by E M Lindsey
“It’s on me,” Will said.
Sage blinked up at him. “…what?”
“I’m going to go out on a limb and say this is a blind date, and you didn’t know what you were getting into,” Will replied.
Sage coughed. “No. Oh god, no, this so isn’t a da—” With vague horror, his words cut off and he turned his head to glance at where Jason was sitting, his foot tapping impatiently on the floor. He turned back to Will with a soft groan. “Oh my god, it is a date.”
Will’s brows went up. “You didn’t know?”
Sage flushed, dragging a hand down his face even as he reached for his wallet again. “No. I…I don’t really date, but the guys at the shop are always trying to set me up, and I never realize it until it’s too late and I’m already out with the guy. I’m so sorry I brought this douche-canoe in here.”
“He’s only treating me like this because he’s jealous,” Will told him, trying to wave off the cash.
Sage gave him a withering look and shoved the ten into the little bucket marked tips. “He’s treating you like this because he’s sub-human. He’s worldly because he’s been to Australia? Who the hell talks like that?”
Will pursed his lips in an attempt to hold off his laugh. “He does, apparently. And it’s fine. Trust me, I’ve heard worse. Let me get your drinks before he blows a gasket.”
Sage nodded, moving to the end of the counter and watching as Will poured a fresh cup of black coffee into one of the to-go mugs, and then grabbed another for the chai. He pumped it out of a carafe sitting at the far end of the bench, and Sage’s mouth watered at the sight of the creamy, spiced concoction filling his little cup.
When Will returned, he handed it over to Sage’s grabby hand. “Let me know what you think. It’s…it was…my mom’s recipe.” There was a faint tension in his tone, and Sage felt his stomach ache a little because he was far too familiar with that grieving stumble over tenses.
To help take the frown off Will’s face, he tipped the cup to his lips and swallowed. The flavor burst on his tongue, intense and simmering, the spices lodging in the back of his throat, and he couldn’t help but give a happy sigh. “This is perfect. Do you make it like this for the general public?”
“Mostly,” Will said with a tiny laugh. “I might ease up on the spices a little for the regular customers, but I’ll make sure you get a proper cup whenever you want.”
“I think I love you,” Sage said, and didn’t miss the way Will’s eyes widened a fraction, and a faint hint of blush colored the apples of his cheeks. He didn’t take it back, though. He certainly had no intention of taking it further, but there was something about Will which captivated him immediately. “Okay, I’m going to go break it to this asshole that this isn’t a date and there won’t actually be one in the future. Wish me luck.”
“Good luck. Come by tomorrow and I’ll have some pastries ready for you to try. As a consolation of having to apparently do this more than once,” Will told him.
Sage chuckled. “Count on it.” He grabbed the coffee and his chai, then walked to the table where Jason looked like he was ready to throw a full-on tantrum. As he slid into the chair across from him, he pushed the coffee over and tried his most placating smile. “So…”
“Is that like a habit for you?” Jason demanded, cutting him off. “Flirting with the help to get your dates all worked up? Because dude, I’m not really into the whole jealousy thing,” Jason complained. He took a sip of the coffee, looked pleasantly surprised, then schooled his face into a grimace. “Burnt.”
“Did you just…call Will the help?” Sage asked, unable to hide the shock in his tone. “That is so racist, I don’t even know where to start.”
Jason gave an unapologetic shrug. “No, it isn’t. It’s retail service. That’s what he is.”
Sage blinked at him and didn’t bother to hide the contempt in his tone when he addressed the other man. “Listen,” he said from behind a sigh, preparing himself for the inevitable argument and quick walk back to the shop, “there’s something I think I should clear up.”
“Seriously, if you don’t stop smirking at me, I will punch you,” Sage warned the fifth time he looked over to see that look on James’ face.
James sat back, his lips quirked up. “It’s not my fault you’re so obtuse.”
