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Jake looks up at the clock, a faint sigh escaping his mouth as his eyes lock on the time written there: 2:30. Of all the things he learned about her in the past few weeks spent in her company, one of them is that unlike him, Amy Santiago is a very punctual person; and she always passes the doors to his ice cream parlor at 2 pm sharp with her best friend Kylie. She’s never once been late before — which means, odds are pretty good that she won’t be showing up at all today. Jake won’t have the pleasure to talk with his favorite customer like he’s been doing almost every afternoon for a while now.
It all started at the beginning of the month, when two women he’d never seen before came into the parlor, one of them (Amy, although he didn’t know that at the time) looking a little down and the other (Kylie) trying to cheer her up.
It was a beautiful summer day, perfect for an ice cream break — the air was hot despite the small breeze coming from the beach below. They sat at the terrasse outside for a while, sharing their dessert and conversations about their future that Jake could overhear from the table next to them while on his own break. He didn’t talk to them much that day; but as they came back two days later then another few days after that, he got to know a little more about them and, sooner than later, found himself befriending the two women (okay, mostly Amy) who, in turn, started to come more and more often until it quickly became a daily routine for them to stop by the parlor for some ice cream and a good talk and laugh with him.
It helped Amy distract from the upcoming reality of a choice she’d have to make about what to do next now that she graduated from college, she told him one day. This month-long vacation spent at her best friends’ parents’ beach house was supposed to make her clear her head and weigh her different options before entering the real working world — which, Jake learned too, were plenty and very broad-ranged.
Because Amy Santiago is a smart woman, among her many qualities he kept discovering day after day.
Of course, Jake was more than happy to help out, as the women’s visits made his job a lot more interesting all of a sudden. Hence his current deception regarding their unexpected absence today.
“Waiting for someone, lovebird?”
A voice by his side, that he recognizes as belonging to his colleague and own best friend Charles, suddenly takes him out of his reverie and forces his eyes away from the clock to look at the other man. Charles, who just finished serving a customer, is staring at him with a knowing grin lighting up his whole face. It makes Jake sigh even more. “No,” he lies.
He would never hear the end of it if he told Charles what’s truly going on in his head. The guy is persuaded that he and Amy are made for each other and that he’s into her.
Which is completely ridiculous, obviously. They’re just friends, who’ve only known each other for a month.
A month. Jake’s expression falters even more while a dreadful thought crosses his mind. What if Amy (and Kylie) didn’t show up today because they went back home and he didn’t realize it before?!
He asked how long she was supposed to stay here, in one of their very first, casual conversations. And, even if he hasn’t forgotten what she told him (“Our flight’s on the 31st of August”), Jake has never been good with dates. He barely ever knows which day or even month it is.
Today makes no exception. “What day is it?” he asks Charles then, without prompting and with his heart beating loud and fast in his chest.
“August 30th, wh—… wait, you were waiting for Amy to show up!” he exclaims excitedly as realization seems to dawn on him, but Jake barely pays attention to his friend, getting lost in his thoughts once again. Because today is the day before Amy has to go home — and, today of all days, she didn’t show up to his ice cream parlor like she always does.
The thought of it hurts; more than it probably should. More than Jake imagined it would, having to go back to a life without his daily dose of Amy Santiago always asking with that bright, beautiful smile of hers for the exact same ice cream flavor every time (two scoops, raspberry and mango) followed with one hour of great conversations and laughter — oh so much laughter.
It hurts even more to think that she doesn’t seem like she’s going to come and say goodbye. Jake doesn’t know when exactly her plane is supposed to take off on the next day, but he doubts she’ll have the chance to swing by his parlor for one last ice cream and talk with a friend. If she considers him as such, that is. Because maybe she doesn’t, despite all that they shared in the past few weeks and how close they seem to have grown as they learned to know each other more and more.
