Closing Time
"So we're not getting Linda to bake for us all the time?" Daryl asked.
It was the next week after The Spring Fair and their coffee shop had definitely seen a boom in customers since their triumph at the Fair. There had even been so many requests for the chocolate fountain to be set up in the shop that Punk had started Chocolate Fountain Fridays for customers to come in and get their sugar fix. It was mostly kids with their parents, but it was going down extremely well.
"No." Punk said, "She's like 69. She can't do it all the time. She said she's happy to help for special occasions."
"Well that's good." Daryl nodded.
"I thought you wanted to leave early today?" Punk asked, frothing some milk for a take-away coffee whilst Daryl packed up a sandwich for the customer and handed it to her.
"No, it's alright. It's not important." Daryl said.
"Why don't I believe you?" Punk asked, pouring the milk into the espresso before putting the lid on, handing it to the customer and thanking her.
"It's just a high school football game." Daryl shook his head, "Some of my friends are on the team."
"Why don't you want to go?" Punk shook his head with confusion.
"Just reminds me that I can't play." Daryl said as Punk looked at him, waiting for more explanation, "I shattered my leg last year. I was on the team. I was a… pretty good player." He admitted, "Was going to get a scholarship. Was pretty much the only way I was getting into college. My grades weren't great but… I had football."
"Your leg is that bad?" Punk asked. He'd never wanted to say, but he did notice the young boy limping every so often.
"Yeah." Daryl nodded, "I broke it in three places. I had to have three surgeries. Still doesn't function properly." He shook his head quietly.
"So no scholarship?" Punk figured.
"No, I got dropped from the team." Daryl said, "I kinda spiralled out of control. Stopped going to school. Didn't really care about anything anymore. Most of my friends are heading to college after this school year finishes. That's why my mom pushed me to get this job."
"She probably just wants you to gain some independence. I was like you at your age. Didn't really know what to do or which direction to take my life." He nodded.
"I thought I'd hate it here. But it's taken my mind off of it all." Daryl said, "It's not so bad."
"You'll figure it all out, kid." Punk assured him.
"How'd you figure out you wanted to be a lawyer?" Daryl asked. He knew it was a touchy subject for Punk, but he was growing more and more comfortable with him. They spent twelve hours a day with each other, and although at times they got on each other's nerves, there was definitely a friendship growing.
"I knew they got lots of money." Punk said with a small smile as Daryl laughed, "I didn't practise law until I was twenty-four. I just worked dead-end jobs until then." He said, "I don't know what flipped the switch. I didn't have a lawyer parent on anything. Just… liked the idea of it. Thought I might be good at it."
"Were you?" Daryl asked.
"I was alright." Punk said modestly.
"What kind of lawyer were you?" Daryl asked.
"Criminal defence." Punk said.
"This is definitely a change of scenery then." Daryl said, looking on at the busy coffee shop as Punk nodded.
"Yeah, but it's one I welcome." Punk smiled, "You sure you don't wanna go to the football game?"
"Yeah. I'll stay until closing." Daryl nodded.
"Ok." Punk said, patting him on the back and heading over to clear a table.
"You remember I'm going to be out of town next week seeing my parents." Lyla said during shift with AJ as they prepared coffees for one of their tables.
"Yeah, I have it in the diary I think." AJ nodded, "I can get Becca and Shiv to come in during the week if I need it, but I think I'll be ok." She said.
"Don't spread yourself thin. Take the help if you need it." Lyla reminded her.
"I will." AJ scoffed.
They had swiftly moved on from the anxiety that was The Spring Fair. Although they'd done well and sold out of everything they had to sell, it still felt like they'd lost after the gloating of their coffee nemesis. Not to mention his sweet little thank you talk on stage had won him over with the town.
They'd decided they wouldn't let it get to them anymore. AJ knew she had partially started the petty fighting when she stole his display board and glared at him every time they saw each other on the street, but it didn't mean his smugness was ok.
They decided they were focusing solely on their café, and it still flourished even as Punk's began to grow in customers too. She knew there was possibly room for two coffee shops in the town, she just wished the other owner was more approachable.
"Have you ever looked into going over to Puerto Rico to see your folks?" Lyla asked.
"Not really." AJ said, "I always tell my mom I will but… well, I'm needed here." AJ shrugged.
"You know I can take care of things whilst you're gone, right?" Lyla smiled, "You don't have to worry so much." She nudged her friend.
"I know." AJ smiled, "You know how it is with my parents'. It's exhausting spending just an hour with them but going all the way out there for a few days? I don't know if I could do it."
"Do you think it's down to the fact they never really raised you?" Lyla wondered.
"Maybe." AJ shrugged, "They just live in their own little world. They have no idea how hard it's been to build this place up. They think it's just pouring coffee." She rolled her eyes.
"Would you even go visit your aunt for a little while?" Lyla asked.
"Do you want rid of me or something?" AJ chuckled.
"No." Lyla laughed, "You just never take a break. I know you love being here but we all need a vacation. Even you." She nodded.
"I think Aunt Nico is travelling right now anyway." AJ said.
She had been raised by her Aunt Nicolette, her mother's sister, in New Jersey since the age of 8. It was where she was born, but when her mother and father decided they wanted to move back to Puerto Rico, where they were originally from, they realised they only had enough money for theirs and her brother and sister's flight tickets…
The plan was always for them to send money over for AJ to get a flight with her aunt at a later date, but the money never came, and her aunt eventually found them an apartment, raising AJ who communicated with her parents through the phone for most of her childhood.
