Everyone Has a Someone

There’s this guy who keeps coming to the café where I work. He always orders the same thing: iced coffee, double shot, extra ice cream, and a croissant with tomato, avocado, and cheese. He always wears a red jacket with his school’s logo plastered on the back. He has caramel brown eyes and pitch-black hair, spiked up in a messy style. He normally comes in alone, but every now and then, a few other boys wearing the same red jacket follow him. Whenever the other boys come to the café, they are loud and rowdy the whole time. We all prefer it when it’s only him.

“Thomas!” Ellery’s voice pulls me out of my daze. “Stop staring at our customers, food’s up.” I tear my eyes away from the group of boys sitting in the corner and push through the doors into the kitchen.

“Got a croissant, table 7,” Bailey, our chef, calls out, as I slide the plate into my hands. “Got a bowl of chips too,” they call out, placing the bowl into my hand.

I reverse back through the kitchen doors, slipping around the counter and crowds of people waiting for orders. When did we get so busy? I slip between two groups of girls to get to the table of red jackets.

“I got chips and a croissant,” I almost yell over the top of the group of boys.

“There’s supposed to be two bowls of chips,” one of the boys calls out as I slide the bowl into the middle of the table.

“Well, I don’t have them yet,” I sigh, placing the croissant in front of our regular. I slide back behind the counter to take orders as Ellery flies through the kitchen door with a second bowl of chips. I spend the rest of my shift taking orders and making coffee, as the boys’ yells echo throughout the tiny coffee shop. They are the only table inside. Fair enough, I wouldn’t want to be near them while I was eating either.

As the crowds shrank and the orders started to decrease, the boys continued chatting, ordering a second round of fries. I’ve asked Ellery to kick them out almost every shift, but he says they are good for business or something. It makes us seem busier than we actually are, I guess. Fifteen minutes before my shift ends, the boys in red jackets finally start gathering their things. Our regular with caramel-colored eyes grabs his bag and wanders up to the counter.

“Hey,” he sighs, pulling out his card. “Sorry about the noise. I wasn’t expecting the boys to stay for so long,” he shrugs.

“It’s fine,” I respond with a smile, adding up his total, purposely leaving off one of the bowls of chips. It wasn’t fair that he had to pay for all his friends.

“Here you go,” I say, pushing the card reader forward. “Twenty-eight dollars today,” I say with a cheerful grin, even though I am so done with this shift.

“Thanks, mate,” he smiles again, swiping his card. “See you tomorrow, yeah?”

“Yeah, I’ll be waiting,” I joke as he slips his card away.

“Yeah,” he sighs quietly, walking back over to his gang, as they all begin yelling at him again. Poor dude. If I were him, I would have quit whatever club he was in a long time ago.

Caramel came in again the next day, thank God.

“Hey, buddy,” he nodded my way, sliding into his usual seat by the window.

“Hey, just the usual?” I say, already scribbling down his order on a piece of paper.

“Yeah, thanks,” he replies, pulling out his laptop as I slide through the kitchen doors.

“Ah, I see your boyfriend’s back,” Bailey chuckles, grabbing a croissant bun.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” I say, rolling my eyes. “I barely even know him,” I sigh, pushing back through the swinging doors. I start on his coffee. The coffee machine starts grinding the coffee beans, the sound echoing through the small café. I sneak a peek over the coffee machine to look at caramel. He was looking right back, blankly staring at me. I quickly tuck my head back behind the coffee machine as my face rushes with heat. What the hell was that? Why was he staring at me? I try to forget about it, dropping the ice cream into the cup and filling it to the brim, adding a straw and spoon. I take a breath before walking over to him. He probably wasn’t staring; we probably just happened to look at each other at the same time, or maybe he zoned out. People are naturally more likely to look at things that make sound and are moving than anything else. Yeah, that’s why, he was just zoned out.

“Here,” I smile, placing the coffee in front of him.

“Thanks,” he returns the smile. “Hey, can I ask you something?”

“Yeah?” I stand, tilting my head.

“Do you go to Woodcreek Academy?”

“Uh, yeah, how do you know?” I answer awkwardly.

“My cousin goes there,” he shrugs, taking a sip of the coffee.

“Cool,” I mutter. “I’ll be right back,” I say, pointing to the kitchen before hurrying behind the safety of the swinging doors.

“He knows where I go to school,” I whisper to Bailey.

“Cool, can you take these eggs out to table 6?” they respond, sliding a plate of eggs and bacon to me.

“But, I’ve never seen him near my school before. In fact, I’ve never seen him outside of the café,” I half stutter, grabbing the plate. “I’ll be back.”

“Sure,” Bailey shrugs, turning back to the two saucepans on the stove. I push through the kitchen doors, generally placing the plate down on the only other table here besides Caramel’s. I look up and spot him staring at me again. Quickly, I lower my head and rush back into the kitchen.

“Guess he is staring at you,” Bailey laughs, looking through the window of the kitchen door. “Like more than usual.” I turn to look at them.

“What do you mean, more than usual?” I raise an eyebrow.

“He’s been watching you since he first came here. It started with small glances, and I guess he’s getting more confident,” she laughs. “That’s why me and Ellery kept teasing you; we thought you knew.”

“Well, I didn’t know,” I pout. “You could have told me.”

