work on this paper during the day. And I have been dying to finally beat Baz at Catan. I would risk failing school to wipe that smug grin off his face.
“I’ll try to make it.”
My answer is met with a wide grin and Simon nods his head, pleased. The sounds of on-screen explosions escort me out of the room.
8am comes too soon and sees me back at the cafe, churning out the ceaseless coffee orders. The bell on top of the door never stops chiming and I greet the constant stream of overtired students, overworked office workers, and… the “journalist.”
All pretense of being a polite service worker drops and I openly glare at him. “Why are you here this early?”
He throws his hands up in defense. “Whoa! I’m not here to try and get a quote today. I just want a coffee and somewhere to write.”
“Okay. Welcome to The Cloisters Cafe. What can I get for you.” I accompany the monotone with a face that will let him know I don’t believe him for a second.
However, he does nothing to arouse further suspicion, just thanks me for the coffee and sits at a table. He pulls out a laptop covered in stickers that I don’t look at because I don’t care. (Is it more or less unsettling that he seems to have an obsession with cryptids?)
I’m wiping the tables around him when he speaks up for the first time since he ordered. “I’m Shepherd, by the way. I’m sorry if I’ve been coming across as pushy.”
Maybe because it’s been a long day, or maybe because I find it tiring to maintain this much suspicion towards a stranger, I reach my hand out. He takes it in his and shakes it.
“I’m Penny. And my forgiveness is still pending.”
He laughs and I, for the first time, don’t find the smile grating or overly cheery. In fact, it’s kind of lovely. When he smiles like this his eyes get all small and his face is all open. It would be very easy to catch him off guard while he’s smiling. But I also just enjoy looking at it.
Apparently I am also enjoying clinging onto his hand like I’m lost at sea. I quickly let go.
“Right, well, I should…” I gesture to the backroom. He nods.
“It was nice to meet you properly, Penny.”
“You too, Shepherd.”
I hurry into the back room to perform some deep breathing and when I resume my place behind the counter, Shepherd has disappeared. Shockingly, I find myself eager to come into work on Monday and see him again.
I am pulled out of my study spiral on Saturday by the sound of the front door opening, closing, and Baz’s immediate and condescending critiques.
“Simon, that cannot be what you’re wearing.”
I grin despite myself. Some things will always remain the same; the sun will always rise in the East, the Earth will always spin, and Baz will always take issue with Simon’s trackies.
I interrupt Simon’s spluttering reply by sticking my head out of my bedroom door. “Baz, I don’t think he’s done laundry in weeks. Those might be the only clean trousers he has.”
Baz scoffs and gives me a quiet smile over Simon’s head. “Right, well let’s see what we can do about that. Bunce, you’re still coming tonight?”
“Ha! As if I would miss a chance to put you soundly in your place.”
“I thought you might be too intimidated to face me again, after your resounding defeat last time.”
I flip him off and duck back into my room to get ready. My paper is almost done and I am capital R Ready for a night off.
When I join the boys in the living room Simon has been dressed in some jeans and his hair is fluffier and styled. He still looks underdressed next to Baz, but I don’t think Baz has met an event he couldn’t justify dressing up for. Even just board games with his friends.
“You look good, Bunce.”
“Thank you so kindly, Basilton.” This is another of our rituals: Baz pretends that he likes my style and I pretend like I care about his opinion.
Together we head out into the night, ready to brave the London commute to Baz’s cousin’s flat.
When we get there, I am immediately struck by the knowledge that this is not a ‘chill’ gathering with ‘close friends’ and ‘board games.’ What Dev appears to be hosting is a fully blown rager with as many people as can conceivably fit into a small flat. (Actually, more people than can conceivably fit into a small flat. This party is probably a fire hazard.)
“I thought this was supposed to be small,” I say to the night air. The three of us are lingering outside his door, feeling more than hearing the music.
“I am going to kill Dev,” Baz growls and rips open the door without knocking.
“Baz does love a good dramatic entrance,” I say to Simon.
He smiles at me and then looks fondly after Baz before leaping into action. “I’m going to make sure he doesn’t actually kill Dev. Or help him hide the body, we’ll see how the night goes.”
I follow Simon into the party. While this isn’t what I was expecting, I had wanted a night off. A night out isn’t that much different. I’m sure there are some drinks here that will take off the ache I get between my shoulders when I spend too much time at my computer.
