Chapter Text
Like every morning, Joe Biden finds himself wrapping his apron around his barely-there waist as he gets ready for another day of work. Being a barista isn’t easy; even at the young age of eighty-two Joe finds himself quite tired at the end of his shifts. Luckily, annoying customers aren’t as prominent during this time, 5-10 am, and more often than not, Joe finds himself taking short little naps behind the counter due to the calm and quiet atmosphere.
Speaking of naps, just as Joe feels his eyelids shutting and his muscles relaxing, a strong palm meets the back of his head, the sound of the smack reverberating across the whole coffee shop.
“Joe Biden!” his fellow barista, a young and beautiful Kamala Harris, can be seen glaring at him as he turns his head in her direction. “What did I say about sleeping on the job? It’s barely been an hour since you came in, do you not sleep at home, or something?”
Barely an hour? Joe can’t believe it! Kamala must be lying, it feels like he’s been here for 5 years! However, when he looks up at the clock on the opposite wall of the shop, he sees that the arrow has just hit 6.
Wow, doee he really get tired so easily? And at his young age? As he’s about to apologize to Kamala for yet another one of his workplace naps, the chime of the doorbell rings out across the coffee shop, signaling a new customer coming in. Like a machine that’s just been powered on, Joe immediately turns on his signature smile and customer service voice.
“Hello, welcome to Sleepy Joe’s, is there anything I can—“
His words are abruptly cut off at the sight of the most gorgeous man his blue eyes have ever laid sight upon. Clad head to toe in black, the gorgeous man sports a leather jacket, leather pants, and killer combat boots. The dark color of his outfit contrasts beautifully with the soft blonde of his luscious locks, which frame his face and accentuate his soft jawline. The man’s green eyes are so enthralling that Joe doesn’t even realize he’s been staring until he notices those same eyes moving up and down his figure, sizing him up.
Of course, the lower half of Joe’s body is out of view due to his position behind the counter, but the attention makes him blush and turn his gaze away from those enchanting eyes.
“Uh… what would y-you like to order?” Joe stutters, facepalming himself mentally. There goes any chance he ever had.
The mysterious man, however, does not seem deterred by Joe’s embarrassing stutter. As Joe lifts his gaze up to the man’s face once more, he sees a smirk stretch across those gorgeous lips.
“Just a shot of espresso,” the man says, his voice a deep and dark timbre that causes a suspiciously warm feeling to erupt inside of Joe’s stomach. “Donald Trump is the name for the order.”
Joe’s hand, which was just tapping the man’s order onto the screen of the register, immediately stills. Donald? The Donald Trump? The man who’s notoriously known around the city for being the leader of one biggest gangs in the country? Inside of Joe’s coffee shop? This can’t be!
But as the man extends his arm out to hand Joe Biden his credit card, Joe sees a tiny sliver of what looks like the gang’s signature tattoo running up the handsome man’s hand. Joe has seen this same symbol graffitied all across town. There is no way around it, he thinks, this really is Donald Trump.
Joe feels a shiver of fear run down his spine, but the warm feeling inside of his stomach hasn’t calmed down – if anything, it’s gotten even more intense. There is something seriously wrong with him.
Hastily, Joe taps the man’s – Donald’s – order into the register and swipes his card for him. When he hands the card back, he can feel his face burning a bright red from fear, or maybe from something else.
No! Definitely not something else, he’s just scared, that’s all! It’s a natural reaction!
Donald pockets credit card and, with those gorgeous green eyes still staring right into Joe, he says, “Nice earrings, they suit you.”
Joe feels his face burn tenfold as Donald points toward his rainbow shaped earrings. He had bought them a while ago and decided to wear them for pride – as an ally, of course! He isn’t gay, but he wanted to show support to Kamala and all of her six girlfriends (she’s currently in a very messy polyamorous relationship, so the number might’ve already dwindled down to four or three by now).
“T-Thank you, I-I like your… uhm,” Joe stutters helplessly, trying to find another way of saying ‘captivating eyes’ without sounding like a total creep. “I like your tattoo!” is what he lands on, like a total dumbass. Now Donald will definitely know that Joe knows who he is, and he’ll have to kill him for being such a nuisance! Joe can’t die yet, he’s too young!
He bites his lip in mortification as Donald just laughs, his eyes curling up into crescents and his smooth, orange skin glistening in the warm lights of the coffee shop. Joe forgets his embarrassment for a moment as he just watches Donald’s breathtaking expression, getting lost in those beautiful features once again before Donald says something else.
Due to his incessant staring and wild imagination, he hadn’t really caught what Donald said.
“Sorry, what was that?” he asks, the blush never leaving his face.
“I said,” Donald then leans forward and places his strong forearms, clearly built from working out at the gym (or maybe from a life of crime, Joe’s brain helpfully supplies) on top of the counter. “I think you’re cute, and I was wondering if I could have your number.”
Joe’s traitorous heart skips a beat. And then another one. And another one. And suddenly he feels like his heart has stopped altogether.
He knows he must look pretty dumb right now, mouth agape and eyes wide, but he really can’t speak with the current turmoil going on in his head. I mean, seriously, this beautiful man wants his number? For real? No one’s ever liked Joe Biden in such a way, especially not enough to come up to him and ask for his number. In fact, Joe is pretty sure no one has ever really liked him as a friend, much less romantically. The only reason Kamala even puts up with him is probably because of that one time he set her up on a date with Leon Kennedy, her longtime crush, who she later added on to her polycule (he was kicked out after a couple weeks for reason still unknown to Joe Biden). She probably just felt like she owed it to him to be his friend.
She didn’t actually like him. No one did.
Thankfully, he does not say any of this self-deprecating monologue out loud. Instead, he chooses the next best thing, that being, “Sorry, I’m s-straight.”
The disbelieving look on Donald’s perfectly orange face, along with a raised eyebrow, makes Joe Biden doubt that Donald actually believed him. It’s not like he was lying! He really is straight, seriously! Just because he gets intense butterflies and heart flutters when the handsome man in front of him runs his hands through his luscious blonde strands does not make him gay! Not at all!
“Right, straight,” the handsome man chuckles to himself, then looks back at Joe with a furious intensity behind his eyes. “That’s fine. Give me your number anyway, we can be friends. Just friends.”
The last part sounded like it was forcefully ripped out of his esophagus, like it hurt Donald to say it out loud. However, Joe Biden did not feel like being chased down by a group of gang members and tortured in a dark basement just because he refused a gang leader’s slightly off putting friendship offer. He pulled out a post-it note and hastily scribbled his number in shaky handwriting, handing it to Donald as soon as he was done.
“Thanks,” Donald hummed as he shoved the note into his jacket pocket, winking at Joe as he turned to walk out of the shop.
A bit dumbfounded by what had just happened, it took a few seconds of staring at the back of Donald’s handsome head, the one that was currently leaving the coffee shop, before he realized something.
“Y-you didn’t take your drink!”
It was too late, Donald was already halfway through the door and seemed in no mood to stop. As the sound of the door slamming shut echoed across the coffee shop, Joe noticed a strange feeling inside of his chest, something unnerving and strange.
Somehow, it felt as though he had not signed his number onto the note, but instead he had signed his destiny.