Chapter Twenty-Three

twenty-three

The back office at Sip is a micro museum to the way things used to be. Emphasis on micro—it’s about the size of three cubicles pushed together, or at least that’s what my manager said when we were first setting up the space. I’ve never had the pleasure of spending time in a cubicle, but if my days in the back office are any indication, I don’t think I’d mind it too much.

To call it cozy would be generous; there’s just enough space for a diner-size table, a coatrack, and two desks—one for me and one for the Sip desktop, which serves exactly two purposes: clocking in and clocking out. The walls are a mismatched gallery of decor from the old shop that didn’t fit the new aesthetic. Highlights include several old tin coffee signs, framed pictures from storewide Christmas parties, and a poorly designed poster from our first open mic, hosted shortly after my one-year work anniversary. The poster has since yellowed with time, a subtle reminder that, among my sixteen-year-old coworkers, the real relic here is me. Only in my own hometown would I feel practically prehistoric at twenty-one. At least I feel at home here in the office, surrounded by antiques.

A notification dings in the bottom-right corner of my laptop screen: all 3,099 photos and videos from the reopening are officially uploaded. It’ll take hours to sort through them, and I’ll probably need to take some work home with me tonight, but I’d still choose this over a barista shift any day. I eject my SD card and the computer whirs to remind me how hard it’s working. Nice try, bud, but you can’t impress me. I’m working hard too.

Time slips away as I click through the gallery, dragging and dropping my favorite video clips into my editing software. I don’t realize I’ve fallen into a flow state until the buzz of my phone extracts me from it—one text from Mom. It’s an apartment listing, the third one she’s sent me today. I suffocate my urge to thumbs-down react to it, then click the link and swipe through the photos: plain white countertops, gray paneled flooring, angular faucets on the bathroom sinks. Same as nearly every other suburban apartment that labels itself “affordable luxury housing.” The balcony is a nice touch, but the complex is two towns over, which would double my commute to Sip. I send a generic “nice!” and connect my earbuds to Bluetooth before switching on Do Not Disturb. She’s trying to be helpful, but I can’t think that far ahead right now. I need to stay focused. Popping in my earbuds, I press play on a voice memo I recorded while studying last night.

“What are the tax differences between a Roth IRA and a traditional IRA?” my recorded self asks, and I whisper the right answer along with her. The low-budget audiobook of the study guide was my idea, but listening to it at work was Brooklyn’s suggestion. She’s a first year at Weymouth, it turns out, which explains why we get along better than I do with my high school coworkers. She and I essentially cohosted a roast of WCC over our lunch break yesterday, followed by an extensive bitch session about the pains of still living with our parents. Us post–high school hires have to stick together, even if it’s just for the holiday months.

“When’s the group upstairs clearing out?”

This time, it’s not my own voice asking the question. I pluck out an earbud and swivel toward the door, where Brooklyn leans against the doorframe, rotating one of the half dozen gold rings stacked on her fingers. We’ve worked enough shifts together for her to know I’m the person to come to with questions, but not enough shifts to recognize that I’m rarely enthusiastic about answering them. If someone is going to interrupt, I’m at least glad it’s her.

“The book club?” I ask. “Are they not out yet?”

Brooklyn shakes her head. “And I can’t remember if there’s a group after them.”

“It’s super not your job to remember that,” I assure her. “You’re doing great.”

I swivel my chair back toward my laptop, clicking into today’s reservations. Looks like the women’s Christian book club is running a little over, and while there’s no reservation after them, we’ll need the extra seating once school lets out for the day. “Go ahead and clear them out,” I say, double-clicking on the reservation and sending the rental receipt to the email on file. “They’re a monthly reservation. They’ll understand. And remind them to tag us if they took any photos.”

Brooklyn makes a clicking sound with the side of her mouth, but instead of turning back around, she leans to the side, catching a peek at my computer screen. “Whatcha workin’ on?”

“A highlight reel of the reopening. Wanna see?”

