grab a to-go cup and start pouring her coffee. I find most customers like to get that to their lips as fast as possible. Hell, I’ve known people to finish their cups before they even get to the cash register. I admire that kind of dedication.
“How’re things?” I ask Alice as I pop a lid on her drink.
“So good!” she says, taking the coffee from me. I reach down to bag up the muffin when she adds, “I was sorry to hear about you and Ryan!”
My head snaps up, muffin clutched in my hand. “What? What about me and Ryan?”
I notice that she holds her coffee with a raised pinky. Who does that?
“That you guys split up,” she says, eyeing the other confectionary offerings behind the glass.
“Oh,” I say, fighting to keep that professional smile intact. “Right, that is true.”
He’s telling people we split up? It’s been less than five days. And did we really split up? Is that what I should be telling people while we’re on this break?
“I know this sounds weird,” Alice continues, “but I wanted to come and make sure you were okay with everything before our date. I didn’t want to step on any toes, or get involved in something that’s still messy, you know?”
My hand clenches on the muffin, and it crumbles into chunks on the floor around my feet. “You’re...you’re going on a date with Ryan?”
Shannon’s head whips up from a few feet away. She can sense danger the way police dogs can sniff out weed in an old station wagon.
Alice looks at her mangled muffin. “Yeah,” she says cautiously. “When he said you’d broken up last week, I asked him out to dinner. I hope that’s okay?”
Shannon is hovering in her spot, waiting to see if she needs to tackle me to the floor before handing her customer a scone.
I blink wildly at Alice for a few seemingly endless seconds. “Oh, sure!” I trill. “I mean, totally! How great for you both!” I reach down into the case and pull up another muffin, carefully placing it in a bag. Handing it across the counter to her, I say, “Really, that sounds awesome. I hope you both have a great time!”
Shannon comes over, puts her hand on my shoulder, and in her most friendly-sounding tone, says, “Hey, Pumpkin, can you go trade places with Butter and finish up those cookies for the next round of rush? And have her bring up another tray of the coconut cuppies?”
I smile benevolently at her. “Absolutely.” I turn to Alice and keep the look alive. “It was so nice to see you again,” I say, moving out of Shannon’s way. “Have a great time on your date!”
I scurry into the back room and relay the cupcake message to Butter, who rushes out with a tray in hand.
Flopping down on the stool at my station, I stare off into the void for a moment. Five days. It’s been less than five days. How in the damn hell did he find someone to go out with in less than five days?
“Are you okay?” Liz asks, cutting another batch of scone dough. “You look a little pale.”
I look up and feel a blank expression plastered on my face. In the background, the sounds of a busy morning rush register in the one part of my brain that’s not sitting here repeating the Five days? mantra.
“I’m fine!” I say, willing it to be true. I grab my mug and quickly dump the now-cold coffee in the sink, reaching over and filling it again with the pot we keep back by our stations. “I just needed another little jolt to keep me conscious.”
She takes this as a suitable response and gets back to her scones, now loading them on a sheet tray for baking.
Shannon sticks her head back through the door. “All right?” she asks me as I chug coffee that’s only half a degree below molten lava in temperature.
Liz looks up at me again, suspicious now.
“Super!” I say, raising my mug. “Just super!”
I take another sip and head back out into the front room. The line isn’t any shorter.
“You can take some time,” Shannon whispers beside me. “Seriously, I’ve got it under control up here.”
I shake my head. “I’m good, really.”
And I have to mean that. This was my idea. I told him to go date other people. I’m not sure what I initially thought that would entail, but I can’t fault him for doing the exact thing I insisted he do.
Admittedly I didn’t assume he’d make progress this soon. He’s a pretty quiet dude, and I don’t think I pictured him out there getting his mack on, bringing home a caravan of eligible concubines.
Then I remember that Alice said she asked him out. Was Alice standing around lusting after my boyfriend all these years?
While that thought should probably make me want to punch Alice in the face, all I can focus on is—Why haven’t I been lusting after him for years?
It took Alice five days to ask him out. It’s taken me nearly two years even to attempt to have sex with him again.
Wait. She said when he told her about us splitting up last week. That means she probably asked him on Thursday or Friday.
Less than forty-eight hours and he found a date.
My cheeks feel numb.
“Good morning,” a voice says in front of me.
I look up. It’s Ben Cleary, holding a to-go cup and wearing a friendly smile.
The last time I saw Ben, he was splattered with coffee, red in the face from laughing to tears, and being a really good sport about an absurdly awkward situation.
His teeth are very white. But not, like, too white. I hate when they’re too white.
I’m not sure why it hits me, really. Maybe it’s just the reaction to hearing about Ryan moving on in the world. Maybe it’s because I’ve known Ben for so many months as a customer. Maybe it’s because I accidentally sexually objectified his admittedly impressive jawline the other day. Maybe it’s because he should have looked a little pitiful all splattered with coffee, but he managed to appear endearing.
Whatever the reason, I find myself struck with the urge to offer Ben Cleary my last dumpling.
I mentally jump away from the thought as if it’s physically burned me. I can’t ask Ben out. I shouldn’t even be thinking about asking someone out.
Just because Ryan is going out with someone, maybe several someones, doesn’t mean I should. The whole point of this is to fight my way back into the relationship I let myself be too busy to tend.
But if that’s the point, maybe Shannon and Butter are right. Maybe I really do need to know for damn diggity sure that my equipment works properly before I go back to Ryan.
How’s it going to look on our anniversary—after I’ve assured him I’ll fix all
