The Expectation to Never Expect

The smell of caffeine invaded my nostrils and I felt a rise in my heart beat almost instantly as the boy behind the register caught my eye. His dark hair was forcefully pushed back into a messy quiff, a style he’d adapted to keep the locks from falling into his eyes. His light pink lips pulled back in a smile, his long fingers sliding a cardboard cup in my direction.

“Latte. You look like shit.”

I’d been working at Mamina Papito for barely three weeks but instantly I’d managed to befriend the only worker my own age, Rory Hewitt. We were both barely eighteen, we were both fresh out of high school and with no sense of direction but to enjoy our first free summer.

“Such a sweetheart.” I dropped my bag to the floor behind the register and hunched over the warm cup of brown liquid, my drowsy head pounding, and my insides trembling.

“So what’d you do, stay up past bedtime? The baby’s growing up”

“Just because I’m three months younger does not make me a baby.” I wiped my eyes and straightened up off the counter, tying my apron around my waist and filling a metal jug with skim milk. “I thought we’d talked about this.”

He scoffed, the sound overly patronising to my ears. “I remember you trying to convince me, kind of like how you tried convincing me you knew a good night out.”

“I could drink you under any table without a single effort.” I laughed daringly as his deep sea green eyes stared in disbelief.

“You wish. I bet you don’t even know what a night on the town truly is.”

“And you do?” I wiped down the steam wand of the coffee machine and smiled over at my co-worker, his dark hair falling slightly in his eyes as he read the next order over.

“Love, I invented nights out.” Rory paused, the slip of order form tightly between his fingers before he began the bases nodding to the jug of soy hoping I’d catch on to begin heating the nutty liquid. “My friend’s throwing some party this weekend for the start of summer, pre-night before invading the shitty bars of this place. You think you’re so tough and can drink like the boys you should come.”

“This how you swoon all the girls?”

Rory’s head fell backward as he laughed. Normally I wouldn’t be so confident; normally it took having my best friend by my side to be showered in the gift of easy conversation. But with Rory it seemed different, he gave me the ability to act carefree and carelessly.

“Just the ones worthy of my attention.” His green eyes winked cheekily in my direction as he handed a woman in her mid-thirties a quarter strength Vienna.

“What a charmer you turned out to be.” I feigned to be swept off my feet in lust and smiled as I poured yet another jug of milk, throwing it under the wand and watching as it span and swirled to perfection.

“On a serious note. You figured out your summer?”

“Not at all.”

“That’s the way!”

Truth was after thirteen years of school I didn’t want direction. I wanted freedom, I wanted lessons, I wanted to taste that young ready world for all it was and never pass up a single opportunity. Eighteen was everything and I welcomed it with open arms. Rory had the same opinion, both of us had deferred our university studies to sleep late and stay up all night.