As I weave through the crowd I am met by dozens of people I don’t know and, even more surprisingly, dozens of people I do. Trixie is even here with her girlfriend, Keris.
She grabs my arm as I pass by and shouts to be heard over the music. “Your stalker is here!”
“Who? Shepherd?”
“If that’s his name. The one from the cafe.”
Of course. Of course Shepherd’s here. Because it wouldn’t be a day in my life if I didn’t see his peculiar face.
“Thanks for the heads up.”
Trixie nods and goes back to dancing/holding/making out with Keris.
Knowing that somewhere in this crowd, Shepherd is lurking, probably smiling obnoxiously, makes the party seem less like a fortuitous happenstance and more like a trap.I should just go home. I start to text Simon that I will see him later. He'd be upset, but he's here with Baz. That's what I'm going to do. Leave. But... something in me doesn’t want to leave yet. I should probably do another round and make sure I didn’t forget to say hi to anyone. I don’t want to come across as rude.
And then I see him. Not that I was looking for him. But I see him, standing against a counter near the drinks in the kitchen, deep in animated conversation with some guy wearing a band t-shirt. The guy looks like he wants to leave the conversation, but can’t quite figure out how and also can’t quite figure out why he actually doesn’t want to leave Shepherd at all. Or maybe I’m projecting. Either way, I do my best to be a good Samaritan for the strangers I see at parties, and I interrupt their conversation.
“Are you following me?”
Fairly good as far as an ice-breaker. It certainly takes Shepherd off guard.
“I don’t usually follow people anywhere but social media.”
I resist rolling my eyes at the near-pun. “Does that mean you sometimes follow people?”
Shepherd chuckles like this reaction is predictable and adorable. I hate him for it.
“Can I get you a drink, Penny?”
There must be something in the way that he says my name, some trick he’s playing, because I nod. And when he gets me a drink from the fridge, I follow him to the couch. And when he sits down on the couch, I sit beside him. And when he talks, I answer.
The night flies by after that. My self imposed curfew of midnight comes and goes. As does 1am. Then Dev is kicking everyone out of his flat and Simon grabs my hand as he passes through the living room.
Shepherd leans down and presses one fleeting kiss to my cheek. He slips a piece of paper into my jacket pocket and precedes us out the door.
Simon and Baz are well and truly drunk and they walk a few paces in front of me, leaning into each other for support. I reach into my pocket and pull out Shepherd’s paper. It’s a sticky note with a phone number written on it and a smiley face wearing glasses.
I smile despite myself.
I reach the final editing stages of writing my behated assignment. I would quite literally rather do anything else. I don’t like to hand in anything that’s less than perfect, but I also feel that I must have written it correctly the first time. I’m a capable person. I don’t mix up my homonyms.
And so, I take a page out of Simon’s book and procrastinate. I scroll social media, exhausting the insidious Instagram feed, reaching the bottom of the fruitless Facebook, and trekking through the ever-interminable tweets. I am very nearly ready to leave the happy world of cat videos and return to my essay when I see his face. Shepherd.
His enormous grin looks out from my computer screen, plastered next to a headline that reads: “The Dark (Roasted) Side of Campus Coffee”
Wait. He’s actually a journalist?!
This means that he’s not a sleazeball. This means that I have been horribly rude to a probably very genuine man. And a very charming, undeniably handsome man who is endearingly obsessed with cryptids.
I don't feel totally in control of my actions as I root through my desk drawer for the sticky note with the phone number on it. He answers on the fourth ring.
“It’s Penny. You’re actually a journalist?”
“What? Did you think I regularly go around asking hot girls random questions about ethics as pick-up lines? Especially at their places of work?”
I’m going to choose to ignore the fact that he definitely just called me hot there for a second. One thing at a time, after all.
“So, you're probably done with your article about the Cloisters, huh?”
"Well, I was thinking of writing a follow-up article. More of a call to action really, encouraging our fine university to follow through on its professed sustainability policies and fork out the moey for some more ethically sourced coffee beans. I was hoping to maybe get a quote from someone on the inside?"
“Oh yeah? And what would be in it for me? Besides the knowledge that I am bettering the world obviously.”
“I was thinking a coffee?”
I scoff. He has to be joking.
“Dinner,” I suggest instead. “Dinner, and you’ve got yourself a deal.”
"Okay," he says, and I can hear that obnoxiously beautiful grin in his voice. "You've got yourself a date."