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Garreth had been going on about this café for weeks. He called it “life-changing,” as if the roasted beans had descended from heaven itself. Ominis suspected it was more about the cashier Garreth flirted with behind the counter than the actual quality of the drinks, but Garreth was relentless until finally, on a dreary Saturday morning, Ominis let himself be dragged along.
The shop wasn’t far from his flat. He noted the route as Garreth swiftly led him, his grip light around Ominis’ elbow. In his other hand, Ominis held his cane loosely outstretched. He didn’t fully trust Garreth to not lead him into a lamppost.
”Ah, here we are!” Garreth suddenly bellowed, jerking to a stop and nearly taking Ominis’ arm with him. ”The Sallow Sun.”
”It sounds like a disease”, Ominis said disdainfully, rubbing his shoulder where his arm had nearly been dislocated.
“Maybe,” Garreth admitted, practically vibrating with excitement. “But I didn’t sleep for forty-eight hours after their triple-shot vanilla latte, and when I finally did, I passed out for eleven hours straight and dreamt very vividly about glazed donuts.”
“That’s supposed to be a recommendation?” Ominis snarked, but allowed himself to be led inside. There was a high threshold at the entrance that Ominis nearly caught his foot on before Garreth’s grip steadied him. Inside, the sharp whistle of steaming wands and the low grind of beans filled the air. Ominis tilted his head, orienting himself as Garreth steered them to what he presumed was the start of the line. From the echoes, it sounded smaller than he’d expected; wood floors, low ceiling, the hum of conversation caught and carried in the close space.
“Queue’s short,” Garreth whispered, giving his elbow a gentle nudge until they stopped.
When it was their turn, Garreth leapt in without hesitation.
“Hey!” Ominis could hear the grin in his voice as he leaned across the counter, laying it on thick. “So, I’m interested in your special cookie-and-caramel-drizzle frappuccino, but I was wondering if I could… add a few things?”
“Sure,” the girl behind the till said easily.
Ominis suppressed a laugh. Poor thing. She clearly had no idea what she’d just unleashed.
True to his word, Garreth lit up like a freshly charged iPhone.
“Perfect! Okay, so, could you switch the caramel drizzle to chocolate drizzle instead, and do oat milk instead of normal milk? The whipped cream can be normal, though. For some reason my stomach only revolts at one of them. Oh—and can I add three shots? Proper ones, mind you, not those weepy little pods that disgrace the very name of coffee. I want to feel my heartbeat behind my eyes, you know?”
The girl gave a polite hum, tapping something into the register.
“Right, and sprinkles on top, please. But arranged to spell out the letter G.”
The tapping slowed.
“And one pump of mocha flavour would make you an angel. Oh, and we’ll be sitting here, but I’ll take it in a to-go cup anyway. With an extra straw. They go soggy far too quickly. And is it too late to ask for it to be made extra hot?”
By the end, the padding of her fingers on the keys had nearly trailed off entirely. A pause followed, thick with hesitation, as though she wasn’t sure if she was being pranked.
“…All those changes will be five dollars extra,” the cashier said at last, cautious, as if bracing for him to add more.
Ominis heard Garreth pull out his wallet and shuffle a few notes. “Keep the change,” he said smoothly, and Ominis could practically hear the wink in his voice.
“Right,” the girl replied, amusement breaking through her professionalism now. “And a name for the order?”
“My name’s Garreth, but you can call me anytime,” Garreth drawled, and the girl let out a giggle. Ominis rolled his eyes. Say what you want about Garreth, but he was smooth.
From somewhere behind the counter, close to where Ominis could hear the whistling of the espresso machine, a new, male voice called out:
“Oi, what the fuck, Anne? What the hell is this order I just got?”
The girl — Anne — just snickered.
Then, it was Ominis’ turn. He folded his cane, tucked it away and said politely:
“A medium latte, please. No… changes.”
The relief in Anne’s voice was palpable as she rang him up.
“And a name for your drink?” she asked.
“Ominis,” he said evenly.
