Cup of Roasted Coffee

2; the latte hotte

After Paul had met Emma at Beanies and the two had shared a cute conversation, Bill couldn't stop talking about the incident with their coworkers. It was weird, because Bill definitely didn't seem like the kind to do something like that. In a way, he sounded like a proud mother. All he had to do was start to refer to Paul as "my son".

It was Monday, only a couple of days after everything, at 12. Paul had been working for a few hours nonstop and decided he could use a booster. He knew that if Bill was told about where he was going, the entire office would find out and half of them would want to come, so he would have to sneak out the front doors.

He slowly stood up from his desk and quietly walked through the isles of cubicles. Halfway there, however, one of his coworkers, Ted, popped out of nowhere. Paul jumped back in defense, clearly startled by the action.

"Hey, Paul."

"Hi, Ted."

"You going to Beanies?"

"Yeah, you wanna come?"

Well there goes his secrecy plan.

Ted let out a painfully mocking laugh. "Maybe. Is your little friend going to be there?" He winked.

There was a quick pause.

"Ok bye, Ted."

Paul made sure to leave the building as fast as possible after that. He didn't really care if Bill found out now, because Ted could do far worse with that knowledge and he already had it. He walked quickly down the sidewalk and almost fell through the door to Beanies. At long last, he was there.

Emma was wiping down the counter, but unlike last time, she wasn't alone. A much younger girl stood behind her, leaning against the wall with a phone to distract her. She didn't seem to be helping much.

He walked up to the cash register and rang the small bell that sat beside it.

"Hi, can I help you?" Emma hadn't looked up from her little cleaning job. She was very caught up in her work and it didn't look like much could stop her until she had finished.

"Just a black coffee please." He smiled at her, even knowing she couldn't see it.

"Sure, that'll be $5." Her eyes finally flickered up towards him. "Oh! It's Pa- shit!" Her surprised reaction had forced her to throw her hand backwards. Emma had managed to knock over the coffee pot. The sound of glass hitting the floor drew the attention of the three other customers for about 0.5 seconds.

"Oh god, I'm sorry. Let me help with tha-" before Paul could offer further assistance, the girl from before stepped in. Not to help, but she still got in the way of things.

"Emma, oh my god, Nora's going to kill you! You better not let any of that glass touch us."

Emma rolled her eyes, going to grab a broom. "Zoey, oh my god, I don't give a shit." She spoke is a high pitched voice in order to mock her. Zoey, her name was, stormed off after the remark was made.

She held the dust pan down using the ballet flat on her foot and began to sweep up her mess. "Sorry, I'll try to get the coffee out quickly." She murmured, shooting an apologetic glance to Paul.

"No, no, take your time. I've got plenty." Paul couldn't lie(it was physically impossible for him to do so), he felt somewhat awkward standing there while the short girl tried to pick up a mess he kinda made her make. He watched as she threw the glass shards away and could've sworn he saw her kick one of the left over ones towards the kitchen door.

"Black coffee, right?" Emma snapped him out of his daze and he quickly nodded. She grabbed a new coffee pot and started her work. "So what brings you back?"

The question caught him off guard. He most definetly wasn't expecting her to remember him. "Uh, what?"

She laughed a little, a tiny smile playing on her lips. "You're the guy from the other day, right? Who I let in early? I think the name was Paul-"

"Yeah, that was me. I, uh, really enjoyed your coffee. I had to get some more." He tried to fabricate a believable excuse for his return. The coffee here wasn't the best thing he ever had, it was probably more on the shittier side of the coffee scale, but it meant he could see her again. Of course, he couldn't say that. Not yet anyways.

Emma looked at him suspiciously, as if he was up to something. Shit, was she onto him? Maybe he should just download that stupid Tinder app instead of trying to swoon over a barista. Ted uses it a lot and it seems to wor-

"Here's your most desired drink then," she joked sarcastically, breaking his thoughts, and handing him the paper cup with the signature logo on its sleeve. He took it quickly and dropped some spare change in the tip jar. "Thank you."

They exchanged smiles, the awkward air calming down somewhat. Paul raised his cup up once, she gave him a thumbs up, they said goodbye, and then he was back on the trail to the CCR office building.

Upon arrival, the first people he saw were Bill and Ted, who were talking by the water dispenser. "Look who's back! So, how'd it go?" Bill looked curious, and Paul figured Ted had told him of his location.

"Yeah, Paul, how's your little latte hotte doing?"

Paul almost choked on his coffee at the disgusting nickname. He coughed once, twice, and gave Ted the look of judgment. "Please don't ever say that again."

The two laughed, one more than the other. "Don't listen to him, Paul. Seriously though, make any progress?"

Paul wasn't sure how they knew he had a mini crush on Emma. He didn't even know if they knew or had just assumed. They sure were being nosy about it. Also, he had zero idea on how to respond to that question.

"Uh, we talked? I don't really know what you want to hear." He set his cup down on a nearby table and leaned against the surface. Ted raised an eyebrow at that comment, something he didn't understand.

"Are you sure that's all that happened?" The sleazebag pointed to the cup. Bill and Paul looked towards the direction of his finger, and sure enough, there was some writing on the cup sleeve.

Paul picked the cup up and removed the cardboard piece. He tore the paper so he could read it easily and looked at the small note written there.

I know this is cheesy but...
my Instagram is @ emmaperky

Huh.

-♡-