Chapter 12: The First Impression
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This was what life looked like when money wasn’t something you had to worry about every day, when you didn’t do mental math before buying groceries or check your bank account before saying yes to anything.
And it had nothing to do with me.
The contrast felt heavier in the quiet, pressing in around the edges in a way I didn’t have the energy to fight right now.
I shifted slightly on the bed, pulling the blanket over myself more out of habit than necessity, my eyes growing heavier as the exhaustion I’d been ignoring all day finally settled in. My limbs felt distant, my thoughts slowed, and everything became soft around the edges as it always did right before sleep began to take hold.
This could still work, I just had to keep it simple, follow the rules, stay out of his way and don’t get involved.
Don’t make this harder than it needed to be.
Even if I had this strange desire to see his steely exterior to crack and see just who this guy was beneath it.
I exhaled softly, allowing my eyes to close halfway as I embraced that thought, repeating it quietly enough that it started to feel like something I could actually believe.
Nothing that needed to matter beyond mere survival.
The quiet enveloped me again, softer now, almost distant as sleep began to tug gently at my thoughts, a familiar inevitability whenever I finally stopped resisting.
And just before I drifted off completely another memory surfaced.
A memory of the first time I met Damien.
It wasn’t exactly a great encounter as you’ve already guessed.
I frowned slightly, opening my eyes enough to glance across the room again, watching the steady outline of his back as he remained perfectly still and unbothered. Existing in that way of his that made the rest of the room seem like background noise.
Did he even recognize me?
The question lingered, more curious than anything else, swirling quietly in the dimming haze between wakefulness and sleep.
Because I knew I recognized him. Not to brag but I really didn’t have an unforgettable face, and he’s always been lingering around me for almost two years, do there should be a fair chance he knew just who I was.
From a few scattered moments that had blurred together over time...small encounters that never lasted long enough to matter but somehow stuck, as certain things do when your brain decides they’re worth holding onto without consulting you first.
And then—
It all came rushing back, clearer this time, you see...it was my first week at Joy’s Café.
My first real shift where everything mattered, messing up wouldn’t just be inconvenient, it would have consequences. I needed to get it right because I needed the job, and the job needed me to not be a disaster.
And everything had gone wrong.
I was moving too fast and not fast enough at the same time, trying to keep up with orders that felt like they were coming in too quickly to handle, between juggling trays, names, drinks while customers talked over each other and machines hissed in the background.
The noise itself was overwhelming, a wall of sound I hadn’t yet learned to filter like the others seemed to manage effortlessly.
It was chaos, ontrolled chaos for everyone else. But just chaos for me.
"Table four needs two lattes and a cappuccino!" someone called from behind me, already onto the next task before I could even process their words.
"I’ve got it!" I replied too quickly, even though I really didn’t have it under control. I’d learned early that confidence was something you performed before feeling it, and no one had the time or patience to wait for you to catch up.
I remember grabbing the tray too quickly, stacking the cups securely but not securely enough, balancing everything with a kind of forced confidence I hadn’t quite earned yet.
My hands were steadier than my nerves. The floor was slightly damp near the counter...an inconvenient detail I filed away too late and before I realized it, my foot had slipped right onto that spot.
And I swear to you, that the world went in slow motion as the tray tilted.
And everything went with it, in that horrifying moment where you see what’s about to happen, but can’t do a thing to stop it.
Then came the impact, the sound of ceramic breaking on the floor, sharp and definitive.
A collective intake of breath from someone nearby and the unmistakable splash of warm coffee landing where it absolutely shouldn’t have.
For a moment, everything went quiet, not completely quiet, the café never fell silent...but enough for that moment to hold weight, for my cheeks to flush, for the floor to become the most interesting thing in the room.
I scrambled up quickly, my hands trembling slightly as I tried to regain my footing, my heart racing in a way that made coherent thought difficult. The apology spilled out before I was even fully standing.
"I’m s–so sorry," I blurted, words tumbling out faster than I could control. "I didn’t mean to...I didn’t see—I’m really sorry—!"
And then I looked up and I saw him standing there completely still, as he always was, like motion was something reserved for others.
Looking down at me with an expression that made it seem like I was some kind of gross bug he’d accidentally stepped on, unsure of what to do next.
The coffee had splattered on the edge of his shirt, leaving a dark stain against the crisp fabric, but that didn’t seem to bother him. He didn’t even glance at it. His gaze remained fixed on me, which somehow felt worse.
It was as if I had become the center of his ire, cold and cutting, completely unimpressed...like the situation was beneath him, including my frantic apology, which he received without a single word.
I was just... in the way.
Something disposable that had briefly disrupted him, even then, before today, before this room, before all these rules and silence, before this divided space...I had known, with a certainty that didn’t rely on evidence or reason.