“Maybe it’s too painful for her to say goodbye.” The excitement in Charles’ voice has now gone, his features painted with a sad, compassionate expression instead as he takes Jake out of his morose thoughts as if he’s been reading his mind. If Jake would usually shake his head and deny any feeling he might have towards the woman or any chemistry they might share, hiding behind some she’s just a nice customer, there’s nothing going on between us!, this time he does nothing of the sort.
On the opposite, he ponders his friend’s words and somehow finds himself hoping Charles is right. Thinking Amy cares too much about him definitely hurts way less than thinking she doesn’t care at all — to the point that she wouldn’t find it relevant to say goodbye to him after all the conversations they had and their many meaningful moments, too.
So, yeah. Jake hopes that Charles is right. Because, as it turns out, he was already right before, even though Jake has been too stubborn to admit it until now.
He does like Amy. Like, I-don’t-want-her-to-leave-me type of liking her.
Like… he has romantic feelings for her.
Damn.
“What should I do?!” Desperate, he turns to his best friend as realization of what the other man has been saying all along finally hits him. He can’t let her go without seeing her one last time.
Charles grins as an answer. Literal stars are shining in his eyes. It’s like he’s been waiting forever for this moment to happen. “Go find her! Tell her how you feel before it’s too late! Oh, and bring a bottle of lavender shampoo with you. There’s nothing more erotic than—…”
But Jake cuts him before he can finish his sentence. “Ugh, Charles, I’m not gonna do that. But…” He looks down at all the different ice cream flavors laid out in front of him, all there for their customers to pick, as an idea pops into his mind. A much, much better one than whatever his friend was going to suggest he does. “I have the perfect parting gift for her.”
With a smile, he grabs one of the pots they keep for when people want to buy a greater amount of ice cream to bring back home and carefully pours two big scoops inside of it, ready to go. He then does it a second time with another pot, thinking about Kylie and how it’s her house he’s about to intrude. Contrary to Amy, though, he can’t remember which are her favorite flavors so he goes with two basic ones he knows everyone tends to like.
Once he’s done, satisfied with himself, Jake starts walking out of the parlor to do as Charles suggested and find the woman he likes before he doesn’t have a chance to do it anymore and regrets it. He still pauses in front of the entrance, facing his colleague hesitantly. “You sure you don’t mind being on your own while I’m away?”
He nods towards some customers who just came inside, ready to order.
Charles beams in return — it’s like his smile hasn’t left his features ever since Jake quietly admitted he does have feelings for Amy. “Of course not. Now go chase your true love,” he replies. Jake winces a little at his choice of words, but his heart still races in his chest with adrenaline as he finally takes a step out of the parlor and onto the beach, both his little boxes carefully carried in his arms.
The trip from his workplace to where Amy and Kylie reside is a short one — Amy showed him the house once, as you can see it from the parlor’s terrasse. Hence the two women picking this particular place out of the many they could have found elsewhere in town, probably. Because they live right next to it and can easily go there as they wish to.
When he arrives at the front door, though, Jake stops in his tracks. His palms are sweaty from his nervousness. He hopes the two pots of ice cream he’s still holding won’t melt. But most importantly, he can’t help but wonder if Charles’ idea was truly a good one — he can’t help but feel out of place here since he wasn’t invited.
He’s a little afraid of how Amy will react when she sees him. What if she doesn’t want to see him?!
She and Kylie might not even be here. It’s their last day of holidays, after all. It would make sense that they’d like to make the best of it and spend it outside rather than stuck in their house. No matter how big and beautiful this house seems to be, Jake realizes as he takes a better look at it. But before he can change his mind and turn around as if he was never there, the door suddenly opens in front of him.
He finds himself face-to-face with Kylie, who looks at him suspiciously. “Jake?!”
“I, huh—…” Jake clears his throat. He feels a little uncomfortable. He’s always had the feeling Kylie doesn’t like him much and now here he is, standing in front of her parents’ house without even giving her a warning first or asking if it would be OK for him to come by. “Anyone ordered ice cream?” The words are out of his mouth before he can think of them, his default mechanism of hiding his nervousness behind silly jokes taking over while he shows her what he’s come with.