Sage pushed his rolling stool to the opening of his stall and fixed the other man with a firm glower. “It’s your fault you let these guys think that I know I’m going on a goddamn date with them.”
“Some of them have been decent,” James told him. “That one last week was real nice, and got that sweet skull and flames right over his lil’ pec. Tell me that didn’t pique your interest.”
“James, I’m not ready. I don’t…” Sage said, the rest of the words dying in his throat because he was just so fucking sick and tired of telling everyone he wasn’t dating. He was tired of having to invent excuses because they wouldn’t just accept that he didn’t want to put himself out there yet. Or maybe ever.
He was still taking baby steps with therapy and learning to control his petrifying fear that anyone he loved would end up dead. He also knew it was out of love that his family was doing this, but it was starting to feel a little painful when they wouldn’t listen.
James seemed to read something like that on his face, though, and his smirk fell away as fast as it had appeared. “Look, Sage, I don’t mean to cross any lines here.”
“I know,” Sage muttered.
“I just wanna see you smile.” The sincerity in James’ tone was enough to make Sage’s heart twist, and it reminded him that he was exactly where he was meant to be. Derek might have arrived and established himself first, but they had welcomed Sage with open arms and open minds, and he’d never felt like he belonged before the way he did now. “I know that guy tonight was a piece of shit…”
“More than that. He was a straight-up racist,” Sage groaned, shaking his head as he pushed back to grab his sketchbook. He was finishing up his sketch sheet for their Flash Friday sale they did once a month, doing his best not to stress since—as usual—he was the last to get his up on the board. “Have you been to that new coffee spot? Masala?”
James shook his head. “Naw, you know me, creature’a habit.” He jutted his chin at the reusable mug with the faded coffee cart logo on the side. “They any good?”
“The guy’s Indian, and he uses his mom’s authentic recipe for the masala chai. It was probably the best thing I’ve had in my mouth in a long time,” Sage said, knowing full well how James would take that. He ignored the snort of laughter. “The owner’s name is Will and he was nice. Except Jason was a fucking prick to him—he called him the help. Like, I still can’t get over it, you don’t even know.”
James sighed. “Okay, you know I wouldn’t have let that guy set foot in here if I’d known, Sage. And I actually didn’t encourage that asshole tonight. He already had it in his mind he was gonna follow you out.”
Sage groaned and picked up his red pencil to put the finishing touches on his little dragon. “Well, he’s gone now. He threw a huge hissy-fit about it in the parking lot, but I didn’t back down. Don’t think he’ll be back here for work though.”
James chuckled and Sage heard the telltale hiss of the suction on James’ prosthetic as he released the socket and eased it off. “That dude only ever comes for the Friday the Thirteenth deals anyway. I don’t think that dude has ever paid more than twenty bucks here. Tip included. The only reason he was in tonight was because Luke offered to touch up his tiger head for free. I don’t even think he tipped him.” James leaned out of his stall and shouted, “Hey, Luke! That douche with the tiger tip you tonight?”
“Naw, man, nothing,” Luke called from the back room.
“Gross,” Sage muttered. He turned his page from side to side, not entirely satisfied, but it was the best he could do late on a Wednesday night. They would start taking appointments the following day, and Sage needed the cash.
Ripp
ing the page off his book, he stood up and headed to the corkboard in the front lobby and pinned his sheet right next to Mat’s. Stepping back, he took a minute to appreciate their stylistic differences—all of them in the traditional flash style, and yet all of them with their own distinctive touches.
Sage had always favored more geometric design in his own work, in spite of the ink on his body being American traditional. Mat had done almost everything he had apart from a few shitty tattoos he’d gotten in their little squatter’s home as kids, and Sage often wondered why his tattoo style differed so much from what he wanted to display on his body.
Still, he didn’t have it in him to contemplate anything that deep. Not now, anyway. He had enough going on as it was. The anniversary of Teddy’s death was coming up in a few months, and he was feeling different about it this year. Halfway back home from Teddy’s birthday visit, it occurred to him that he hadn’t cried once. The idea of moving on terrified him almost as much as the loss itself, and he wasn’t entirely sure how to process it.
