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“You’ve been frothing that milk for three minutes,” Stan says, eyes on the small silver pitcher in Richie’s hand. “It’s literally just air.”
Richie looks down at the pitcher as well, as if he’d forgotten about it. “Oh,” he says, and sets it on the counter. He wipes the tip with a rag before Stan can say anything about it. Stan is about to turn away and focus on the drink he’d been making, foolishly thinking the conversation was over, when Richie starts up again. “It’s just that-” he lowers his voice to a whisper. “He’s here again.”
Stan glances over to the table nearest to the big window. It’s where he - Eddie - always sits when he studies with Bill. Eddie is, in fact, there, and is talking with his hands to Bill, who looks like he’s trying to focus on the laptop in front of him. Stan turns back to Richie.
“Right,” he says. Richie looks at him expectantly. “Sorry, why is this any different than every other day that he’s here?”
“Because,” Richie responds, drawing it out. “I’m finally gonna do it. I’m gonna make a move.”
Stan’s eyebrows raise in surprise. Richie had been fixated on this guy for weeks now, but had yet to actually say anything to him other than his standard flirting at the register that most customers tended to laugh or brush off.
“I’ve thought it through already. I’m gonna start writing stuff on his cups, pick up lines, y’know? And then right before Valentine’s Day I’ll ask him out. On the cup. Obviously. It’s foolproof.” Stan looks like he has something to say about that last part, so Richie continues. “I like you a latte. Kind of trite, but a good start. Does this need more sugar, or am I sweet enough? Maybe we don’t want to raise questions about the quality of our work. You’re like coffee, the way you keep me up all night. Are you an espresso shot? Because you’re small but pack a punch.”
“Do not say that to him,” Stan stops him. He’s gone back to his work, but Richie knows he’s still listening. Richie only pauses when Stan goes to call out his finished drink. He’s about to continue when a customer approaches the counter, and Richie takes his order.
“Hey,” he says after the man has removed his card from the chip reader. “If I put something like, Can I be the foam to your cappuccino? on your cup, would it make you want to go out with me?”
“I’m straight,” the man says, uncomfortable. Richie sighs.
“It’s not- whatever, man. We’ll call you when it’s ready.” He walks away, and Stan is watching Richie, amused, as he strides over to him and grabs him by the shoulders.
“It’s gonna work,” Richie tells him, shaking him a little. “I know it. Wait and see.”
-
“You ku-keep looking over there, d-did you order and they ffforgot or something?” Bill asks, eyebrow arched as he drank from his iced coffee.
“Huh?” Eddie responds, spaced. His gaze rips away from the barista who’d handed out his drink with great effort. “You say something?”
Bill rolls his eyes with a fond sigh. “I d-don’t know why I even tr-try to talk to you at this point.” He returns to his book, reading like the good English major he is.
Caught, Eddie just frowns, unsure why he’d been so distracted in the first place. His gaze falls to his notes on the table, and he ends up glaring directly at the equation for compound interest. The campus coffee shop is a good study place because the tables were relatively secluded from each other, but the one Eddie had chosen today was right in the line of sight of the barista hand-off counter, so he keeps finding himself distracted by the constant motion over there.
“Eddie!” A redheaded barista calls out, setting his hot drink onto the handoff counter.
Shooting an apologetic glance to Bill for being inattentive, Eddie heads over to the counter and grabs his usual americano. Before Eddie could slip on a hot sleeve from the small display of them, some writing on his cup catches his eye. The cup reads I like the way you espresso yourself in bold Sharpie lettering with the usual sticker indicating what drink it is placed innocently next to it. He gives it a curious look before shrugging and slipping the sleeve onto his cup. Valentine’s Day is closing in, so it’s probably something the baristas chose to do for the holiday.
“Did they write something on your cup?” Eddie asks as he sits back at the table. “Mine has a pun on it.”
“What?” Bill picks up his cup, but the black iced coffee makes it impossible to tell if there was something written until he drank it down (or added creamer, but anyone who knows Bill knows he’s pretentious about his coffee being black). “What d-does it sssay?”
“I like how you espresso yourself,” Eddie parrots, slipping the sleeve down to show him.
