Saving Max

Saving Max - Chapter 1

Max couldn't run fast enough to not be late, but he ran anyway. Slinging lattes at Moonbuckles Café was the only job Max had. He could not afford to lose it.

His well-worn Nikes thwap-thwapped on the cold sidewalk. A small hole in his left shoe grew a microscopic bit larger with every step, the leather upper slowly separating from the rubber sole. Max felt the stitches coming undone like everything else in his life. Soon his sock would show through. Water would seep in when it rained. Max would have a cold, soggy foot all winter while his shoe fell apart in slow motion. But he would put off resorting to the magic of duct tape as long as possible. He still had some pride left.

A little, anyway. Max slowed as he approached the coffee shop. He didn't want to look late.

Above the café door, with its full-length glass pane, hung a painted yellow quarter moon, carved of wood and wearing the face of the Man in the Moon himself. Max nodded to the colorful sign as he pushed the door open. "Hiya, Bucky," he muttered. Max didn't typically speak to inanimate objects but he always greeted the store mascot by name. Though the world seemed against him, Max felt that at least Bucky was on his side.

Not so his co-workers.

"Late," mouthed Jess. She looked up from the register to glare at Max and cast a pointed glance at the pizza-sized wall clock above the stainless steel coffee brewer to her right.

Max nodded in unfelt contrition. He shuffled through the half-empty seating area, not making eye contact with the patrons, and passed through a curtain of red, yellow, and orange plastic beads that clicked and swayed behind him as he entered the work area at the rear of the store.

Max washed up in the back room. He wasn't that late. Seven minutes tops. Too little to stress over. But bitter Jess lost no opportunity to find fault. Max wasn't sure why she hated him, he was just certain she did. With Jess as shift manager, he'd spend all day washing dishes, cleaning the bathrooms, bagging trash, and doing every other unpleasant task she could assign.

Four years busting my butt to graduate college and three more in law school, all to become a glorified janitor. Max's hollow-eyed reflection stared back at him from the small mirror above the large sink. He looked like a reject from a dreary Russian novel. His blue eyes were dull as a dirty window. His longish brown hair was a curly tangle, only half-tamed with hand lotion because he couldn't afford actual hair product. He no longer bothered to drag a razor across his face more than twice a week. It wasn't like he'd be arguing in court anytime soon.

Max plucked a cheery yellow apron from the peg beside the whiteboard where the next two weeks of shifts were detailed in bright marker strokes. The apron was the color of a smiley face, but to Max it might as well have been an orange prison jumpsuit.

I'll never get out of Bayhill. Or out of debt, he reminded himself. Not at this rate, anyway.

He relieved Jess at the register so she could take her preferred station working the vintage Contralto espresso machine, a hissing, belching brass and copper beast with Bakelite handles and an old-time pressure gauge.

To Max, coffee was coffee was coffee. He knew swill from palatable and hot from cold. He didn't care about blends, origins, or certifications. All Moonbuckles coffee was fair trade, organic, shade grown, and locally roasted. All very well, but some people were just psycho about fussy nuances of temperature, foam, grind, and roast that couldn't possibly matter to a sane person. Jess, unfortunately, was one of those people. She was also one of the best baristas in Bayhill, with multiple awards proving her coffee prowess. Her plaques and trophies were on display on the shelves lining the righthand side of the store.