He hopes it will help break the ice between them.
When it doesn’t and Kylie looks at him unimpressed, though, he’s quick to add, “Sorry to show up uninvited, but… Is Amy here? I need to talk to her.” He scratches the back of his neck in a nervous tic.
Kylie doesn’t even try to retain the sigh that escapes her mouth following his question. Yet she still opens the door bigger as an invitation for him to come inside and nods towards a staircase in the entrance. “She’s upstairs.” Then without another word, she continues her course with a trash bag in hands, heading towards the bins at the front of the alley.
“Thanks, Kylie!” Jake tries to shoot her a small, friendly smile. “And… I did bring you guys ice cream.” He shows her what’s in his own hands once again, acting a lot more serious this time.
“You can leave it in the freezer in the kitchen that’s on your left when you come in,” Kylie only responds.
He does as he’s told then doesn’t waste any more time to head towards the stairs. His heart starts beating faster and faster with each new step he climbs taking him closer to Amy, only to stop for a full second when he finally finds her in one of the rooms. She doesn’t seem to have heard him coming as she stands with her back on him. Her hair is up in a messy bun and she’s wearing a flowery dress that Jake could swear looks a lot like the one she wore the first time she passed the door to his ice cream parlor. He didn’t know back then, how meaningful this simple customer would become to him.
(Yeah, he definitely has it bad for her.)
Jake coughs to make his presence known. When she turns around, Amy jumps in surprise.
“Hi,” he says, feeling a warm smile tugging at his lips as soon as their eyes meet. He’s still pretty nervous, but somehow feels more at ease than earlier too now that he’s in her presence.
“Jake, what, uh, what are you doing here?! Is everything alright?!” She keeps staring deep at him, as if she’s trying to read him.
“Oh yes, yes, I’m fine. Sorry I came unannounced,” he apologizes about his intrusion for the second time, “I just… you guys didn’t show up at the parlor like you do every day so I brought you some ice cream. It’s in the freezer downstairs.”
At that, Amy smiles — something warm and beautiful that makes him calm down completely. But then he looks around and sees the open suitcase on the floor that’s filled with clothes and his own beam falters as Jake is brought back to reality — a reality he managed to forget about just for a moment, lost into the woman’s gaze.
She’s packing her stuff because she is leaving. Going back to New York City, hundreds of miles away from here.
He tries to shake the sadness away before it overwhelms him. “But uh, I see you’re busy.” He suddenly feels even more like an intruder than he did earlier as he nods towards the suitcase, not leaving Amy the chance to react to his previous words. She follows his gaze and, when she brings her eyes back on him, her expression has changed — she seems a little down now and avoids looking straight at him.
“Oh, yeah, we’re… we’re leaving tomorrow night so we decided to pack and clean most of the house today so that we can enjoy our last day without being rushed.” She takes a short pause before she goes on with her eyes back on him this time. “So that we could… have the time to come and properly say goodbye.” Jake sees how the tip of her ears start to redden in a blush and he can feel he’s falling a little harder for her.
This conversation saddens him, of course — the whole prospect of not seeing Amy again for who knows how long (maybe even ever) after getting used to seeing her every day does. But there’s also a part of him that can’t help but feel relieved. Relieved that she did mean to say goodbye and would not disappear without seeing him (and Charles) first.
She even made sure to make her schedule work around it so that she has enough time for it.
It seems that she does care about them — him — too.
“I see.” Jake nods. “I guess I should leave you alone, then? And… see you tomorrow?” It’s not like he wants to go so soon after he arrived, but from what she told him, she has things to do, and he wouldn’t want to come in the way of that. He knows he came here to tell her how he truly feels about her but it doesn’t seem like the best time when to do so anymore.
Also, a little selfishly perhaps, he knows that all she doesn’t do today she’ll have to do tomorrow, which most likely means less time spent together on their last day.
He surely doesn’t want to come in the way of that either.