In return, Bill just snorts. “Th-That’s not a pun, that’s a p-pickup line, Eddie.”
Eddie feels his face contort into his usual frown, looking between the writing on his cup and the baristas behind the counter. None of them seem to be writing pickup lines on other people’s cups, but maybe it was pre-written?
Snapping out of his reverie, Eddie decides he doesn’t actually care that much, despite how his brain is nagging him to look closer. But fuck it, oh well. He has statistics to put in a spreadsheet.
-
The next time Eddie comes in while Richie is working, he arrives before Bill, which isn’t uncommon. Because it usually doesn’t take long to make his drink, Eddie doesn’t take a seat to wait, just stands by the counter playing on his phone. It makes things all the more nerve-wracking for Richie - he’s right there, how can he not say some stupid shit to him, say something dumb about the weather or drop a bad pick up line that will make Eddie stare at him looking only slightly bewildered and offended.
Today, though, when Eddie is hovering in Richie’s peripheral vision, Richie is locked in on his drink. He runs through the list of flirtatious things he could write on his cup in his mind before landing on one, one he thinks is perfect to start with: Is your name Earl Grey? Because you look like a hot-tea!
Richie scrawls it in his best handwriting before he starts concocting the beverage, proud of himself. He finishes it off and slides it across the counter to Eddie, calling his name, and giving him a big smile when he looks up from his phone.
“Enjoy!” Richie practically shouts at him, making him jump a little.
“Thanks,” Eddie replies, grabbing the drink. Richie would feel self conscious about it if Eddie hadn’t smiled back at him as he left.
Richie tries really hard not to stare. Really, really hard, even. But he needs to know the moment Eddie reads the message, needs to know how he reacts, if he likes it or if Richie will have to quit at the end of this shift and never show his face on campus again. He’s distracted while taking customers’ orders, gaze flicking over to that corner table every few seconds. Eddie has pulled out what looks like homework, and eventually Bill joins them, and they chat while working on their respective tasks.
Maybe he misses it. But from what he observes, Eddie never even sees the message. His usual seat faces away from the counter, and while Richie sees him glance over every now and then, he never gets up to ask him about it, or comment on it otherwise. Richie thinks he can see the edge of his writing facing away from Eddie where it’s sitting on the table. By the time he’s watching Bill and Eddie pack up their things, Eddie tossing the cup in the garbage on their way out, Richie’s shoulders are sagging with defeat.
“I’m going to die alone,” he tells the next customer to ask how he’s doing after he’s asked them.
“Oh,” the girl responds. She stares at him for a moment, and he stares back, before she continues hesitantly with her order.
He’s talked himself out of and back into his plan at least three times before the end of his shift, like he’s picking petals off of a flower, he loves me, he loves me not, he’ll never come back to this coffee shop, et cetera, but by the time he clocks out he feels hopeful. It was just one, he tells himself, and there’s plenty of time before Valentine’s Day for redemption.
-
It’s maybe a week later when Eddie becomes fully aware of the pattern.
And Eddie thinks maybe he’s going insane. Or maybe dying slowly? Something generally bad is happening, though, considering he’s hallucinating that the barista –whose name he’s learned is Richie, according to his name tag– is flirting with him.
He looks down at the cup in front of him, perched and taunting him with the phrase “I’m soy into you.” He knows it has to be a mistake, considering he didn’t even order soy milk (mostly because of the impacts it can have on gut health). Either way, his face flushes a beet red every time he catches his eye lingering on Richie’s veritable chicken scratch handwriting.
And that’s the pattern: there are only pickup lines on his cups when Richie is behind the counter.
Staring and confused is how Bill finds him, and he’s almost certain the expression on his face is dumbstruck if the eyebrow Bill lifts at him is any indicator.
“What’s wrong with you, Eh-Eddie?” Bill asks as he sits down, immediately pulling out the tomes his major makes him haul around every day.
“Can you see this too? He wrote on my cup again!” Eddie responds, ignoring the question. He turns his americano towards Bill, showing off the message. “This is crazy, right?”
Bill just snorts, flipping open a copy of The Elements of Style. “Ssssounds like he’s soy into you, man.”
