Description
Bryce wasn’t sure if Sasha was actively punking him, or just being naive. He waved his hands over his portly frame, as pale as it was pudgy, knowing he was blushing a creamy shade of crimson across both chubby cheeks. “You have to ask?”
Sasha seemed unphased by his extra twenty to thirty pounds. If only he was straight, that would have been great. Instead, he always found himself attracted to guys like Tay: long, lean, effortlessly athletic, and superbly confident, the exact type of guy least likely to be interested in him.
“So, because you’re not cut and ripped you think there’s no chance with you and Mr. Sexy Narrator Guy here?”
“Precisely.”
“Hogwash.”
Bryce rolled his eyes. “Easy for you to say, Miss Effortlessly Sexy Bohemian Barista Chick. But trust me. When it comes to guys like Tay? And me? Not a chance.”
“Have you tried taking that chance?”
“Only about a dozenteen times before, yeah.”
Sasha narrowed her eyes at him across the tabletop. “Really taken a chance, Bryce? Or just created some narrative in your head and then given up halfway through actually approaching said stud?”
Bryce chuckled, clearly seen. Again. Perhaps in addition to being a barista of note, Sasha was some kind of mystic seer of all-knowing visions. “Perhaps, but I’ve tried enough to know there was no shot on each such occasion. And trust me, Tay is no different.”
“And yet, you sit here day after day watching him walk to and from wherever he’s going?”
“I think it’s to work.”
“You think?”
“I mean, there’s a workshare office at the end of this strip mall, and they have a number of recording studios. I figure he goes there, records his hot and spicy chapters for the day, and then heads home.”
“And you found all this out, how?”
Bryce tapped his trusty cell phone, but not too hard. The racy cover of the golf erotica he’d been listening to had finally just disappeared from the screen and he was in no hurry to bring it back for Sasha’s prying eyes. “Research, obviously. Same way I spotted this business card on my way to the bathroom one day and learned what my Mystery Man did for a living.”
Sasha smiled, a radiant sight he saw far too rarely when she was behind the service counter, whipping up fresh cappuccinos and frappes for her steady stream of daily clientele. She was about to say something when the bell over the door rang, clearly startling them both.
Perhaps for different reasons. Sasha greeted the customer warmly, then turned back to Bryce with a wagging finger and more sober expression, like an irate mother not giving up on her lecture just because a stranger was there to hear it. “To be continued, young man,” she said before standing abruptly and drifting behind the counter.
Bryce waited, not entirely opposed to the idea. He didn’t have a lot of friends — read, any friends — and the quick outpouring of secrets, emotions, and gushy gooey romanticism was a breath of fresh air in his mostly solitary life. But the afternoon rush was upon them now, and thus the line never lessened, the business never slowed, and eventually, duty called.
He waved at the door, hoping to catch Sasha’s eye, but she was busy filling a gaggle of high school girls’ orders and deluged with cries of half-whip soy mocha and the like. Instead, he merely left, as anonymously as he’d come, and not one day closer to meeting, let alone sleeping with, Tay.
