It seems I have a new regular.
She's quiet and comes in late at night. She's unpredictable too; sometimes coming in every night for a week and then not returning for a few days, sometimes weeks. I wonder what it is that keeps her from sleeping, that brings her here late at night when she clearly has a day job, when the dusky circles under her eyes could most definitely benefit from a solid eight hours of rest. She dresses professionally, looking like the countless other nine to fivers I serve, wears 'power heels' that I imagine preclude her from any job involving too much walking around. A desk job, I assume. We've begun chatting a little but nothing too profound.
Yet.
We share a friendly greeting and make comments on the weather, sometimes share an eye-roll and a smile, directed towards an impatient patron. But she'll open up eventually. The ones like this always do.
Sometimes I think that the barista has become the new hair stylist. People see me everyday, some of them two or three times a day, and we begin to strike up a rapport. There are, of course, the people who simply order, pay, and leave with their order and little more than a nod but then there are the others.
The group of people, who from the first time they order, offer a few more seconds of eye contact; the ones that smile and say thanks when they receive their order. I like these ones.
Soon, we are greeting each other like old friends and I know the names of their pets and children, the gripes they have with their significant others, and the fact that although they'd never request it because they don't want to sound demanding, they'd really prefer it if I skipped the foam on top of their latte. I notice the small things, like when they scrape the foam off with a stirrer and discreetly place it into the trash or a napkin; I omit the foam the next time and they smile in thanks when they feel the extra weight of the cup. I'll give them a pastry on the house and they will slip me a nugget of information in return.
I change names, adjust scenarios, and write another chapter in my novel.
This woman however, is a mystery.
She orders a chai latte and quietly reads her books over in what I have affectionately named 'Rick's chair'. It's fast becoming her chair as well. It's fairly lucky they haven't run into each other and begun a feud over who has seating rights.
Although Rick has been scarce of late, there was a period of a few weeks, when Rick was finishing up Heat Wave, that they missed each other by mere minutes. It probably doesn't hurt that it's the most comfortable seat in my somewhat eclectic collection of thrift store and antique auction finds. She seems to be a fan of the crime genre, and I think it's rather fitting that she chooses his chair.
I've seen Patterson and Connelly in her hands, a hardcover copy of A Study in Scarlet with the dust jacket still in pristine condition. She had taken the time to carefully set the jacket on the table while she read so as not to cause harm and I know she's an avid reader to have had that particular book. It's part of a box-set, a very expensive set, that I myself had spent more than I probably should have on a few years back. Taking the time to protect the tome had warmed me to her instantly and you simply can't beat Holmes for as far as a good mystery novel goes.
Sorry Rick.
She intrigues me, and I can't help but study her as she unassumingly reads in the corner. It's quiet tonight; just her, myself, and a young man studying for a final with his head buried in a book and the insistent buzz of techno seeping out from under his headphones. The mystery woman is deep into her book with her brow furrowed, teeth digging into her lips and her tea going cold.
It will be a few more hours until the nightclubs close and my pre-dawn rush of drunken idiots will begin, so I have plenty of time to observe her. Why does she always make an effort to smile and say thank you and yet never offer up much more? Why does she stick strictly to benign topics and how can I learn her story? If she doesn't want to share, why would she not just order her beverage and go home?
Outwardly, she doesn't seem to want to strike up a conversation and yet there's a flicker of something... the way she occasionally catches my eye as though she's about to say something, her lips parting for a second before she quickly withdraws back into herself. I want her to open up to me. It seems like there's more than meets the eye with this one.
She's reading Storm Fall tonight and it tickles me that she is reading that particular book in the very chair that a good portion of it was first penned. I can tell when she reaches Derricks death, by the point she's at in the book, how many pages she has left to turn, but also by the way she takes a deeper breath and chews on her thumb nail. It's not much of a reaction, she's obviously read the book before (judging by the deep creases in the spine, probably quite a few times), but it's there. That Derrick's death still touches her, brings a smile of affection to my face. I'm still sad about it too, and mad at Rick. Could he not have just retired his hero?
As she gently closes the book and slips it into her purse, I decide that tonight is the night. Tonight, I am going to break the ice and dig a little deeper. I'd probably grow old and die if I were to wait on her. Books seems like a safe and easy topic and I'm always eager to hear what other people think of Rick's work; I decide to dive in.
Easy with this one, Jess.
I pick up a rag and some lemon scented cleaning product. Quietly, I ease my way towards her, giving the tables and counters along the way an unnecessary second cleaning. She smiles in my direction as I swipe at the table adjacent to hers and I take it as my invitation to proceed.
"Good read?" I ask, gesturing to her purse.