In Eddie’s not so humble opinion, Bill wasn’t taking this seriously enough. Obviously Richie thought it was funny to pick fun at Eddie for some reason, considering the shit-eating grin he always had when he placed Eddie’s drinks down on the counter. “He could just talk to me, then. This is just…”
“Cringey?” Bill supplies, and Eddie shakes his head.
“No, more like…” Eddie struggles for the word.
“Desperate?”
This time, Eddie glares at Bill. “I’ll go with… unromantic.”
Bill gives him a significant look across the table. “I-Is it? The buh-blush on your face sssays otherwuh-wise.”
“Fuck you, Bill. Read your fucking Beowulf or whatever.”
-
Richie’s next few attempts are more and more successful. Sometimes Eddie notices it right away and just gets flustered at the counter, Richie watching him with a shit-eating grin, leaning forward on his elbows and batting his eyes up at Eddie. Some of them make him blush - sweeter ones like I must be a drip coffee, because I’m slowly falling for you - but others make him roll his eyes at Richie even though he’s still smiling.
(“This one doesn’t even make sense,” Richie overhears Eddie telling Bill one day, showing him the side of his cup where Richie has written Let’s be like a cappuccino – strong and full of frothy goodness. “Like, what the hell does that even mean?”)
Today, Richie is feeling a bit bolder, so he wracks his brain (and the internet) for something with a little more spice. He thinks of one just as Eddie walks through the door, Bill behind him. Bill offers to order for them but Eddie refuses, telling him to go grab their table while he waits in line. Richie smiles to himself; sure, he might just be polite, but he likes to think that he might have some ulterior motives.
Eddie orders, and Richie chats with him, asking about his classes and what he’s been working on when he comes in to study. It’s over sooner than Richie would like, but that means he can get to making Eddie’s drink - and carrying out his correspondence.
“I don’t like this look on your face,” Beverly says when he turns away from the register. Richie holds up a finger, telling her to wait, before grabbing an empty cup and starting to write on it. He sticks his tongue out while he focuses on making it legible.
When he’s finished, he holds it up to Beverly. Can I be the stirrer to your iced coffee?
“I think this might be bordering on, like, harassment,” she says, looking between the cup and Richie’s excited expression, which falls as soon as she’s done talking.
“Noooo,” Richie draws out the word. “He likes it. Promise. I think. I mean, you saw how he was when Greta fucked up his order that one time. I think he’s the reason she quit.” Beverly raises an eyebrow at him. “Anyways, if he didn’t like it, he would say something.”
“What, you’ve done this before?” She asks, and Richie’s face lights up.
“Oh, you don’t know the plan!”
He gives her the rundown while making Eddie’s coffee, in hushed tones since he’s still standing a few feet away. Richie hopes he’s too distracted to actually be listening. Beverly shakes her head at him when he’s finished, turning to take orders while Richie passes Eddie his drink. He watches as Eddie looks for the message, having come to expect one. He tilts his head a little before the realization hits and he blushes.
“What- oh,” he stammers. He looks up at Richie, who winks at him.
Richie watches Eddie glance at him more intently while he studies. Richie almost always glances back, not afraid to meet his eye, but Eddie always turns away, embarrassed. When it’s time for them to leave, Richie thinks Eddie wants to come up to the counter with the way he hesitates, but they’ve just hit a rush and Richie and Beverly are both occupied, so he just follows Bill out.
-
Richie feels every second of his shift that passes while he waits for Eddie to arrive.
Today is the day, he’s decided. There’s only a few more days until Valentine’s Day, so the clock is ticking - Richie has been putting off this moment as long as he can. He’s got a long list of reasons if anyone thought to ask him: it’s never the right time, Eddie might say no, he ordered his drink iced today and it won’t be as visible on the clear cup, so on and so forth. But he’s just about out of time and all his reasons are starting to feel invalid.
Every pick up line he can think of while he waits suddenly sounds like the dumbest thing in the world. He bounces a few of them off of Stan, who shares the sentiment, but offers no better options.