“Duh.”

I press play on the rough cut, and although it’ll be another hour of editing before I have a presentable draft, Brooklyn seems mesmerized. “That’s sick,” she says when the screen dips to black. “How’d you get so good at that?”

“Practice, mostly,” I say with a shrug. “I didn’t learn it at Weymouth, that’s for sure.”

We share a laugh before Brooklyn disappears to shoo away the Christian book club, and I settle back into work and into an unfamiliar feeling. I feel…content? Hopeful? Like I’m doing what I’m meant to be doing, even if I’m not where I want to be? Maybe it’s that I finally have a coworker I can connect with, or maybe it’s the rush of editing video, knowing it’s something I’m actually good at. There must’ve been a time when editing didn’t come so naturally to me, but now, I’m like a painter with 3,099 different colors on her palette and no instruction other than “paint.” Videos, graphics, social media posts—so long as I make the plan and execute on it, there’s wiggle room for me to try and fail and experiment along the way. Maybe that’s allowed for studying too. Maybe that’s allowed for life in general. If I try and I fail, I’m allowed to try again—to retake the class or transfer next year—or experiment with something different, like doing marketing for Monarch.

I can hear Ellie’s voice in the back of my head, calling me a small business marketing consultant. If that involves doing more of this type of work, I could be into that. I open a new tab on my laptop, type “small business marketing consultant” into Google, and scroll through the results. Past the ads, I land on the suggested questions. What does a small business marketing consultant do? How much should a marketing consultant charge? I click on the second one and try not to tumble backward out of my chair. About $100 to $175 an hour. A few more minutes of browsing Google tells me I’m just about qualified—although a degree might make a big difference.

An email notification hits the [email protected] inbox, and I close out of my corporate daydreaming and return to today’s tasks. I pop my earbuds back in, testing whether typing emails and studying can happen simultaneously, or if I’ll start replying to wedding shower requests with details about accounts payable and revenue projections.

“What are the tax implications of a sole proprietorship versus an LLC?”

I say the answer out loud, and there’s a “Huh?” in response from a voice behind me. I flip around—it’s Brooklyn again, looking bewildered. “Were you talking to me?”

I hit pause on my phone. “No, I’m studying.”

“Ohhh. The recorded question thing.” She nods, tossing her long braids over her shoulder. “Got it. And sorry to interrupt. There’s just this customer…”

I almost laugh at how genuinely sorry she sounds, as if interrupting me at work and asking me to do my job were completely out of bounds. “It’s cool. What’s up?”

“Someone’s trying to use this coupon but”—her nose crinkles—“it doesn’t look legit.”

“Is it a punch card?” We phased out our classic Buy nine drinks, get the tenth drink free model when we closed for renovations, but we’ll be dealing with stragglers for the next year, I’m sure.

“I don’t think so? It’s on their phone.”

I push away from my desk and onto my feet. If it was one of the other baristas, I might tell them I’m busy and to figure it out on their own. But I like Brooklyn.

“I’ve got it,” I say. “Lead the way.”

I follow Brooklyn down the hall, chatting about finals while inspecting the back of what appears to be an intramural softball T-shirt. Just as I work up the courage to ask her if she has a team for this spring, we pass through the swinging door into the space behind the bar, and my heart bangs against the base of my throat. Standing in front of the register in a MUNA T-shirt and an ultraoversize denim jacket is the coupon user in question, Miss Ellie Meyers. Fuck, I should’ve pieced that together.

Brooklyn steps up to the register with a winning customer service smile and a bubbly tone to match. “Murphy can help you,” she says, stepping out of the way and placing me in full view. While Ellie had at least a three-hour drive to think about what to say to me, the three seconds I’ve had to prepare don’t quite cut it.

“Hi,” I squeak out, just to fill the silence as I try to compute how the hell she’s here, three hours from campus, in the middle of the day on a Thursday.

“Hi back,” she says.