“Pardon?”
He was used to that. Patiently, he repeated, careful to enunciate: “Ominis.”
A pause, the scratching sound of a marker on paper, and then the girl chirped, “Perfect, thank you. Card reader’s just in front of you, a little to the right.”
He slid his hand along the counter until he brushed against the edge of the terminal. After a brief search, he found the contactless pad and held his card there until it beeped.
They stepped aside, Garreth muttering about how fit the guy behind the machine was — Ominis assumed that meant the one making the drinks, from the clatter and hiss of milk steaming just a few feet away.
“A … whatever the hell this concoction is, for Garreth?” came the same male voice soon after. The tone was brisk, practiced from shouting across a busy shop floor. Garreth snagged his drink with a cheerful “Thanks, mate.”
A beat later: “A medium latte for Ominous!”
Garreth wheezed with laughter, elbowing Ominis in the side. “That’s you.”
Ominis schooled his face into polite neutrality, stepping forward and finding the counter edge again. He slid his hand carefully until his fingers brushed the warmth of a paper cup. “Thank you,” he said, and then, with a mild smile, added, “It’s pronounced Omi-nees, not Omi-nous. Unusual name, I know.”
“Right, sorry, mate,” the voice replied. Unapologetically cheerful, as if he misspoke all the time. Ominis shook his head faintly and carried his cup back to Garreth, who guided him toward a table.
The coffee was surprisingly good.
He returned a few days later.
It wasn’t far, and the taste was worth the trouble of navigating the crossing alone. He’d memorized the distance between lampposts, the rough change in pavement before the café entrance, even the particular door handle. Inside, it was the same cashier from before. Anne, he remembered.
“Hi again!” she greeted him brightly. “What can I get for you?”
He followed the sound of her voice, stopping when his cane brushed against the front of the counter.
“Just a large black coffee, please,” Ominis said, folding up his cane and putting it in his pocket.
“And the name?”
“Ominis.”
There was a slight hitch in her tone, as if she were checking she heard correctly. He repeated it, evenly. She thanked him, passed him toward the card reader, and he found his way to the side.
A few minutes later, the male voice called out: “Black coffee for… Oliver?”
There was a beat of hesitation. He nearly doubted it was his until the man added, “Large black coffee, no changes, unlike your … extravagant friend here yesterday.”
That was his order. Ominis smiled faintly and collected it. “Thank you,” he said, and didn’t even bother correcting him this time. Maybe Anne had typed it in incorrectly, or the guy was stressed and just … slipped. It felt a bit strange, since the coffee shop seemed empty besides Ominis and an elderly couple chatting by the window, but what did Ominis know? He had never worked in an environment as loud and stressful as a coffee shop.
“Have a nice day,” the barista said, and there was something pointed in his voice Ominis couldn’t place.
“You too,” he said, almost a bit hesitantly, as he turned and followed the sound of the doorbell chiming to find his way out.
It was indeed a rather odd place, but the coffee was warm in his hands, and it was close to home. That was enough reason to come back again.
Ominis chalked the first time up to… well, the first time. The second time? A simple misunderstanding.
Then came:
“Vanilla latte for Oberon?”
“Hot chocolate for Oscar?”
“Orchid? A black coffee for Orchid?”
It was getting increasingly difficult to chalk these up as mistakes.
When Garreth insisted on dragging Amit and Imelda along one afternoon, Ominis figured it might be a reprieve. Surely the man behind the counter wouldn’t butcher four names in a row.
The shop was bustling when they stepped inside, having arrived just at the lunch rush. Ominis listened closely. It was the same barista from before. Name after name was called out, and from what Ominis could tell, no one else seemed to hesitate about their order or correct the barista. He even called out a few names Ominis most definitely found stranger and more difficult than his. At one point, the guy even shouted: “An Americano for Vsevolod?” A man stepped forward and thanked the barista with a gruff, Russian accent.