“Yeah. Okay. Thank you for coming by with the ice cream — I was gonna miss it today.” She shoots Jake a knowing smile that almost makes him believe she’s actually talking about missing him.
He beams in return. “You’re welcome. Good luck with the packing, and see you tomorrow.” Despite his words, he doesn’t move just yet, and nor does Amy. They keep staring at each other in silence for a beat too long before he clears his throat and eventually turns around. But right before he can take a first step out of the room, Amy’s voice unexpectedly resonates behind him.
It stops him dead in his tracks and makes him look at her again.
“Wait! Are you… free, tonight?”
Jake frowns. “Yeah, why?”
“Kylie’s going out with some friends of her own so I was wondering if maybe you would like to get dinner or something? My treat. As a way to pay you back for all the ice cream and your help with my existential crisis about my future.” She lets out a small laugh at that. She otherwise looks a little bashful, blushing completely now, and it’s oh so adorable.
Jake’s heart is pounding in his chest as he ponders her words — is he dreaming, or did she just ask him out to dinner?!
“Santiago… are you asking me on a date?!” he says jokingly, the only way he knows how to cope with the nervousness building inside of him, but also to make sure he got it all right.
“I mean, you can bring Charles with you if you want, but… maybe, yeah?”
“I think Charles is busy tonight but I’ll make sure he knows you invited him too,” he’s quick to answer her. It’s not entirely true, but he knows Charles will never want to join in on an evening between Jake and Amy anyway. He can already picture his best friend squealing with pure excitement at the idea when he’s going to learn about the news. This will be the perfect timing when to tell her exactly how he feels. “See you tonight, then?”
“Great. Let’s meet here at 8?”
“Perfect.” Jake shoots Amy one last grin before he leaves for good this time. He already can’t wait to see her again later tonight. “Bye Kylie!” He shouts on his way out when he passes by the other woman, too excited to act casual and try to hide his utter happiness at the prospect of spending a whole evening alone with Amy without his duties at his job coming in the way of their exchanges for once.
It almost makes him forget, if only for a while, that this first date together might as well be the very last one too.
“Two scoops coming in — raspberry and mango, obviously.”
Jake puts down a bowl in front of Amy, grinning knowingly and proudly at her as he does so. She offers him a warm smile in return, shaking her head a little with a small chuckle escaping her mouth at his antics. Before he takes a seat in the booth next to her, he goes back behind the counter and makes himself his own personal favorite ice cream: chocolate and bubblegum topped with whipped cream and some extra gummy bears added to the mix for good measure.
He sees Amy frown in disgust when he finally joins her but doesn’t pay it much attention. She doesn’t know what she’s missing.
Dinner has been going well so far — great, even. As expected, when Jake went back to the parlor and told Charles everything that happened and his plans with Amy for the evening, his best friend lost it, talking about their date all afternoon and making Jake even more excited for the night to come. He who’s usually late for pretty much everything made sure to be in front of Kylie’s parents’ door at 8 pm sharp. Amy was already waiting on the porch, changed from her summer-y dress to a more formal, red one and wearing a smile big enough to light up the whole sky.
They ate at a restaurant Jake knows well, a little fancy without being too expensive (working at an ice cream parlor doesn’t pay that well, even though Amy insisted on paying anyway like she told him so when she first invited him), then took a quiet stroll along the beach before they reached his (now closed for the night) workplace and Jake got the idea to come inside to share some dessert.
The place looks somehow romantic and intimate, when void of any customer and not entirely lit up.
“So you do remember,” Amy states as an answer to his previous words, looking down at the ice cream in front of her. It makes Jake frown in confusion.
“Of course I do. It’s not like you tried many different flavors for the past month you came here.” He beams amusedly at her.
“Neither did Kylie.” Her eyes are piercing right through him now, and Jake doesn’t understand — what does her best friend have to do with it? He doesn’t get the chance to ask for more explanation, though, because she’s quick to add, “And yet you didn’t bring her usual order this afternoon when you came by the house. So I figured you’d gotten lucky with mine, but apparently you didn’t.”
