Chapter Text
Newt likes order.
He likes schedules and rules, booking events well in advance and leaving extra time in his daily planner so even surprises have a potential place in his orderly life.
Newt also likes going to that café on the corner, just after the morning rush even if that means waking up way earlier than necessary for his afternoon classes, because they make his tea just right and he can sit in the same spot, everyday.
And Newt really, really likes his tea just right, Earl Grey with an extra splash of milk but only a pinch of sugar. He likes the way the bitter taste would stain his tongue and spread like hot silk down his throat. It’s the same way he first drank tea, in the hospital and then in the days after his release, when he had to use a crutch just to get to his kitchen.
His friends all drink coffee: Thomas and his standard two creams-two sugars, Teresa with her cup of just boiled-just black, and Minho buying his fancy grandes from Starbucks, a different order everyday because he likes to be ‘adventurous’. During exam time, they all seem to have a cup permanently glued to their hands, downing coffee like a lifeline.
Newt doesn’t understand coffee or even addiction but he does understand dependency and his is on tea made just right with extra milk and a little sugar from the corner café.
There are things in Newt’s life that he is certain of and drinking tea instead of coffee is definitely one, and there are things that Newt knows is true and that is he is content on his own.
Except there are exceptions and when he walks into that same café at his usual time, instead of Sonya standing behind the counter there is a man with skin the colour of roasted coffee beans and eyes the colour of Teresa’s coffee and suddenly, Newt can’t remember his order anymore.
“Can I help you?” Newt watches the man’s lips, a pale pink, move freely around the words and Newt isn’t sure if the smell of freshly-brewed coffee his nose is suddenly picking up is coming from the man or just the shop itself.
“Is Sonya here?” He eventually says because that is all his mind can remember after rebooting his brain with a kick to his ankle to remind himself that he’s in public.
“No, she isn’t,” the man frowns, pauses, and when Newt doesn’t speak up, he continues. “Sorry. She asked me to trade shifts with her since her track club’s meetings switched to morning practices instead.” He shrugs, a smooth tilt of his shoulders like liquid in a cup that’s been jostled.
“Oh,” Newt bites the corner of his lip when his words dissolve on his tongue, too nervous to speak to this stranger who smells like coffee and Newt suddenly wants to know if he might taste like it too.
“Are you a regular of hers?” The man only asks because the rest of the café is empty, too early for the afternoon rush and too late for this morning’s, just like how Newt likes it best. But for some reason, being alone with this man whose every word is liquid-smooth and every time he speaks makes Newt want to drown himself in his voice feels like the most nerve-wracking idea.
“Yeah, I am,” he nods his head jerkily. All his movements feel jerky and he is too aware of it, his awkwardness. “Every weekday around this time, before I have to go to class.”
The man looks like he wants to smile, and it makes Newt’s cheeks feel warm, like leaning over the steam rising from a hot drink. “Then I guess since you’re now my regular customer, I should know your order then.”
“Earl Grey, medium,” Newt says and the man immediately raises a brow at him, studying Newt who avoids his gaze and instead, searches the front of his apron for a nametag, for a name to put with the face and the smell of coffee.
“It’s Alby,” he says firmly when he catches Newt reading the Albert that’s actually printed on the metal tag. “How do you want your tea?”
Newt pauses to roll the name in his head and then on his tongue, answering the other absent-mindedly, “Regular. Alby.” Even his name tastes like coffee, or what Newt wants coffee to taste like, from the smell of it, the sight of it.
“And your name?” Alby looks up at him expectedly from the cup cradled in his left hand and the marker in his right, poised above the curved side. Newt is momentarily confused and he turns to look but the café is still empty, just the two of them present.
When he turns back to the counter, Alby is still waiting so he hesitantly replies, “It’s Newt.”
“N-E-W-T?”
“Yeah,” he’s only mildly surprised that Alby got it right; there are only so many ways ‘Newt’ can be spelled, even if it is an unusual name.
“Right…Newt,” Alby rings up his order and Newt takes out his wallet and counts out his change. He glances up at the pause before his name when he slides over a five-dollar bill with thirty-five cents weighed down on top of it, sure that he will drop it all over the counter if he held it in his hands. Alby quickly slides back four dollars in exact change, and their hands don't even brush. “It’ll be ready in a bit.”
For the first time since he began coming to this coffee shop for tea, Newt did not sit to wait and he will not stay afterwards because his heart is stuttering in his chest as if it is already hyped up on caffeine just by looking at Alby.
As soon as the steaming cup is placed on the counter, Newt mutters a quick thanks and snatches it up, afraid that if he stays another minute, he’ll do something completely out of character. Newt is already hurrying out the door when Alby calls out, “Hey, man, you’re gonna burn your fingers without a sleeve!”
He turns back at his name but his heart is already out the door and even if his fingers are stinging, they can’t possibly compare to how hot his cheeks are feeling.
“I’m fine, thanks,” he quickly says, switching the drink to his other hand and no matter how much he wants to, he knows that if he gives in to Alby now he’ll become hopelessly addicted, as if he already isn't.
Dependency he can deal with, but addiction is something new, something unpredictable and that is definitely something Newt does not have room for in his life.
So he leaves, as quickly and orderly as possible, and desperately tries not to think about where he’s going to get his fix tomorrow.