I want to say something poignant, something friendly or romantic or at the very least worthy of a reaction. Instead, all that comes out is, “Trying to redeem a coupon?”

Not my finest work.

“I am.” Playful recognition shimmers in Ellie’s eyes as she hands her phone to me without breaking our gaze. From the corner of my eye, a screenshot of my email stares up at me. “I don’t think I was meant to redeem it so soon, but I’m hoping you can make an exception.”

“You drove all the way from Champaign for me?” I blurt out, hoping Brooklyn has lost interest and wandered off. I can’t check. I can’t take my eyes off Ellie. I’m certain the second I look away, she’ll be gone, disappearing like a fine dust into the air. Or else I’ll blink twice and she’ll turn into a forty-year-old man with a long-expired gift certificate, asking if we sell coffee here.

“No,” she says, drawing out the o sound. “I drove all the way from Champaign for a free chaicoffski.” She leans over the register and taps her phone screen with one blue fingernail. “Lucky coincidence that you happen to be working.”

“What would you have done if I wasn’t working?”

She breathes a laugh. “I honestly didn’t think that through. Is that bad?”

“No.” I match her laugh. “But only because it worked out.”

Beside me, Brooklyn pops her tongue, startling me out of this hushed conversation and back into my workday. “So does this happen a lot, or…” She trails off into a suspicious little smirk.

“Hardly ever,” I assure her, punching in my employee ID to comp the drink. “I’m gonna take my lunch break, ‘kay? Right after I make this.” Without looking at Brooklyn, I head for the back cabinets where we keep the ceramics and pull down a pale yellow mug and its corresponding saucer. “One chaicoffski, coming right up.”

I insert myself into the fold of the bar, unapologetically giving myself priority over the existing drinks in the queue. If the other baristas mind, they don’t say anything about it.

“Shit, should I have been using for-here mugs?” Brooklyn asks, peering into the back cabinet for what I assume is the first time.

“Nah, we only use them if someone asks,” I explain. “But I know this customer. I know she wants to stay awhile.” Only the first half of the sentence is true, and even then, just barely. But I know I’m in no rush to get rid of Ellie, and I’ll do what I can to keep her here for at least the length of a conversation. I pull two perfect ristretto shots into the mug and top it with our house-made chai and juniper syrup, half a pump of vanilla, a frothy blanket of oat milk, and a delicate sprinkle of cinnamon and nutmeg. A perfectly made, original recipe chaicoffski.

“One chaicoffski for…” Brooklyn lifts a brow toward me as I place the mug on the bar. “For?”

“For El Bell,” I finish for her.

“Uh, one chaicoffski for El Bell,” she repeats with a laugh. Across the shop, Ellie unfolds her legs and presses out of the green velvet bucket chair, the same one she sat in the night we snuck in. Her hair sways against her cheeks, perfectly framing her dimple as she sashays up to the bar and delicately wraps one hand around the mug, guiding the saucer with the other. She moves her drink off the ledge quarter inch by quarter inch, thanking us twice without taking her eyes off the mug, as though she’s thanking the chaicoffski just for being itself.

“Mind if I clock out and sit with you for a bit?” I ask. When she doesn’t answer, I tack on, “Totally fine if not.”

“No, no, I was hoping you would,” Ellie says. “Sorry, I’m just so worried I’m going to spill this.” At long last, she looks up at me with a sheepish smile. “Don’t be offended if I drop your art and ruin it, okay?”

“You’re not going to drop it,” I promise her. “But if you do, I’ll send you another coupon.”

I hurry to the back office to clock out for what I’m sure will be a longer than usual lunch break, then step back into the shop to find Ellie almost 90 percent of the way back to her table, which miraculously has gone unclaimed during her long journey back to her seat. She’s shuffling across the floor like a little kid trying to pick up static from the carpet. I block her path, holding my hands out and taking the mug and saucer from her. “Please,” I say. “Let me.”