They placed their orders one by one and stepped aside. Garreth got his usual, syrup-heavy concoction. Ominis made sure to enunciate each syllable clearly for Anne, who no longer even double-checked and seemed perfectly confident in his name. Maybe the barista was stressed. Or maybe… he just couldn’t read.
“I’m not going to call out all the changes to this order but it’s for Garreth!” came the call soon after. Clear and correct. No hesitation.
Then Amit’s order followed. “Chai latte for Amit!” Crisp. Perfectly pronounced.
“Black coffee with two extra shots for Imelda!” No errors, no stumbling over the syllables.
Imelda’s voice cut through the chatter when she grabbed hers. “That’s me, thanks.”
Ominis was just beginning to hope. Perhaps today would be different.
“Flat white for Omar?” the barista bellowed.
The group went still for half a beat before Garreth snorted so hard he nearly dropped his cup. Amit choked on his first sip, and even Imelda let out a laugh.
Ominis turned toward the counter, affront tugging at his otherwise even voice. “Omar is an Arabic name. Do I look and sound like someone named Omar?” He gestured vaguely to his slender frame and pale hair.
The barista’s voice was unrepentantly cheerful: “Sorry, mate, I try not to be prejudiced.”
Garreth practically howled. Ominis collected his latte with as much dignity as he could muster, though his ears were pink.
He went back, of course.
A week later: “Black coffee for Otis!”
Then: “Americano for Onions!” (That time Garreth had to physically lean against the wall, he was laughing so hard.)
The visit after that: “Cappuccino for Octavius!”
And once, most outrageously: “Flat white for Optimus!”
By then Ominis had stopped correcting him. He would simply step forward, claim the cup, and allow the others their entertainment. He hated to admit it, but there was something oddly intriguing about the barista’s continued mishaps. A part of him wanted to return just to hear what new, ridiculous name the barista would conjure up next. Surely there were only so many names beginning with O.
One day, when he entered, he was met with a new voice.
“Mocha latte for Leander!” a bright, female voice called out. Ominis listened intently as the line slowly moved forward, but there was no sign of his barista.
Not his, he immediately corrected himself. Just … the barista.
It was Anne behind the counter, as usual. She took his order, he found the card reader with practiced ease, and moved to the side to wait for his drink.
“Hey, Poppy, I’ll be taking my break soon!” Anne called out behind Ominis. The new barista, Poppy, replied:
“No worries, I think your brother will be back in five! Just let me finish these drinks and I’ll take over.”
Then, he heard the sound of a cup being set down, and Poppy called out:
“Medium latte for Ominis?”
Perfect pronunciation. Not “Omi-nous”, but a crisp and clear “Omi-nees”.
Which also meant that Anne was typing in his name correctly. It was just the other barista who seemed incapable of getting his name right.
He grabbed his drink, thanked Poppy politely, and left.
He told himself he was just imagining the way the coffee didn’t taste quite as good as when his barista made it.
… Damn it.
The shop was busier than usual, but Ominis knew the rhythm of the place well enough by now. He ordered a black coffee, stepped aside, and waited with the low hum of chatter and the hissing espresso machine.
“Black coffee for… Ornamental?”
Ominis went rigid. For a moment, he was convinced he’d misheard. But the name hung in the air, clear as a day, and the heat of indignation surged so fast Ominis nearly snapped his cane in two.
That was it. Enough.
He strode toward the voice, cane ticking sharply against the floor, and slammed his free hand down on the counter. “You cannot possibly think that is my name.”
There was a pause, then the same infuriatingly cheerful tone: “Just doing my job, mate.”
Ominis jabbed a finger toward the voice. “You’re doing it badly. I have been coming here for weeks. Weeks. You get Garreth’s name right, Amit’s, Imelda’s — the cashier gets mine right every single time. It is not that difficult.”
The silence stretched, just long enough that Ominis felt his ears burn. Then, finally, the barista let out a chuckle.
“Took you long enough. I was running out of names beginning with O. I was about to resort to made up names. Or nouns.”
The confirmation that the mistakes were intentional made Ominis falter, words sticking in his throat.
