I Will Not Kiss You

The man insisted on giving me some reward money for helping him find Muffin. That means he thought I had to take the reward money and wouldn't let me say 'No thank you'. So he gave me ten dollars. I said thank you very much and asked if he was sure about giving me the money. He said yes and told me not to be ridiculous. I didn't like being told I was being ridiculous but I didn't say anything about it because it would have been very rude.

After Gerard had walked me home and said goodbye to me, I told Mom about finding the man's dog and getting reward money. Mom said she was very proud of me and said I'd been very brave and grown up to go through the hedges to look for Muffin. This made me feel happy because it's good to behave brave and grown up.

Mikey said well done to me the next day at school when I told him about finding Muffin. He said that was very good of me and I deserved the money the man had given me. I decided I'd ask Mikey if he'd like to go and get a coffee from The Coffee House because I can go in there now. And I decided that I would pay for our coffees with the money the man gave me for finding Muffin.

So I asked Mikey if he'd like to go and have a coffee from The Coffee House.

"Oh no, Frank!" He said after I told him I would pay "It's your money! I'd feel bad!"

"Yes, it's my money and I can choose what to spend it on," I said "And I'd like to spend it on a coffee for me and a coffee for my best friend."

"Well, that's very nice, Frank," Mikey smiled "And if it makes you happy, you can buy me a coffee."

And then the school bell rang so we picked up our stuff and started walking towards our next class. . .

. . . Gerard was in The Coffee House when Mikey and I walked through the door. He was behind the counter, dressed in a tight-fitting black t-shirt and a pair of black trousers that looked like the type a school boy would wear with his school uniform. His hair was slightly ruffled; but it looked good. And he had black eyeliner and eyeshadow on too.

Gerard was serving a man dressed in a grey business suit with a brown briefcase when Mikey and I came into The Coffee House. Mikey pointed out an empty table with the big squashy purple sofa-like seats. I felt happy because I really like purple. So we went and sat down before someone else went and sat there. But the table wasn't very nice because it had coffee stains and crumbs on it. I wondered if this was a bad un-hygienic place.

"I'm sorry, guys, can I just wipe the table over for you?" A waitress dressed in black with chestnut hair tied back into a ponytail asked.

I recognised her and said "Hello, Tyler."

And she stopped spraying the table with the special cleaner stuff and looked at me. She stared at me for about a minute, squinting her eyes at me. Then she suddenly smiled and said "Oh my God, hi, Frank!"

She moved in to hug me but I stepped back and asked her not to hug me. She shrugged her shoulders and wiped the table with a j-cloth. Then she said we were free to sit at the table and said she'd tell Gerard I was here. So I said thank you because that's polite and it was very nice of her to wipe the table and tell Gerard I was here.

I already knew that I wanted a latte, so I waited for Mikey to look at the menu and choose what he wanted. He chewed his lip while he looked at the menu on the table, tapping his fingers.

I decided I'd get us both a cake or a flapjack to eat as well.

"I think I'll just have a mug of filter coffee, if that's okay, Frank," Mikey finally said.

So I said "Okay."

And I got up and walked over to the counter. Gerard was there, serving a lady with greying blonde hair and a black pinstriped business suit. He had a smile on his face as he spoke to her.

"Certainly, Ma'am," He said, turning around and starting to make her drinks.

He picked up a metal teapot that wasn't very big, put one teabag in it and turned to a big shiny machine. He pulled a little handle on the nozzle and some hot water started pouring out of it. Gerard then gave the teapot to the lady and turned around again, starting to pick things up and open a little fridge and pull out a big carton of milk. When he next turned around, he gave the lady a little metal jug of milk and a tea cup on a saucer with a teaspoon.

Gerard looked at me, smiled and winked before turning back to the lady and moving behind the till beside him.

"Was there anything else, Ma'am?"

"No, that's all, thank you."

"Okay, tea for one," He said, pushing a little button.

He told the lady how much her tea for one cost and she paid him and told him to keep the change as a tip before getting her tea on a tray and walking away.

"Thank you very much, Ma'am," Gerard said, putting the change in a little jar that had a label saying Tips.

Then he turned to me with a big smile.

"And how can I help you, sir?" He asked.

"Hello, Gerard," I said "Can I please have a latte and a mug of filter coffee?"

He nodded and smiled. Then he asked if I wanted to come behind the counter and watch him make the latte. So I said 'Yes please' and walked around the counter. He got a tall thick glass with a handle, like a mug. And he showed me how he made the espresso shot with a coffee bean grinder and squashed the beans down so they wouldn't overflow when he made the shot.

"Then you put it in this little bit here, see?" He explained "Make sure it's in good and tight by pulling it to the right. Then you push this button here, the one with one cup on it; that means one shot."

He even let me push the button but told me not to tell anyone because customers weren't supposed to touch the machinery or come around the counter unless they needed to use the microwave to heat baby food because staff weren't allowed to do it in case they got sued for heating the baby food too much or little.

The machine must have poured hot water into the shot holder thing because espresso started to pour out of the little spout on the bottom and into the glass Gerard was tilting underneath it so it would fit.

"Okay, now I take this out, pull it to the left," He said "And bang it on the edge of this little compartment under the grinder until the coffee goes into it. And we get rid of that at the end of the day. Then I wash this under the hot water on the espresso machine here, push the kettle button so that hot water pours onto it. See? Now it's ready to be used next time."

Then he got the carton of milk out again. He poured some into a big metal jug and told me that what he was going to do would make a loud noise so I wouldn't get scared if it made me jump.

He showed me a nozzle on the side of the machine and held the jug over it so that the end of the nozzle was in the milk. Then he twisted a little dial on the machine and there was a loud scary noise. Gerard explained that it let hot steam out and heated the milk up. He kept putting his hand on the side of the jug, telling me he was checking how hot the milk was. Then he started moving the jug up and down so there was an odd noise and he said it frothed the milk up.

"Okay, it's done. Now I turn this dial to turn the thing off. And I have hot frothy milk for your latte," He said.

Then he picked up a teaspoon and used it to stop the froth going into my latte as he poured the hot milk into it. Then he let a little froth on the top. It was like when I was behind the counter once before.

"There we go, sir," Gerard said "A latte."

I walked back around to the other side of the counter and watched Gerard pour some filter coffee out of the coffee jug into a mug for Mikey. He put both coffee's onto a saucer with a teaspoon and gave me a little jug of milk for Mikey's coffee because it was poured out as black coffee.

"Was there anything else, sir?" He asked.

"Can I have two of these flapjacks please?" I asked pointing to a basket of packaged flapjacks instead of the fresh made ones on display underneath a glass counter.

"Certainly, sir," Gerard said, getting two plates and putting folded napkins on them.

He put the flapjacks on the plates and asked if that was everything. So I said yes. So Gerard pushed some buttons on the till and said:

"That's six dollars fifty-four, please, sir."

So I gave him the money and he offered to help me take the coffees and flapjacks over to our table. Mikey smiled when Gerard and I came over. Gerard put the two coffees on the table and squatted down as I sat on the sofa.

"Listen," He said in hushed tones "I didn't charge you for the flapjacks, just don't tell anyone."

So we said okay. Before he went back to work, Gerard took a bite from Mikey's flapjack and walked away. Mikey said he would complain and I asked him not to because that would mean Gerard could lose his job. So Mikey told me he was joking. So I smiled and started drinking my latte.