The saucer clinks against the table, the mug clinks against the saucer, and I sit down on the very edge of the seat across from Ellie’s, staying ready to run. “Did you not have class today or something?”

“No, I did.” Ellie tucks one leg beneath her, then the other, the heft of her Docs tucked under her thighs giving her a solid three-inch boost. “I skipped.”

“For me?”

“No, for a free chaicoffski.” She reaches forward and slowly lifts the mug from its saucer, then purses her lips, blowing a ripple of cool air over the surface. “I told you that already, remember?”

“Right, right.” I loop a thumb through the scrunchie around my wrist, gathering my hair into a low bun, just like hers. Anything to keep my hands busy while she closes her eyes and takes her first sip.

“Mmm,” she hums, mushing her lips together. “Incredible.” Her eyes flicker open. They’re warm and sweet, like the first sip of chai. “Thanks for this.”

“It’s the least I can do in exchange for that painting,” I say, waving her off.

Ellie’s satisfied smirk falls to a flat line. “What painting?”

“The Murphy’s Bleachers painting?”

Her eyes narrow behind her mug. “How do you know about that?”

“What do you…” I trap my breath behind my teeth, trying to tease apart what I know from what I think I know. If Ellie didn’t ask Kara to give me the painting, then…“Oh my God,” I groan. “Your mom.”

“What about my mom?” She sets her mug down with a clatter.

“Your mom gave that painting to me,” I explain. “She said it was a gift from you.”

As the pieces click together, all of the warmth surrounding our conversation dims to a tepid, room-temperature disappointment. “I started painting that after you left Thursday night,” Ellie says. “Mom must’ve found it, and…”

“And when I stopped by on Friday and didn’t know you had left…”

“And when she texted me to ask about you and I ignored it…”

“Yup. She must’ve known something was up.” I make a sound through my lips like a fast-deflating balloon. “So I’m guessing you didn’t know about the list either.”

“What list?” She asks.

“The list of things your family was thankful for.” I bite a hangnail off my thumb. “Your mom taped it to the back of the painting.”

Ellie frowns. “Why would she…”

“Think about it. What did you say you were thankful for?”

I lean back in my chair and watch as Ellie’s face tightens, then slowly releases into a soft smile, her dimple just barely peeking through. “Ahh,” she whispers. “Very clever, Mom.” She tucks a loose strand of hair into her bun, aiming her smile at the floor. “That’s sweet.”

“Yeah, it really got me good.” I press my tongue against the back of my teeth, then cautiously add, “It felt like…an apology?”

Ellie’s eyes flutter closed, and she nods as she processes. “Right. Which is why you emailed me. Because you thought I apologized.”

“Right.”

We sit there, blinking at each other until I break the silence with a strangled sigh. “So are you…not apologizing, then?”

“Of course I’m apologizing,” she says. “I’m sorry I left like that. I was thinking about what you said about all relationships needing a little space. I thought it’d be best for both of us.”

“So you ditched the opening and left town without saying goodbye?”

“You walked away first,” she points out. “I didn’t think you wanted me showing up on your big day like nothing happened.”

“And when I called you afterward?”

She looks down at her nails, which have been painted a fresh shade of blue. “I needed space too. What you said about me being just like Mary…that really hurt.”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. It wasn’t fair.”

“It wasn’t wrong either,” Ellie mumbles. “Not entirely.” Moving on from her nails, she picks up her mug. A fresh distraction. “I knew you liked me, and it was so easy to pretend we were together that I just…I got carried away. But I never meant to give you mixed signals. I was really into you.”

My stomach twists. “Was? Past tense?”

She rolls her eyes and takes a sip. “What do you think? I drove three hours to see you, didn’t I?”

“I thought you drove three hours for a chaicoffski,” I say.

Her cheeks burn red. “Among other things.”

“And…only because your mom pulled the strings.”

Ellie rubs her lips together, her septum ring twitching in response. “You know what that means though, right?”

“No?”

