Sanity ↬ LeafyisHere

one - meeting

Present day.

Rainy, wet, and quiet. A nice day at the shop. Something I've been wanting for the past week. My grandmother owned a coffee shop in a small town in Boston, nothing too crazy. Business owners ran in my family, and my grandmother preferred coffee. So now here I stand taking grumpy cops and happy families coffee orders.

I've lived in Boston for four years now, and I've grown quite accustomed to it. The peaceful, nonchalant attitude that was openly expressed throughout the area.

"Parker," My grandmother whispers in my ear, and points up towards the front counter where a man stood, and I laughed.

"Sorry, I must have zoned out. Welcome to Barcely's, what can I do for you today?" I smile and he returns it, a warm one at that.

"Just a coffee's fine."

Turning around, I grab a cup and go to the small machine, pouring coffee into the cup and walk back over to the desk.

"Creamer or milk?"

"Either's fine."

I hate when customers do this, it's like I'm dealing with myself, indecisive and a lack of care.

I grab the creamer and add some sugar, handing the cup to the man and he hands me the pay.

"Have a good- Oh you have a laptop," I correct myself and laugh it off as he sits at a table relatively close to the front counter.

"Yeah, my internet is slow and I have some videos to upload so I come here," He responds, and I nod even though he's not directly looking at me.

"Videos? Like YouTube?" I question, grabbing myself a water from the shops fridge.

"Yeah, I have a channel actually, I can show you?" He questions and I walk over and he smiles. "Oh right, I'm Calvin."

"Parker."

He turns the laptop towards me and I take a glance at his channel. 'Leafyishere' and quite a bit of subscribers.

"Oh, not too bad," I laugh, scrolling down some videos and smile at a few of the titles, "Maybe I'll watch some of these later."

He smiles, turning back towards the uploading screen of YouTube and begins whatever it is that he's doing, I wouldn't know; I'm not really that good with computers but it looks like he's doing a thumbnail.

I resume my position behind the counter and start cleaning the dishes and such, when his voice echoes throughout the small shop once more, "I've never seen you here before."

"I haven't seen you here either," when I glance over, he had already had his body turned sideways out of the chair and had locked eyes with me.

"But I kind of want to see more of you."

A small blush creeps up to my cheeks, blush? He smiles and stands up, grabbing all his belongings, and then hands me a piece of paper consisting of a number.

"Oh- okay, thank you for dining at Barcely's," there was no particular reason why that was needed, since he was already out the door. Habits I suppose.

The rain continued on for the rest of the day, and so did slow business until shop closed. My grandmother helped me close, and handed me a small letter, something that I've been waiting for, for weeks.

"Is this it?" I question, although it comes out in more of a squel, she smiles and nods, placing down the rags and walking into the kitchen.

My fingers tear the letter open, and I read the words I've waited for.

Hello Parker, we apologize for the late word from us, we've been quite pact with others interests and entries. We'd like to tell you with great honor, that we would love to have you at Juliard, although you did not meet the standards for a scholarship. Tuition would cost you a great amount, something that your income, from what you told us would not be able to handle. Of course do not let this get your hopes up, there are still plenty of ways to work through this. We sincerely apologize for such late response, and we hope to see you at our campus.

I should have guessed this would happen I suppose. Maybe I should just give up on college by this point in time, all I've gotten is decline letters.

Slowly, I find my way towards my room and switch on the small light, and search for my phone to text the one person whom I know will most likely answer.

'Leafyishere?'