“When Tony hears about the dude’s racist bullshit tonight, you know he won’t be welcome back,” James said as he slipped his leg back on. He took a few, experimental steps along the pathway between the stalls, then stopped to lean against Sage’s doorway. “Seriously though, are you okay? Telling him to grab coffee with you was mostly a joke. The dude was insufferable, I just figured you’d tell him to fuck off.”
Sage offered a watery smile. “Trust me, a guy like that isn’t going to screw up my night.” He peered up at the Death Star wall clock Mat had hung above his station—one of the only ways he could tell time easily because it had ships and symbols in place of numbers, and the guys had learned it right along with him. It had just gone ten, and the shop was as dead as it would be for the rest of the night. “Are you finishing up alone?”
James shook his head. “Naw. Matty and Derek will be back in about an hour to close up. You wanna take off?”
Sage bit his lip, then nodded. He turned away from the cork board and walked back through the swinging half-door, past James and into his stall for his phone and keys. “No point in me sitting around when I have homework to do.”
“Homework,” James said with a grin. “That kills me every time.”
“At least it keeps me busy,” Sage told him, and that was the truth. He wasn’t officially a grad student at the moment—just taking the classes until he figured out if he really meant to do anything with them. But it was nice, and it did keep his mind from going off the rails when life got to be a little much. “We on for poker Saturday?”
“Yeah. I invited Wyatt if that’s cool,” James said as he lowered himself back to his little rolling chair, then scooted to the middle of the walk-way so he could keep eyes on the door.
Sage frowned, then realized who James was talking about. “Your new renter?”
“Yeah. I brought him some waffles yesterday when I made too many and mentioned we’d be doin’ cards and shit. He said he liked poker, so I thought it would be alright if I invited him to join.”
“Not to sound like an ass,” Sage started.
James laughed. “He got some braille cards to play with, or so he said. I figured what the hell, right? He seems like a good guy.”
Sage’s eyebrows lifted, recognizing James’ tone. “Good guy— like you’re interested in him for you or for me.”
James pulled a face. “Neither. Damn, boy, don’t shit where you eat. He pays his rent on time and never complains when we get rowdy. Don’t want him running for the hills just yet.”
Sage chuckled and leaned in to clap James on the shoulder. “Alright, man. Have a good night, and I’ll see you tomorrow.” He took one last look at the cork board, then at his stall, and headed for the back door to end his long, long night.
Chapter Five
Will stared at the deposit slip, the numbers blurring into nothing, the silence of the back room almost suffocating. He felt okay when he was moving, when customers were lining up and making demands. Hell, even the rude ones were a god-send because it meant he had something else to turn his anger on instead of the impotent rage he felt toward the universe for dumping all this shit on him.
He couldn’t even begin to rationalize how his luck had gone so bad so quickly, right when he was supposed to be celebrating. He had exactly three days of Grand Opening adrenaline and bliss before the phone call from Shaw came in, letting him know she and Molly would be heading to Denver in forty-eight hours. Will figured that call was one of those where even on his death-bed, he’d be able to recall with perfect clarity where he was standing, what he was wearing, what the room smelled like when it came through.
When he heard the words, “We weren’t able to find any willing family members to take Molly. I’m so sorry, but if this placement doesn’t work, she’ll have to go into foster care,” they were etched into his mind forever.
In a strange way, he eventually did find some logic in the situation. His father had hated him in the end, but something about his final wishes seemed apropos of how he felt about Will. Maybe it was his father’s last-ditch effort to impose responsibility on him. Maybe the relentless man had used it as a way to motivate Will into doing something more with his life than run a café. It was sick, but it was so like his father to think that way, it almost made him laugh.