“It means my mom likes you enough to try to smooth things over between us,” Ellie says. There’s a tiny bit of mischief dancing in her voice. “The plan worked.”

“The plan worked,” I repeat under my breath, but my mind is still snagged on the word us . There was never really an us in the first place, but the way it sounds falling off Ellie’s tongue feels familiar in an un familiar way. Like the feeling I had sitting in the office earlier. Content. Hopeful. Like I’m on the right track.

We’re both quiet for a moment, letting the din of the shop take over—the clack of laptop keys, the growl of the espresso machine, the soft indie song I could probably identify if my mind weren’t otherwise occupied. I jiggle my leg, trying to shake up the courage to say what I know I need to. Ellie could walk out the front door and never come back again. I could fail my accounting exam and stay stuck in Geneva, and she could graduate and move straight to New York. Our paths might never cross again. I know there’s a possibility I’ll never even think about last weekend again, that it could be some stupid thing that happened when I was twenty-one that I’ll look back on and roll my eyes…but if there’s even a chance that I could’ve had something great here if I’d only said something, I’d never forgive myself. I need to speak up.

“I’m…” I stop, sigh, start again. “I’m not in love with Kat, okay?”

Ellie startles, finding her place on the other side of an abrupt conversation shift. Her mouth falls open, and for a moment I think she’s going to defend herself. I’m ready for another fight, but instead, Ellie’s voice hovers beneath her breath, like she doesn’t even want to hear herself speak. “I know,” she says. “It was never about that, really.”

I lift a brow. “No?”

“Of course not.” She practically hides behind her mug. “You were right,” she admits. “I was jealous.”

“You don’t have to be jealous of Kat.”

“I’m jealous of both of you,” she corrects me, then shifts in her seat like she can’t quite get comfortable. “I know you don’t remember much of high school,” she says, “but I do, and it mostly sucked. People think they have good memories from high school, but they don’t. They mostly have bad memories, but with good people. That’s the only thing that makes it fun, laughing through the bullshit with your best friends that you get to see every day. Without that, most things are just…bullshit.”

“Kinda dark,” I tease.

She glares back at me. “I’m serious. When things are bad, Kat will always have your back, and you’ll always have hers. I’ve only ever had that from Mary.” She pauses, then adds, “And some of my boyfriends, I guess.”

“And I didn’t have your back with your Mom after bringing up grad school,” I say, wishing I, too, had a mug to hide behind.

“Right. And then I heard you on the phone with Kat and…” Ellie leaves the rest of the thought behind her. “I shouldn’t have snapped at you though.”

“And I shouldn’t have left the table in the first place,” I say. “I promised to back you up on the grad school conversation and I didn’t. The transfer app deadline thing really sent me into a spiral, and suddenly it was like…why am I even keeping up this dating charade, you know?”

“How are you doing with that, by the way?” she asks. “With the transfer stuff?”

If only that were my only concern. Between missing the transfer deadline, Ellie no-showing the reopening, and my parents’ upcoming move, I’ve been striking out left and right. “Honestly, I’ve been on a losing streak.”

Ellie breathes a laugh through her nose, but there isn’t an ounce of humor in her sad, sunken eyes. “Me too. I, uh.” She swallows hard. “I got rejected from NYU.”

My heart drops to my kneecaps. “Shit, really?”

“And my backup school. I got both letters yesterday.” She slowly drags her gaze up to meet mine, and when our eyes lock, her eyelids are heavy, like they pulled the weight of the world up with them. “So I guess I’m not moving to New York,” she says.

There’s a teeny, tiny happy dance brewing inside me, but it drowns in a flood of sympathy. Between this and getting dumped, that’s more rejection than anyone could take. And this isn’t just anyone. This is Ellie. “How are you feeling?” I ask.

“Sad,” she says plainly. “I cried for, like, three hours yesterday. But only one hour today, so that’s an improvement.”

“Baby steps,” I say, realizing I haven’t cried at all about U of I. What does that say about me?