“Why? Do you think he’s cute or something?” Bailey nudges me, pulling the croissant off the pan. “Here, take this and go talk to him,” she sighs, handing me the plate.

“I don’t want to,” I whine, even as I slowly push my way back through the doors. I sigh and calmly walk over to Caramel’s table.

“And there’s that,” I say, sliding the croissant beside him.

“Thanks,” he doesn’t look up. What is up with this dude?

After about an hour, he wanders up to pay for his food.

“Hey,” he pulls out his card. As I quickly pull up his order, he scans his card and slips it away. “Before I go, here,” he holds out a small piece of paper.

“Um, thanks,” I smile awkwardly, taking the paper. He smiles gently and rushes out the door. I carefully open the folded paper, hiding it behind the counter.

Hey,

You’re pretty cute, and I’ve wanted to ask you out for a while.

Here’s my number, call me:

### ###

Hunter

“Oh my God,” I whisper under my breath, tucking the paper into the pocket of my uniform. I just scored a guy’s number by making him coffee.

“Ah, that’s why he was acting different,” a voice came from behind me. I turned to see Bailey’s head poking out behind the kitchen window. “You going to call him?”

“Yeah,” I sigh. “I’ll call him.”

“Well, your shift is over. It’s 5 o’clock,” they smile.

“Guess I better close down then,” I smirk.

“I’ll do that. You go call that boy,” she smiles, practically pushing me out of the café. “Tell me what happens tomorrow,” she laughs.

“I will, I will.”

The ride home was painfully long. But when it came down to making the call, I hesitated. What do I even say? Before I overthink too much, I hit the button and my phone starts ringing, no going back now.

“Hello?” a voice on the other end of the phone.

“Hey, um, it’s me from the café,” I cringe at the sound of my own voice.

“Oh, hi,” Caramel’s voice lights up. “You called quickly, hey?”

“I just got off work,” I shrug, my voice sounding higher than I intended.

“Cute,” he sighs. “So do you maybe want to like hang out sometime?”

“Yeah,” I respond in a little voice.

“Awesome. Um, important question: what’s your name?” He hums into the phone. I let out a little laugh.

“I’m Thomas,” I laugh.

“Okay, well Thomas, when would you like to hang out?”

“Up to you,” I sigh. This is easier than I thought.

“Do you have work tomorrow?”

“No,” I say, checking my calendar.

“Awesome. If you want, I can pick you up from school and we can get some food.”

“Okay, but I’d rather meet you somewhere other than school,” I shrug. “Where do you want to eat?”

“There’s this ice cream shop down on Mayfield Road. They’re apparently really good, then we can just walk around the park nearby.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll see you there then, yeah?”

“Yeah, okay. Bye, Hunter.”

“Bye, Thomas.”

I managed to find the ice cream shop the next day. He was already waiting for me.

“Hey,” he smiled.

“Hey,” I shrug. “Wanna get some ice cream?”

“Of course.”

I followed him over to the shop and got a cone of vanilla ice cream. We started walking through the park. The sun shone down on us as we walked in silence.

“How’s school been for you?” Hunter hums, nudging into my shoulder.

“Alright, I just finished an English assignment, so it’s pretty chill at the moment,” I respond, shrugging. We really know nothing about each other, do we?

“Oh, that’s cool. Yeah, I got a footy game tomorrow, so that will be fun,” he smiles, taking a bite out of his ice cream cone.

“Who are you playing?” I smile. He has ice cream on his chin.

“Your school, actually,” he laughs. “You should come watch.”

“It’s not really my thing,” I shrug. Watching a bunch of dudes running around chasing a ball doesn’t seem very interesting to me.

“Are you sure? We could hang out after?” he suggests, stuffing the rest of his ice cream in his mouth.

“Are you trying to bribe me to watch you play footy?” I laugh. “Sure, I’m in.”

“Awesome.”

We ended up saying goodbye, and I went home with a fat, stupid grin plastered on my face. I just got a date with a boy.

The game was more crowded than I thought, but I squished into one of the stands and pulled out my phone. As the bell rang for the start of the game, everyone started cheering as the boys entered the field. Why did I agree to this again? I caught sight of Hunter and kept my eyes on him for the rest of the game. I couldn’t tell you what happened or what team won. I don’t know much about sports (and I was too busy watching Hunter).

As the game ended, the people around me jumped up and screamed. I guess my school won. Cool. I followed the crowd out of the bleachers, pulling out my phone as I got to the car park.

“Where are you?” I messaged.

“Changing room. You in the car park?” he replied immediately.

“Yeah.”

A few minutes later, Hunter emerged from the change room building.

“Hey.”

“Hi.”

“Did you enjoy the game?” he smiled down at me, holding out his hand.

“Yeah, had no idea what was going on though,” I chuckled, placing my hand in his.

“Want to get out of here?” he said, leading me through the car park.

“Yeah,” I smiled, letting him lead me over to his car. I climbed into the passenger seat and leaned back against the headrest.

“Tired?” Hunter laughed, turning on the car as the radio switched on.

“Yeah,” I sighed. I let my eyes droop closed as the radio music surrounded the car in a quiet beat. Hunter rested his hand on my leg. I allowed myself to be dragged into a dream. I finally found my someone.