Instead, it made him cry. In the dark, late night in his little condo, he sat in the empty tub and sobbed hard enough that his muscles ached the next day. He was filled with regret and bitterness—at the fact that his parents were gone and there was no way to ever reconcile. At the way that unless he wanted his sister to be thrown into the system, he would have to become her parental guardian.
And Will had never been a kid kind of guy. He didn’t have friends who had procreated, he didn’t know the first thing about keeping another human alive apart from sleep, water, and food. He wasn’t going to turn the social worker down, of course. What kind of monster would he be to let Molly rot away in some group home away from everything she’d ever known and cared about?
Except, that’s kind of what he’d be doing to her. He couldn’t uproot his life and move back to California. He didn’t want to live in the home he’d run from, a home he’d never have been welcome in after going against his father’s wishes. He had a life in Fairfield. He had a community, and an investment, and his career. But ultimately, he was about to bring more trauma into the little girl’s life because he hadn’t been anything more than a cautionary tale during her early childhood, and they didn’t know each other.
And now, he was going to be the one thing she depended on for survival, and he didn’t know how to make it seem okay.
His hands shook as he finished writing out his deposit slip, then he tucked the bag under his arm and grabbed his keys. The alarm panel glowed against the wall, and Will marched over, setting it before hurrying across the floor to the exit. He had a minute and thirty seconds to get out, but the foreboding beep always set him on edge—like he’d miss his chance to slip out and somehow the cops would mistake him for some hooligan trying to rob the place and shoot him dead before asking who he was.
The door slamming brought him back to earth, and he strode to his car, opening the front passenger side to throw his stuff in. Patting his pocket for his phone, he let the door slip from his fingers just as he realized the keys were on the seat. His car had an automatic lock on it, and he heard the telltale click as he lunged for the handle, the door refusing to budge under his frantic pulling. “No,” he whispered, pressing his palm to the glass.
For a long moment, he just stared through the window at the way the light glinted off the key, betrayal and horror squeezing his chest. After everything else he’d been through, and now this? With a half-laugh, half-sob, Will turned from the car and leaned his backside against it, pulling his phone out of his pocket.
If pressed, he had the cash for a locksmith, but being that it was almost one in the morning, he didn’t think they’d be fast or cheap. Luc
kily, one person had a spare set of keys, but he had a feeling Joe’s price tag for that favor would be somewhere around five figures. He’d been ignoring Joe for a week now, and he didn’t think his call would be very welcome, but he didn’t have much choice.
Joe’s phone rang, and just before voicemail answered, he picked up. “What the fuck do you want?”
“Where are you?” Will asked, not bothering to be polite. “I need your spare key for my car.”
Joe snorted. “Really? First you kick me out of our apartment, you won’t loan me cash you know you’ll get back in like days, and now you want to lock me out of our car?”
“My home, and my car,” Will corrected, his anger rising. “And I won’t see a dime from that money and we both know it. But it doesn’t matter, I’m not trying to take the car, I’m just…” But he heard the dead silence on the other end of the line and realized Joe had hung up on him.
This time, there was no laughter, just a quiet sob as tears welled in his eyes and spilled down his cheeks. It was such a small thing, but it was too much, and Will wasn’t sure he could take any more. He sank down onto the cement parking block, head in his hands, and just let himself unload. What did he care if someone saw him? His life was in the toilet as it was, and nothing was going to make it better.
“Hey,” came a soft voice to his right.
Will startled, flying to his feet and whipping around. He blinked, like maybe his brain really had cracked, but the vision in front of him didn’t disappear, even after he pinched himself. It was the hot guy from earlier that evening who had been on the mistaken date. Sage, if he remembered correctly.
Will had been almost breathless when the guy had walked in, and his stomach twisted with disappointment to see him with some prissy, polo-wearing boyfriend. At least, disappointed until Sage made it clear the guy was nothing to him. Not that Will had time or energy to date—and the fact that he still had Joe to deal with—but all the same, he couldn’t help his relief.