“It sucks, but it’s not like those were the only two art therapy programs in the country,” Ellie goes on. “And living in New York was my dream with Mary. Maybe there’s a new dream without her.”

“You’ll find it.”

“Soon, I hope,” she grumbles into her mug. “That stable, convincing plan we tried to sell Mom on made me realize how much I need that.”

“A plan?”

“Stability,” she corrects me. “Like Marcus with his salary and his fiancée and his fixed-rate mortgage. Bringing you home was like…” Ellie’s eyes glaze over momentarily, but she blinks it away, letting a shudder roll through her. “I felt like that kind of girl, you know? The girl who brings her girlfriend home on holidays and contributes to a retirement fund. Like someone with her life together.”

I swivel my chair a little, leaning in with a secret I’ve been dying to share. “You know, Marcus hasn’t always had his life together,” I say. “Did you know he got fired from Sip?”

Ellie bristles. “Really? He told us he quit.”

I shake my head. “He got caught stealing from the tip jar.”

“Seriously?” Ellie’s eyes go wide. “Says who?”

“Says my manager.”

Her mouth falls open a full two inches. “Shit, that’s bad.”

“I’m just saying, your brother didn’t always have his life together as much as you thought. Maybe we don’t have to either.”

Ellie’s eyes crinkle with the start of a smile. “Thanks for that,” she says.

“Of course.”

“And for what it’s worth, I meant what I wrote on Thanksgiving. I am thankful for you. You made me feel like that kind of girl.”

A prickle of warmth climbs up my neck. “I’m thankful for you too. If I would have been at the table, that’s what I would’ve said.”

“Really?” Her dimple winks at me.

“Obviously.” I pause for a breath, enjoying the little bit of space where things between us are easy before my next question makes them hard again. “So what comes next?”

Her laugh is amused, if not a little smug. “Well, next you can admit that you’re reaaallly into me.”

My eye roll comes with a groan. “Do you have to be so cocky about it?”

“I have every right to be cocky,” she says. “I heard it for myself.” Ellie flashes me a wicked smile, slowly shaking her head. “Kat really shouldn’t have been talking so loud in the library.”

I can’t confirm whether or not my eyes actually bulge out of my head, but just the mention of Kat in the library instantly converts my brain into a wave pool and my mouth into a leaky inner tube, sputtering out air. And that smile—that devilish smile with that stupid little dimple—could put me in a watery grave.

“Hey, Murphy?” A worried Brooklyn interrupts from behind the bar, stalling my pending short circuit. “I thought the baby shower was booked for tomorrow.”

I swallow hard, breathe for the first time in too many seconds, and turn to ask Brooklyn what she’s talking about. Before I can get a word out, a woman with armfuls of light-blue gift bags and pacifier-shaped Mylar balloons answers my question.

I turn back toward Ellie with a wobbly smile and panic-stricken eyes. “I can’t believe I’m saying this but…I have to get back to work,” I choke out, pressing my palms against the table and helping myself to my feet. “Are you driving back to school now?”

Ellie lifts a shoulder, that self-satisfied smile still lingering on her lips. “I don’t have to. I’m free up until a meeting tomorrow at four, and I already turned in my final projects. You know, in case there was a reason I should stay tonight.”

My belly button sucks in toward my spine. “I have to study tonight,” I say. “But if you really wanted to, you could come over and quiz me.” I’m embarrassed to even offer.

“Of course, what time?” Ellie’s eagerness throws me off-balance, and it takes me a second to recalibrate.

“Wait, really? Are you sure?” I can hear the balloon woman’s voice getting louder and louder, and Brooklyn’s desperate stare is hot on my temple, but I’m not walking away from Ellie until I know I can reach her again. “I’ve gotta go, but…text me?”

“Wait, hang on.” Ellie extends one arm, blocking me from the bar. “I, um. I actually deleted your contact.” She sheepishly holds out her phone. “Do you mind?”