"Yeah," she says in a soft voice, with a smile I can't quite place. "I love Castle's books."
She almost looks.. chagrined. That's a bit odd.
"Me too," I smile back. "Although I have to admit, I wanted to strangle him when he killed off Derrick Storm."
"I've wanted to strangle Castle myself a few times, too," she says, smirking and eyes sparkling.
Definitely odd. It feels like she's holding something back. Like she wants to divulge something but won't allow herself.
But then who am I to judge. I'm poking into her thoughts while she sits in the very chair of the very man who wrote our current topic of conversation. I'd love to blurt out that the book she'd just finished reading included an almost verbatim conversation that Rick and I had shared by this very article of furniture.
I keep those thoughts to myself.
I don't like to advertise my friendship with Rick. An incident with a seemingly pleasant and respectable young college student, a few years back, had soured me on the idea of revealing my relationship with the author to anyone but close friends. We'd struck up a similar conversation to the one that I'm having with this woman and I'd offered to get her book signed. It had ended up with the woman camping out at my store at all hours of the day, Rick being practically molested as he'd entered the door, and a restraining order when it had occurred three times subsequently. I'd apologized profusely and promised never to play publicist again. Rick had laughed it off and included it, in a roundabout fashion, in his next book.
"Can't wait to read the Nikki Heat book," I offer up. "I hear he's got a new detective all planned out and ready to go."
"Hmm, yeah," she mutters. "I'm also waiting to get my hands on a copy."
I detect a hint of frustration in her voice and am left completely confused. She definitely likes his books; has to be a fan to not even ask about Nikki. She's a regular on the website for sure. I can tell by the smile as she read and the care she took with her copy of Storm Fall too. It's not Rick's best work if I am being completely honest. It wasn't at all... bad... but she's a hardcore fan if she chooses that one to read over. A Rose For Ever After would have been my choice.
"Well, it's going to be released soon. I heard there was going to be an article about it. Although I don't think I'll bother reading it; it's always puff in those magazine pieces and I haven't bought a Cosmo since I was in my teens. One can only take so many surveys and be told so many times how to please a man before wanting to throw up and/or hurt somebody."
She laughs, her voice merry and her light brown eyes shining, tiny flecks of green appearing and disappearing as she angles towards the light, and I notice for the first time how striking she is when the pensive grimace is not adorning her face.
"Well, I think I might check it out," she says with a grin. "See what the man has to say for himself. But yeah, I know what you mean. I think I'll skip the 'swallow if you want to keep him' section."
She rolls her eyes and I laugh, maybe a snort a little. I like this woman. Swallow if you want to keep him was pretty much the basis for at least half of what I remember reading in Cosmo back when I was an eager young girl, wanting to learn the secrets of womanhood, for the low, low price of five dollars and the cloying aroma of perfume and glue. She's probably a good decade younger than me but it seems the magazine mustn't have changed much since I was a subscriber.
"So what brings you here so late at night?" I ask, checking my watch and noting that it's nearing midnight. "Not that I'm not glad for your company. It's gets pretty lonely here on the late shift."
Very lonely, I think. Rick has been missing for the past month or so and I can only gather that he has managed to weasel his way back into his detective's good graces. He had better show up when Heat Wave comes out. I'm eagerly awaiting the final draft of the novel that I'm already in love with.
She pauses and the light leaves her eyes, her pretty hazel becoming a deep russet brown. I see her mentally deciding whether to share, her eyebrows raise a touch and she eyes me up an down. I hold my breath to hear her reply, noting how her eyes soften when she decides that I'm safe.
"Sometimes the soft buzz of your store... the low hum of people talking, the quiet jazz, a good book... is more soothing than the deafening silence and overabundance of time to think in my apartment."
Oh.
The sadness behind her eyes brings a prick of tears to my own and I realize that this woman has a back story deeper than anything I had previously ascribed to her. I wonder how she manages to be so cheerful and polite in her daily life (what little I have observed from my position behind the espresso machine) when there is so much pain lurking right there at the surface. I'm surprised I've never noticed it before; she hides it extremely well.
I squeeze her shoulder and pick up her empty cup.
"I should get going," she murmurs. She packs up her belongings and heads towards the door.
"Well, anytime you want some spiced tea and company, I'm your gal. Any fan of Richard Castle is a friend of mine. You've got good taste, if I do say so myself," I say, pointing to the stack of Castle novels on a shelf behind the counter. "I enjoyed chatting with you tonight."
"Yeah. Me too." She smiles as she opens the door. "I'll see you around," she calls as the bell tinkles behind her.
I hope so.
I realize that I still don't know her name or what she does as I wash up the coffee mugs.
I'm losing my touch.
OMG! I wonder who this woman could be! *wink*