Page 24 of Christmas Coffee

An older man walks up to the window, and I notice the orange streaks across the early morning sky. The color accents his old wool coat. He’s round with fuzzy white eyebrows, a brown old dude cap on his head, and a smile on his face.

I slide open the window and return the grin. “Hello, sir. How are you this morning?”

He looks at the sign on the hut, and then back at me. “What are you selling? There’s no menu in the window. I thought I’d come over and ask.”

“Coffee and cookies.” I glance at the counter and have no idea what anything is or how much it cost. Quin isn’t here and hot guy is pacing in the parking lot, tensely talking on his phone. Talk about being thrown off balance. If I were him, I’d be more upset that I was in my thirties and working at a place like this.

“I don’t know if I should have something so sweet for breakfast, but I’ll take a cup of coffee.”

“Of course,” I’m about to turn away and grab the coffee, but I hesitate. My mouth has been watering since I stepped out of my car. I bet he smells that candle burning too. “You know, these cookies were the first thing I’ve smelled in a long time that made me want to eat the entire tray. I caught the scent in the parking lot before work this morning. I haven’t tried one yet and I really want to.” I glance between the blustering hot guy, pacing, and the old man. I lean closer to the sill and ask, “How about I split mine with you?”

He blushes slightly and smiles harder. “That’s very sweet, but my wife is waiting in the car and I think she’d have a stroke if she saw me splitting a cookie with a beautiful woman like you. How about two coffees and two cookies?”

“You got it.” I have no idea how much anything cost so I guess. After pouring the coffee into the big cups, I grab two cookies from the sheet and place them in parchment. I wrap them and seal it with a piece of tape since I can’t find a baggie or box. I set the things down on the counter and tell him the made up price. “It’s five bucks per cup—that’s amazing coffee by the way—and three bucks for each cookie. The grand total is sixteen dollars.”

The man hands me a twenty and says, “Keep it. You’re a sweet kid. Put the rest in your tip jar. Merry Christmas.” He takes his coffee and cookies and walks away.

Hot Guy bounds up the steps and throws open the door. “You can’t sell anything yet!”

“Sorry. He walked up. You saw him.” I glare at him, ready to fight and then manage to keep from rolling my eyes. I lean a hip against the counter and cock my head at him. “What was I supposed to do?”

“Wait a minute.” He bites back whatever he was going to say and calmly asks, “How much did you charge.”

“Oh yeah,” I jab my thumb at the window. “You need a menu or something. He got two large coffees and a pair of cookies for sixteen bucks.”

He blinks at me. His lips don’t part and he doesn’t speak for a while.

It gets uncomfortable so I start rambling as I try to not to pick at my nails and avoid his eyes. He’s the one who didn’t tell me anything and then wandered off. It’s not my fault. “Listen, I’m sorry if it was too cheap. I didn’t know and there’s nothing written down. He walked over to ask what we had. They should really have a sign up in the window with whatever else we sell. I guessed. If it wasn’t enough, Quin can take it out of my check. He was a nice guy.”

He still doesn’t speak, just nods slowly. Then repeats, “Sixteen dollars?”

“Yeah.” I don’t know why he’s so on edge. I feel like I broke his brain or something. I lower my head and tip it to the side to catch his eye. “Hey, are you okay?”

His crystal blue eyes meet mine. “Yeah…I need to make a few calls. Keep doing whatever you just did. I need to get in touch with Novous, my new manager.”

I nod and try not to smile. He’s such an ass. When people see my legal name on a piece of paper, they assume I’m a dude. No one assumes it shortens to NOVA. It’s happened before. I’m used to it, but this time it thrills me a little bit because he’s so off kilter. It’s like he had an epiphany and skittered away before he could jump in the air and shout eureka!

Hot Guy walks outside again, plucks his phone from his pocket, and dials. A second later my phone rings. I fish it out of my frock and answer. A lazy smile snakes across my face and I lean forward in the window and say, “Hey, this is Novous.”

Hot Guy stops when he hears my voice from the window. His shoulders stiffen before he turns in slow-mo and lifts those cobalt eyes up at me.

I wave at him with the tips of my fingers and smile too sweetly. “Yeah, I’m Novous, but most people call me Nova. I’m your new manager.”