There’s something in the way she looks at him that he can’t quite decipher but that makes his heartbeat fasten a little in his chest.
“Oh.” Jake doesn’t know what else to say. To be fair, though, he’s not too surprised that his brain would choose to focus solely on Amy’s order and not remember anything else.
He’s never had a good memory — except when he’s interested in something. Or someone.
Amy chuckles lightly next to him, the sound of which puts him at ease. “It’s OK. She liked what you brought her too.” She puts a hand on top of his own in a reassuring gesture. The light touch sends a rush of electricity coursing through his veins.
The pair falls silent after that and starts eating their ice creams before they melt. It doesn’t take too long before Jake breaks the quietness around them again, though. “So… have you decided on what you want to do next?” he asks — that’s the reason why she came here in the first place, after all. To figure things out for when she has to come back home.
Rather than sighing like every time the topic came up between them before, Jake is glad to see that the mention of her future brings a smile to her face for once.
“Actually… yes.” Amy’s whole face lights up with excitement, a contagious feeling that makes him grin back at her too. A beat passes before she shares her big news with him. “I received a call this morning,” she explains happily. “Remember when I told you I studied Arts History and would maybe like to pursue my career in this field and that I had an interview about that at a museum before I came here?”
Jake nods quietly — of course he remembers. More than just her usual ice cream order, there’s a lot of things his brain seems to have caught up on about her during their numerous conversations.
“Well, they said they’d love to have me as part of their team. And… I think I would love that too.” He can read in her eyes that she’s definitely telling the truth.
She did find her path indeed.
“That’s so great, congrats. I’m glad you figured it out. They’ll be lucky to have you,” Jake says sincerely.
Amy smiles at him, blushing a little. She grabs his hand again and squeezes it between her own. “Thank you. And thanks for having been there to listen to me and help me out.”
“Anytime. But… I should be the one thanking you, actually.” She frowns, so he explains, “Y’know, for making my days less boring.” Then takes a short pause during which they stare at each other in utter silence. Tell her how you feel, a voice resonates at the back of his head and forces him to add after he clears his throat and looks at their intertwined fingers, “I’m… I’m gonna miss you, though. A lot.”
Hoping for her to tell him that she’s going to miss him too, Amy’s only reaction is to smile more broadly at him. It’s a little confusing, until she eventually speaks.
“It’s a good thing I’m not going too far away from here, then.”
Jake’s frown deepens, feeling more and more confused. It makes her laugh. God, he loves her laugh.
“Aren’t you going back to New York?!”
“I am. For now. But I’ll be back soon… because my job will be like, less than one hour away from here.”
Jake can feel his whole face lighting up suddenly and a rush of happiness and hopefulness coursing through his core at the news. “Seriously?!”
“Yeah, seriously.”
He’s so happy he could kiss her right here and there. Instead, though, he jokes as he feels a little overwhelmed with emotions. “Afraid you would have missed the best ice cream in the country too much?!”
“Actually… I’m sorry to tell you that, but it’s not even the best ice cream in town.” She laughs when he pouts in mock-offence at her words. She’s then quick to add, “It does have the best employees, though. Especially one of them who would always take the time to listen to me…” She smiles at him knowingly. “And so… I would have missed you too,” she answers his previous statement, in a much serious tone this time. He can tell that she means it, can read it in the way she looks at him, bright brown eyes staring right at him and shining in the faint darkness with so much affection.
That’s the only push Jake needs — he doesn’t shy away this time, finally acting on his feelings by breaking the short distance between their two bodies and kissing Amy. The way she answers to it, clinging onto him and pulling him closer to her, is all he needs to understand that she feels the same way as he does towards her. It makes his heart feel like it’s gonna explode from happiness, and it actually takes a few seconds after they part for it to slow back down to normal.
As they look at each other, still close with their foreheads resting against one another, Jake thinks with a smile that this first date with Amy won’t be their last one too, after all.
Quite the opposite.