Wednesdays

I’d spent hours getting ready, pure nervousness and low-self-esteem eating ravenously into my routine. I don’t know how many times I swapped t-shirts because they didn’t go with my jeans, or swapped jeans to see how it would go with my t-shirt, I must have tried every outfit in my wardrobe on. I didn’t count every minute I spent trying to apply the perfect amount of make-up, then cleaning it all off because I simply didn’t look good with it, or it didn’t match my t-shirt. I hated clashing. And after everything I did, I looked fairly ordinary. God, why did he even ask me out? I was so bland.

Rocking slightly I moved from foot to foot, standing outside Starbucks, hands tucked deeply into the pockets of my black coat. I was wearing a loose light grey t-shirt with a high collar that was way too wide and hung down around my chest, a pair of black, tight jeans, standard converse and a black tightly woven wool coat.

The only evidence I had made an effort to look nice was probably my face; I had applied some eyeliner and a miniscule amount of concealer to my skin, in a hope of appearing better than I was. better than I was what standard was that, exactly?

I distracted myself from my thoughts with a sharp nip to the arm and a very purposeful head turn to find something to grab my attention. And as it happens; I did find something vey pleasant to look at almost immediately. The site of a small blonde making his way through the crowd of people towards me, head turned down to the floor to look out for the many frozen puddles littering the street.

He seemed to be purposely taking his time, either that or his legs were actually just that small. Don’t be mean I shook my head and swept a hand through my hair, smoothing it to the side. What was taking him so long, it can’t have been that long of a stretch of pavement...

“Well hello there stranger”

Finally

“Hey” Lewis nodded towards the glass door and I lead the way, pushing it open and bracing myself for the smell of industrial coffee and sugar which would surely choke any sense from me. Lewis followed me casually, taking slightly larger than normal steps to keep up with my longer legs, I wasn’t even walking that fast.

“Little late?” asked a familiar voice, I smirked as I leant against the counter, Lewis joining me a few moments later, giving Spencer a raised eyebrow.

“Oh I see; coffee date!” Exclaimed Spencer, his face lighting up a little and a small jump finding its way to his feet. Lewis gave me an odd look which I ignored, keeping my attention on Spencer.

“The usual for me, Lewis...?”

“Black coffee”

“You guys make my life easier” Commented Spencer, pulling out two cups “Everyone else wants me to mix something crazy like milk and sugar, it takes forever because I’m bad at measuring, but you two just want good old plain black coffee. It’ll be the Armageddon the day Kris wants some sugar or cold coffee for that matter...” Spencer carried on talking cheerfully as he made the coffee, Lewis seemed interested to hear Spencer’s rant about me and my mind just drifted away to other things, trying to ignore the heavy smell of industry coffee.

Other things were at that moment in time, how skinny Lewis was. I couldn’t help but feel jealous at how he didn’t seem the least big self conscious about his body. And he shouldn’t be either, he had killer curves and legs, and god he was skinny. I couldn’t get that one word out of my mind; skinny. I wanted to be thin like him, to be able to wear anything and not be self conscious about how I looked, because if something made me look fat, I knew I was thin so I didn’t have to worry.

“Kris? Your coffee” I blinked my eyes a few times and quickly pulled up a smile, thanking Spencer with it and taking my foam cup of the side. I trailed off towards my normal seat, hoping Lewis was following behind me. I sat heavily and wrapped both hands around my cup and slouched back comfortably. Lewis, much more majestically, took a seat across from me and leaned forward, one hand looped around his foam mug.

“I don’t mean to be blunt, but are you single?” He asked after a small pause in which I took a sip of coffee.

“Yeah” I answered, going for monosyllables again. I didn’t want to fiddle, so I kept my hands wrapped tightly around my cup. But only just, my hands were craving to smooth over my hair, pull at my t-shirt and fiddle with the buckle of my belt. A smirk touched Lewis’s lips.

“Good” I didn’t ask him back. It wasn’t any issue to me, and I just really didn’t care. He could fuck with me all he wanted to, there wouldn’t be any emotional bonding; there never was.

“Who was the guy at the counter?” Jealous already are we? Yeah, right.

“Spencer” I answered with a shrug, chipping the lid of the coffee mug with my finger nails, deciding whether or not to take it off.

“Any interest there?” Yes, I defiantly did want the lid off; god knows how people drink with these things on.

“Can’t say I care” Lewis raised an eyebrow and sat back, bringing the coffee with him as I finally prised the lid from the foam cup.

“You don’t care about much” It wasn’t a question, it was an observation, I didn’t need to answer. So I didn’t. My attention was dragged away from Lewis by the familiar sound of the door opening. My eyes lazily followed the old lady as she shut the door and slowly made her towards the counter, where Spencer stood with an expression that to anyone else would look like patience. But I could see the small up-turn of his lips; he found it funny.

I looked back to the old lady. What was funny? I couldn’t see anything funny; she wasn’t wearing anything particularly attention attracting and she wasn’t doing anything odd. She was just walking slowly, as everyone her age would.

“Why are you single?” the question pulled me from my observations and I quickly turned back to Lewis, pausing a moment to process the question.

“People don’t like the way I...I...act” I dropped my eyes from Lewis and concentrated on the coffee, watching the dark liquid swirl slightly.

“The way you act?”

“I don’t talk” and I don’t feel. They hated that. When they tried the ‘I feel this about you’ talk, I never had anything to contribute back. Sure, I could say they were pretty to look at, but I never really took in how they acted. In my eyes, they all acted the same. They didn’t like that.

Only Olivia didn’t mind, she said she liked the way I was always off with the fairies. She had always been a bit odd.

“Or are you just to blunt?”

“I don’t care” I told him, growing slightly uncomfortable with the subject, I didn’t want to talk about me. I hated talking about me, there was nothing to me. I was just an unattractive 25 year old man with a coffee addiction and a go-no-where love life. Or rather, sex life.

There was silence for a while, and I could accurately feel Lewis’s eyes on me, tracing the lines of my body with a lazy ease. I hated people looking at me. It made me think about what they were thinking, it made me feel... bad. Just a vague sense of bad, it wasn’t strong enough to be stacked into any other category.

“You’re very...odd”

“Thanks” Lewis flat out grinned and leaned forward once more, seeming to become suddenly more engaged within the conversation.

“So, Kris, what do you think of your job?”