Well, at least she knows he’s a pessimist. Not that she’s going to–or can–do much with that information. But she still files it away.
“I think that things can get better,” Alice says. Because she, actually, is more of an optimist. Just a cautious one, really. “I mean, not always. Sometimes–often–they get worse. But things sort themselves out often enough, you know?”
She grabs a water bottle that’s in reach and takes a sip.
“I mean, not that I’ve had a lot of highs in my life. But things look up.”
Maybe you should try getting high is at the tip of his tongue but that’s a bad idea, abort immediately, because jesus, he’s not trying to like, fucking scare some random barista in an empty coffee shop, goddamn.
But yeah, anyway, he’s done that. You know. Self-medication.
God, he’s a fucking mess.
He can’t imagine she’s a mess if she has the energy to try to be hopeful about the future and all that shit.
But he’s also not completely heartless, so he’s gonna let her have it.
“Yeah, if you say so. Sorry to like, rain on your, uh … coffee table.” That’s not the word. He pauses for a split second then says the correct one. “Counter.”
“I mean, I guess,” Alice says, but it’s not really very committal. It’s just… Yeah. She knows how it is. “I don’t hate it here,” she agrees. “I’ve always lived here, and I don’t really have anyone, but it’s always been home.”
Despite the bad memories. Dead dogs and knives in her gut.
“It could be worse.”
Yeah, the chipperness is all gone now. It kinda suits her voice more to be serious anyway, somehow. She’s got a lower pitch than he’s ever heard on a girl before but it seems both softer and more natural for her to be speaking more like this. Like, not that she seemed forced or anything before.
It just is.
He smiles wryly, swallows that bite of the muffin, nods.
“Right. So then you just kind of stick around at your job, and stick around in your town, and then you don’t really become anyone, but you’re still like, well shit, I should be someone, or I should be better than whoever the fuck it is I am, and then you still don’t. And that’s life. Like, bam. Doesn’t get any better than that.”
“I mean, I always kind of had my own stuff going on,” Alice says, with a shrug. Relative poverty, for one. A murder attempt, for another.
But his accent is charming, and so is he, so Alice is okay with continuing the conversation. Just… not in quite that direction.
“You like it here, then?”
“I don’t hate it here. You know how it is.”
He gives her a meaningful glance, not sure if she actually does, but like, judging from what she said just now, probably, right? It’s that whole thing about getting stuck. Not exactly because you are stuck. But because you’re not really free enough to leave either.
Or, okay, honestly, it’s because you’re too cowardly and too unmotivated to make the change.
He takes another sip of coffee and then picks up the muffin, starts peeling off part of the wrapper.
Alice smiles a little at his relief of having a black coffee. He seems to relax a bit, too, which is good. It makes her relax a little bit, too.
It’s hard to, still, even with her attacker long gone.
“Sweden sounds nice,” she says instead of ending the conversation like she should. “I’ve lived here my whole life. Never really left all that much, even though I wanted to.”
“Sverige”, he says at first, in an exaggerated fashion: swer-yeh. The name of his country. Then he shrugs. “Americans don’t travel much. I mean, from what I’m told.”
He doesn’t mean that in a judgmental way, but it’s kind of curious to him. It just seems like something that’s not cultural, somehow. Growing up at home, they went abroad almost every summer. It was just something you did.
Comparisons. Yadda.
“Sweden’s fine. I’ve been thinking of moving back, but … nyeh”, he says, with a lifted hand, moving it in that so-so gesture.
“Fair enough,” Alice says. Shrugs a little, then slides him his coffee and his muffin across the counter. “It’s ‘one of those days’ a lot, I seem ‘em.”
She has them. A lot.
She doesn’t step out from around the counter, or dare start packing up more. He’s cute, but he’s still a man and she’s still alone with him. And the ‘police’ button is under the register.
“Where’s that accent from? Can I ask that?”
When he gets the coffee and he’s done with the wallet fiddling he kind of immediately takes a sip, complete with a little ‘ah’ sound because yeah, fuck the clichés, sometimes that’s the purest goddamn expression there is for some relief at the end of a hard day.
Or a hard 24 hours, actually.
Yeah, he didn’t sleep last night.
Anyway.
“Sweden”, he answers, and finds that since she’s not really moving, and since she’s still talking to him, he’s not really moving either. It’s kinda … nice? At least for a moment? To just be talking to someone like he’s not some freak-ass lonely person.
“One black coffee and chocolate muffin sans nuts, coming up,” Alice says, not sure why she’s trying to be cutesy. She’s not ready to flirt. She’s not.
She’s not.
So she rings him up and tells him the total, before turning her back on him to get his coffee while he has a chance to dig out his change or card or whatever he’s paying with.
“You know, most people don’t come in for black coffee at this hour.”
She’s not.
He gets his wallet, digs out his card - he’s too Swedish to carry cash, he’s never shaken that habit - and inserts it into the terminal and enters his code to pay, then waits for her to come back with the coffee and complete the transaction.
She’s chipper. Like most baristas, in his experience. But he is a little surprised she’s this chipper this late. If it were him he’d just want to go home.
He smiles again, a little.
“I know. If I didn’t know I wouldn’t have come in all, shit, sorry, what if you don’t get me my shit.” When she pushes a button on her end and the card terminal says it’s done, he withdraws his card and starts putting his wallet back in his pocket. “Just one of those days, you know.”
Yeah, the smile is surprised, even if earnest, when he comes in. She hadn’t expected anyone else to come in, but she hadn’t yet locked up because technically they weren’t closed yet. And it’s late enough that she’s been trusted with the privilege of locking up after everyone else.
It strikes her, every time, that she is alone, but she’s trying to relearn how to be alone. At least here there’s a button she can press that will call the cops immediately.
“Technically you have three minutes,” Alice points out gently, then lowers her eyes to the register. It probably looks shy. It is shy. But he’s cute, despite looking kind of like a mess, which most people running last minute into a coffee shop do look like, anyway. Messes, that is.
“Any kind of speciality coffee?” she asks. “Or just coffee-coffee? I should know, if your life depends on it.”
“Just black”, he says, shoulders falling a little with a sigh. Not like he’s upset or anything, just that he can relax because he’ll be getting this stupid little lifeline. He steps up to the counter, unzips his jacket and reaches into it for the wallet in his inside pocket.
It’s chilly out.
Figures, since it’s January.
He nods at one of the last remaining muffins on display, too.
“That chocolate muffin thing - no nuts, right? Yeah, then that too. Thanks.”
