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The words leave both our mouths together, tumbling over each other until neither of us can finish the sentence.

I laugh, and because I need to do something with my hands, I stick one out to shake.

She steps in for a hug at the same exact second.

So my hand ends up somewhere around her ribs and her arms are already halfway up, and we both go still, each of us half committed to a completely different greeting.

“Sorry, I...” I start.

“No, that’s...” she says.

Neither of us finishes that one either.

Then she huffs out a small laugh, closes the last of the distance, and I get my arm the rest of the way around her, and the whole awkward thing turns, all at once, into an actual hug. Her shoulder tucks under mine like somebody measured for it, and for one second the coffee shop disappears.

Four days ago she was just a wrong number. Now she’s standing in my arms. I pull back just enough to look at her again.

She’s smiling.

I glance down at the four cups covering the table. “I guess since we both ordered, you can try mine and I’ll try yours.”

She laughs, and it’s the first time I’ve seen her do it in person, and I’m in awe. “I was hoping you’d say that.”

I slide into the seat across from her and push my white mocha over with two fingers, slow, like I’m making a trade in a movie.

“My white mocha for your caramel latte?”

“This is a very interesting combo.” She grins and wraps both hands around my cup, like she’s accepting the terms.

Olivia peels back the lid just enough to blow across the top before taking a careful sip.

I don’t watch the coffee.

I watch her.

Her eyebrows lift, just a little, and then something loosens in her face, and the corner of her mouth pulls up like she got caught enjoying herself and can’t quite stop it.

“Huh.”

“Huh good?” I lean back, one arm along the top of the empty chair beside me, entirely too pleased with myself.

She nods, taking another sip, slower this time, savoring it now that she’s quit guarding it.

“I wasn’t expecting to like it this much.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.” I don’t bother hiding how pleased I am.

“You should.” She’s smiling into the cup now, and it reaches her eyes, and I decide right there that I’d trade coffees with this woman every morning for the rest of my life if it keeps doing that to her face.

She studies the cup for another second before looking back at me.

“Can I ask you something?”

She keeps nudging her cup in slow circles on the table, picking at the corner of the label where the barista wrote her name in marker, and she asks it to the lid more than to me.

“Sure.” I lean in, forearms on the table. She’s got my whole attention and I don’t much care if it shows.

She glances up then, quick, like she’s checking whether I’m actually listening or just waiting for my turn to talk.