Richie is at the register when Bill walks through the door. He feels his heart rate pick up, but it nearly stops when he realizes that Bill is alone. By the time he reaches the counter to order, Richie thinks he’s doing a pretty good job of playing it cool. He makes small talk with Bill as he orders, putting in his order and passing it off to Stan.
“Eddie’s class r-ran late,” Bill tells him once he’s taken his card out of the card reader.
“Oh,” Richie responds. “Alright.”
Bill gives him a small half smile before turning away to go grab his and Eddie’s usual table. Richie is white knuckling the sides of the cash register contemplating why Bill would think to tell him that - what could he know? What had Eddie told him?
Stan switches out with him, taking over the register while Richie makes drinks as best as he can while being lost in thought. He’s so lost in his head that he doesn’t notice Eddie come in, doesn’t hear him order his usual from Stan - he only realizes when Stan sets the cup on the counter and Richie picks it up to make the drink. It’s the only one devoid of an identifying name and Stan shoots him a look when he picks it up. Richie widens his eyes at him, raising his eyebrows, and Stan gives him an encouraging thumbs up.
Richie’s distraction had been useful in one regard: he’d decided on what he was going to write on Eddie’s cup. He grabs a marker and steadies his hand.
Eddie - Will you be my valentine?
No jokes, no puns, nothing silly. Straight to the point - something Richie isn’t often. He exhales as he puts the dot on the question mark and makes the drink quickly.
He calls Eddie’s name once it’s done, but he’s already looking up at him, phone tucked in his pocket while he waits for Richie to slide his cup across the counter.
“Hi,” Eddie says, reaching for the cup.
“Hi,” Richie replies. His face is so warm, he doesn’t even want to know how red he is. Eddie starts to slide down the cardboard sleeve to read what Richie wrote but Richie places a hand on top of the lid in an attempt to stop him. “You should wait,” he rushes out. “Until you’re at your table. Not here.”
Eddie gives him a quizzical look, but smiles and agrees. Richie watches him look back at him over his shoulder as he walks away. He wipes his palms on his jeans.
Now all he can do is wait.
Okay, maybe he was being dramatic. Eddie slides the sleeve down the instant he sits down, and Richie can see him blushing from the counter. Eddie looks over at him with a small smile that Richie thinks is fighting to break into a grin.
Unfortunately, though, Richie does have to go back to work. He had planned not to get an answer right away, not wanting to have to deal with a possible rejection in the middle of his shift, but now it’s biting him in the ass because all he can think about is Eddie and what he’s going to say. Richie is maybe ninety-eight percent sure he knows, but it’s still nerve wracking.
He doesn’t end up having to wait too long - Eddie is nearly as antsy as he is to give him his response. He would have blurted out a yes immediately had he read the note while still at the counter. Once the line has died down a bit and he can see the two baristas chatting at the counter, only one drink needing to be made, Eddie looks to Bill for encouragement before standing, taking his cup with him.
“Excuse me,” he says, clearing his throat. Richie is at the counter in a heartbeat. Eddie slides his cup across the counter to him, the cardboard sleeve no longer there. “Uh, I’d like to have this remade. There was way too much… milk,” he lies.
Richie tilts his head at him for a moment, concerned, before he looks at the cup and sees that there’s more writing than when he’d initially given it to Eddie.
“Of course,” he plays along. He picks up the cup and reads Eddie’s mostly-legible handwriting - Absolutely , written just underneath his message. Richie grins and looks up at Eddie, who’s blushing.
“What time do you get off?” Eddie asks.
“Depends on what I’m thinking about,” Richie smirks. Eddie drops his smile to glare at him until Richie amends, “Five thirty.”
“Cool,” Eddie toys with the wrapper of a straw sitting in the dispenser on the counter. “I’ll see you then?”
Richie’s grin grows even wider, somehow, and he nods. “Cool.”
Eddie reluctantly returns to his seat. He glances over his shoulder at Richie every few seconds, nearly running into someone getting up to throw out an empty cup, but Richie watches him go, still smiling. When he sits, Bill raises an eyebrow at him as if to ask how it went, and all Eddie can do is smile down at his textbook.
For the rest of his shift, every drink Richie makes gets a heart scrawled under the name.