She'd worked hard on healing her inner child from feeling neglected for most of her childhood and teenage life, but it still hurt her. She figured it always would. Surprisingly, her relationship with her parents now was mostly fine. She knew they carried guilt for the fact she'd practically grown up without them, but she'd let it go, mostly because she had been loved and cared for by her aunt.
"Where is she travelling?" Lyla asked curiously, sitting their prepared coffees on trays, "Hold that thought." She said, delivering the coffees to the table waiting for them before quickly returning.
"She's been in Thailand for a few weeks now. She sends me emails like it's 2001." AJ shook her head with a smile.
"I want to be her when I grow up." Lyla said.
"Yeah, me too." AJ smiled.
"You think he's happy he's got that stupid board back?" Lyla wondered, looking over out the window across the street to Punk's shop.
"I saw a dog pee against it this morning." AJ said, "It was great." She smiled deviously as Lyla chuckled.
"You can go if you want. I can clean the rest of this place up." AJ said later that night once they'd closed.
"Are you sure?" Lyla asked her.
"Yeah. The kitchen is cleaned up. I just gotta wipe the tables and mop the floors." AJ said, "You go." She nodded.
"I'll never find a better boss." Lyla smiled, grabbing her jacket and bag as AJ smiled.
"Damn right you won't." AJ nodded.
"See you tomorrow, dear." Lyla waved, leaving the coffee shop as AJ began wiping the tables out the front.
She turned on the main lights which made the whole place far too bright, but necessary for the nightly clean up. She also blasted music through the speakers. Normally they'd have some music playing in the background through the day when they were opened but closing time cleaning called for the volume to be cranked up a notch. She always found it helped her clean quicker.
One cleaning all the tables, she stacked the chairs on top and got the mop and bucket out from the back.
She dance mopped her way around the shop floor, singing to Cecilia by Simon and Garfunkel, occasionally using the top of the mop as a microphone, adding in a little bounce of her hips as she leaned under the tables to mop under.
The music was so loud she hadn't noticed the door opening, nor had she heard someone calling hey.
"Hey!" Punk yelled loudly over the music as AJ jumped, hitting her head on the table she was leaning under, holding it as she stumbled back and looked over at him.
"Oh my God." AJ shook her head with frustration.
"What?!" Punk yelled sarcastically as she rolled her eyes.
"We're closed!" AJ yelled.
"Can you turn this down?!" Punk yelled back at her as she huffed, sitting her mop in the bucket and walking round to the back of the counter, leaning down to turn the stereo off.
"What?" AJ shook her head.
"I just… wanted to talk for a minute." Punk nodded.
The truth was, although it had felt good in the moment, rubbing in his triumphant first time Spring Fair experience, the more days went by the more terrible he felt. He knew she wasn't innocent in their little games, but he figured it might be time to be the bigger person.
"Talk about what?" AJ shook her head, coming back out from the counter and picking her mop back up.
"Well, I think I got a little carried away at the Fair." Punk nodded, putting his hands in his pockets, "I really wanted my stall to do well. And not just so you could see but… so I could prove to myself I was doing ok with all of this." He said.
"You were a dick." AJ said, continuing to mop the floor, not looking over at him at the doorway.
"Yeah." Punk nodded, "And so were you when you stole my board." He said as she turned to him.
"Because you wrote out with the old and in with the new?" AJ shook her head, "Did you think I was going to be ok with that?"
"I only wrote that because every-time I saw you in the street since I moved here, you've stared at me like I'm the devil." He said, "I waved the first time we saw each other, and you just ignored me." He shook his head as AJ looked at him. She could swear she heard sincere hurt in his voice.
"I probably didn't see you." AJ shrugged.
"You saw me." Punk scoffed.
"So that gave you the right to stand in front of the old town and mock me? Call my café "the other coffee place?" She said, using quotation marks with her fingers to quote him, realising she'd dropped the mop in the process, "Do you have any idea how much blood, sweat and tears I put into building this place?" She asked, not realising she was stepping closer to him in fury.
"You think you're the only one who has ever tried to make a business work?" He questioned.
"This isn't just a business to me." AJ shook her head, "I've built a life for myself here. I feel comfortable here. And it's took me a long while to feel comfortable in a place." She said, "And you just waltz on in here so easily with customers piling into your place every day."
"I didn't waltz anywhere." Punk scoffed, "It's been difficult for me too. You don't know anything about me-"
"And you know nothing about me." AJ said.
"I know you're not from here." Punk said as AJ looked up at him, not realising how close she'd gotten to him, to the point she was standing right in front of him.
"How would you know that?" AJ asked.
"Daryl, the kid who works with me… he told me." Punk said, "And if you're not born here, there's only one other reason for a person to be here."
"And what's that?" AJ looked up at him.
"To run away." He nodded, "Maybe you and I aren't so different."
"I think you should go. I need to finish cleaning up." AJ shook her head, not wishing to continue the conversation, not enjoying where it was going.
"I am sorry for how I behaved at The Fair." He said as AJ just ignored him, picking up her mop and continuing to clean the floors. She looked back at the door a few seconds later and he was already gone.