No Strings Attached.

Chapter 1

"Hi there! What can I get for you today?"

Her smile overwhelmed him with a sudden incomprehension, he quickly darted his eyes towards the menu board to hide the nerves that had just instantly swallowed him all at once. His fingers began a tapping routine on the counter while his brown eyes twitched and blinked in a way that one would assume he was thinking not realizing he was trying to keep his demeanor with the number of butterflies that had just swarmed into his belly.

"Uh yeah...um..." Squeezing his eyes shut, he lightly shook his full dark brown hair.

A sentence Malakai, he thought, words...sentence.

"Hi yeah," he coughed inwardly "um, tall coffee. Regular".

Nailed it!

She nodded as she keyed in his order into the system. "Would that be all?"

He somehow managed to let out a sound that was somewhere between an 'hmpgh' and a yelp.

Nice one, he scoffed sarcastically at himself.

"Name?"

His eyes locked with hers, "Malakai" he said, surprising himself that he was able to get that out with less difficultly and smiled inwardly in self-approval. Instinctively wanting to know hers, he looked to the employee name tag clipped at the side of her green apron. Queen, it read.

His head tilted slightly in surprise at such a rare and unusual name. Did he read it wrong? He probably had. He looked closely at her nametag once again.

Q-U-E-E-N

Nope, he'd definitely read it correctly.

Lowering his eyes under the length of the parted curtains of his front hair, Malakai stole subtle glances of the girl bearing such a glorious name. The first captivating thing he noticed about her was her darker than dark ebony skin, almost blue. He'd never seen anything so mesmerizing. The extreme contrast of its tone to the brightness of her eyes and wide smile. The way it somehow seemed to reflect the dim lights of the cafe, radiating a dazzling glow about her. He sucked in a light sharp breath. She readjusted the face cap that held her ponytail of box braids, unaware of the eyes that were admiring her.

It wasn't like it was his first time seeing her. Heck, he'd just been handing her his card for a stranger just a while ago. But yet somehow in that moment of really looking at her, Malakai concluded that no one could have been a more fitting embodiment of the name Queen.

She looked up to inform him of his expected amount and he abruptly glanced away again as if he wasn't just staring at her a second ago.

"Your total amount comes down to $2.10."

The paying transaction process was a complete haze to him as he took out his debit card from his wallet, trying not to totally blank on his ability to construct proper sentences with actual words. Well, a sentence, he successfully was able to construct. With words, however, barely.

"Perfect. Your order would be called shortly, have a nice day." she said.

And just like that, he was dismissed from her mind without a second thought to continue her workday like any other. Malakai, on the other hand, couldn't resist shyly stealing more glances and stares while waiting for his order to be called. Anyone could have easily seen the admiration practically oozing from his eyes if they had cared to look at him in those moments.

Lord, what is this? he thought in frustration at himself.

And as he walked out of the café and into the lively streets of Toronto with his misspelt coffee in hand, he knew. Malakai knew his heart would find a way, a reason, to somehow get his brain to get his feet to find its way to the opposite side of the counter of this very Starbucks café, just to see her.

And he knew, he wasn't going to fight it.

***************

"Um...thanks?"

She scoffed at the average-looking man struggling to zip up his business pants by the closed door.

You have no shame, she thought.

He'd finally figured out his zip configuration and was working on the buttons on his shirt, fervently looking at his watch in the process.

Studying his mannerisms as he went about his shirt, it could easily be told that it was his first time here. She'd known because he wasn't a face she'd had in her room before, however, anyone would have been able to tell by the guilt that had flushed his face right after they were done.

"Your shoes are beside the drawers".

"Uh yes, yes they are" he laughed uncomfortably and quickly put them on, leaning on the wall for support.

She got up from the bed, wrapping herself in its beige sheets, and approached him just as he was about to leave. "What?-" tossing her braids to the side, she pouted exaggeratedly "-no kiss goodbye?"

She saw it again, the confidence reigniting in his eyes. The same light she'd seen in the eyes of every man that walked into her room for a session with her. As his lips slammed once again onto hers, she let her mind wander away into numbness. They think they're in control. Kissing her with what he would call passion but to her tasted like cardboard with a mess of tasteless spit. He disgusted her. They all did.

He was panting heavily when he finally let go of her. His stale breath mixed with the intoxicating smell of his heavy cologne. "You're incredible" he gazed down at her in oozing desire, "Queen".

Her name was spoken in momentary lust and she knew he'd let his guard down--they always do. She smiled to herself in satisfaction. If only they knew how lowly she thought of each and every single one of them.

You dog. Her eyes pointedly looked up into his, smirking in glorious coy. "Say hi to wifey for me".

He was stunned and clearly out of words. His face became once more flushed with guilt and he ran his hand through his thinned-out hair.

"I-I...y-y-you..." he stammered.

"Have a good night," she said sweetly and sarcastically blew him a kiss as he stumbled out the door. Firmly, she shut it behind him and breathed a sigh of relief. No more sessions for the rest of the night.

The digital clock atop her drawer read 2:13 am.

She grabbed the digital clock placed atop the drawers by the door. 2:13 am an early night. She contently rested her head on the door again. She could catch some extra sleep time that she hadn't been able to get this past week. Her doors had been open and closed by various men more times than she could usually count. Her eyes rolled in frustration. She suspected Lana had something to do with it.

Flopping her burrito-wrapped self onto her bed, Queen stared at her plain ceiling and entered into her mind of oblivion trying to ignore the feeling of disgust with her own body. She scoffed. Who was she lying to? It was no longer hers. She'd lost the right to it that awful night seven years ago.

A shiver ran through her bare form underneath the thin sheets. A warm bath would be lovely right now. Ughhhh, she thought but deep tiredness wore her down so heavily, she couldn't even fathom the thought of getting up so she instead tightened the wrap of covering on her and stared at the plain wall to her side.

This was it. This was her life.