“I… what?” he managed, brow furrowed. “You’ve been messing up my name on purpose?”
He couldn’t fathom why anyone would bother. Judging by the long line at every lunch rush and the way the shop never seemed empty even during its slowest hours, there was no conceivable reason the guy should waste time on something so ridiculous.
The barista laughed again, warm and pleased. “Come on, you can’t possibly tell me you didn’t figure it out sooner. I mean, Optimus? Orchid? I even called you Ofelia once.”
Heat rushed to Ominis’ cheeks, both from the memory of the Ofelia incident (he hadn’t reacted at all that time, and his drink had been called out three times before he realised) and from the smug amusement in the barista’s voice.
“I thought you were just stressed. Or couldn’t read very well,” he admitted, fingers fumbling for his cup if only to do something.
“Me, not read?” the guy snorted. “How about you? I’ve been writing my number on the bottom of your cup since the first time I called you Ominous. Which was genuinely accidental, by the way.”
”He has a stack of cups with his number written on them already prepared,” Anne suddenly chimed in helpfully, before she drifted back to the register and welcomed the next customer.
Ominis’ mouth fell open. He nearly dropped his cup.
“I’m literally blind! How did you expect me to know that?”
There was a pause. Then, sheepishly: “Ah. Right. Full disclosure? I didn’t realise you were blind until now.”
Maybe the guy could read, but he was actually an idiot.
“You…” Ominis began, stunned. “You’ve been— I literally have a visibility cane. I walk in with it. I tap it on the floor. You can’t have missed it.” He gave the cane a small, irritated shake for emphasis. “And I fumbled for the card reader every single time in the beginning.”
“I don’t see what happens at the till,” the barista said, sounding distinctly more flustered now than cocky. “I’m usually steaming milk and panicking about new names on O while my heart’s trying to beat its way out of my chest because the hottest guy I’ve ever seen just walked in. Excuse me for being drawn to your face and not any… eventual accessories you may have.”
Ominis opened his mouth, then shut it again. He wasn’t sure whether to be more outraged at the weeks of torment or disarmed by the blunt honesty of the compliment.
At last, he managed, dryly:
“The cane is not an accessory, it’s an aid. And if this is your idea of flirting, it’s appallingly inefficient.”
The barista laughed again. “Maybe. But you kept coming back, didn’t you?”
Against his better judgment, Ominis felt his lips twitch.
Maybe it was the thrill of the barista’s confidence; just shy of cocky, yet somehow charming and disarmingly genuine. Or maybe he simply wanted something to show for spending a small fortune on overpriced coffee. He leaned forward over the counter.
“So. Since you’ve been tormenting me for weeks, I think it’s only fair I know who to blame. What’s your name?”
“Sebastian,” the barista said readily.
Ominis tilted his head, feigning concentration. “Ah. Sylvester?”
A beat of silence. Then: “No, Sebastian.”
“Septimus?”
Another pause, sharper now. “Sebastian.”
“Severus?”
The voice cracked with indignation. “It’s Sebastian .”
Ominis couldn’t help it. A small smile betrayed him. “Just making sure you know what it feels like.”
“I — oh, you’re evil,” Sebastian muttered, though his voice was warm with reluctant amusement. “Christ’s sake. Alright, I deserved that one. Truce.”
“Truce,” Ominis agreed. He hesitated a moment, then decided to be as bold as Garreth’s drink orders. He held his phone out across the counter.
“Now, since your cup method is wasted on me, perhaps you’d like to put your number in here directly?”
Sebastian hesitated only a second before Ominis felt the brush of fingers taking the phone from his hand. There was a moment of silence, the sound of the number pad tapping, and then the phone was gently pressed into his hands again.
“There you go,” Sebastian said. His voice was softer now. “And… if you’re free Saturday?”
Ominis wrapped his hand around the warm cup placed carefully at the counter, tucking the phone back into his pocket with the other. “I am,” he said evenly, though his heart gave a small, surprising leap.
He left the café with the coffee in his hand, a new number in his phone, and a date for Saturday.