The Break

Sometimes, all someone needs is a break. A break from their job, from their studies, from their family, and even from their friends; sometimes, they are in need of a break from their own lives.

To Landon, a break would be welcomed with thin, but strong open arms; it was essential that he broke free from what weighed him down. It was not that the twenty-one-year-old led a hard and problematic life; quite the contrary, in fact, as he had great marks in university, got well paid in his job at the coffee shop that one of his old teachers had opened, around ten years prior, had friends who would, without a doubt, always be there for him, and a family that supported and loved him like no other. However, three years into his Creative Writing and Drama course at Kingston University, everything was finally catching up to him - the feeling of fatigue from working too hard, and the boredom of leading a life marked by a constant, never changing routine -, making the boy bitter, almost.

Before, he used to wake up with a smile on his face; a content grin that was permanent on his lips as he went on with his normal habits. He would get up from his messy bed, put one of many patterned button-ups that, although being made to cling onto his torso, were still slightly loose and skinny jeans that gave his legs and other parts covered by the material just enough space for the skin to breathe, brush and straighten is bleached blonde hair (that he always ended up covering with one of his beanies), making its fringe fall across his vivid green eyes and barely touching his protuberant cheekbones; after putting on his shoes, he would go about having breakfast in his small, but cozy, apartment, and then leave for school. His day would move forward smoothly, as he would spend his mornings in university, and the afternoons in the neat, homely coffee shop where he worked; afterwards, he would go home and study for two hours straight, make and have dinner, which he'd eat while watching his favourite TV show, call his family, and go to bed. And all through this, every single second of the day, a smile would be filling the scrawny boy's plump pink lips; it would not falter even once, no matter what happened - it was as if it was etched onto his face, painted, or perhaps sculpted, on his lips.

Lately, however, that smile was not there. It started off with it shaking for just a second, but then, as days and weeks passed by, increasingly slower, that smile seemed to lose its power, disappearing, once and for all, after a rather rude costumer at the shop told him he looked like a skeleton, in his rather large work apron. That day, the smile was so used to seeing was replaced with a permanent frown and sad eyes; Landon's lips seemed thinner, and his green orbs reminded those who saw them of slowly dying grass.

The only moments in which the boy's old smile would return was when he was away from the world, slowly drinking a hot black coffee that burned his tongue and throat in the most pleasurable way, warming his insides with its bitterness. He only ever smiled when his short break from his work, at exactly four thirty, every afternoon, took place; he lived for those moments.

Now, however, there was no smile on the coffee shop worker, as about an hour had gone by since he had had the pleasure of feeling free. There were still thirty minutes until his shift at the small coffee shop would end, so Landon was stuck attending to numerous clients' desires, hot beverage after hot beverage, with the ocasional smoothie being on the list. He was currently tending to a rather old woman's order - a special infusion imported from India to that coffee shop, only -, just reaching across the black marble counter to hand the lady her warm cup.

Right behind her, on the queue, there was a really handsome man, Landon noticed. He couldn't be that much older than him, probably two or three years, but his warm blue eyes looked experienced, perhaps due to the small girl that was hoisted up in his defined arms, covering half of the seemingly slightly worked out torso that the worked could see through his tight black t-shirt; before he could stop himself, his eyes moved to the man's barely chapped lips, that were not as plumpy as Landon's, but were not that much thinner, either; they were just in the middle, complimenting his round nose and briefly chubby cheeks - that the brunette child also owned - in a way that made them desirable, for the bleached blonde. Before he could dive into those thoughts, however, he heard a small, girly call, and his eyes diverged from the man with black hair to the girl in his arms, finding her looking at him, her coffee brown eyes curious.

"Why are you so sad?," asked the child, her eyes now wide and innocent as she waited for an answer.

Honestly, Landon did not know how to respond to such question; why was he sad, really? Was it because his life was perfect, but plain? Or was it because as perfect as it could seem, the boy felt tired, as if something was missing?

He was looking slightly bewildered at the small child; how could he reply to her?

"Don't be sad; people are prettier when they smile," she voiced out, wiggling swiftly in the man's arms as she tried to reach Landon's face; for what, he never got the chance to know, as she was never allowed to do as she wished.

"That's enough, Vic," said the man, his voice stern and sweet at the same time; Landon wondered how he managed that. "But my daughter's right; you'd look even prettier if you smiled."

The man's last comment surprises the worker more than his daughter's question, and he can feel his blood starting to run up to his cheeks. Before he is able to blush, however, he scowls a bit under his breath, as he forces himself not to redden; he opts for the defensive mechanism he has built, over these last weeks, and raises a brow at the client.

"I'm here to make your drinks, not to talk about my smile and whatnot," says Landon, in a rather rude manner, before demanding to know their orders. With a frown of his own, the man tells the university student what his daughter and him will have, waiting in silence to get the beverages and then strolling over to the table farthest from the counter, next to a big window that allows them to see what goes on in the street where the coffee shop is located.

It wasn't until his shift is over and Landon is preparing to leave that he paid attention to the two, once again. He was walking towards the door, his black leather jacket in hand so that he could put it on once he got outside, when his eyes flickered to the table they were at, on their own accord. When did so, he happened to catch the girl looking at him, a small smile on her lips as she waved him goodbye, her father too engulfed in observing the outside to notice.

Landon pretended to be unaware of the girl's gesture, continuing on his path to the door, without another glance. When he reached it, though, he faced the little girl, once again, glad to see that her father was still to absorbed in his own world; then, for the firts time in weeks, he let a genuine smile cross his lips, when he wasn't on break - a smile that only that small child got to see, before Landon left the coffee shop, facing the bitter cold air of the outside with a warmness that certainly didn't come from the building behind him.