by C. L. Ryder
“Thanks, I’ll find it.”
After working the register for an hour, Jane had Kelly—one of the more experienced barristas there—coach her on latte art technique and then give her a rundown on what she felt were the best roasts they were carrying. She then spent some time chatting up the customers as they came to pick up their orders before going upstairs to space above the coffee shop, which would eventually become the main office for Southern California.
It was still sparse and open, the industrial concrete walls were undecorated and the big hardwood floor space was bare. A triangle of sunlight spilled across the floor from the huge windows, casting a beautiful reflection of light on the wall, and Jane felt a warm rush of excitement build through her body. She remembered when the San Francisco branch had been under construction, and she’d stood in the empty shop and saw a scene much like the one before her now. She’d felt like she was setting out on a great journey into unknown. Would the business fail or succeed?
She smiled. Another six years and where will the company be? New York, Tokyo, London… And in ten years?
Her smile slowly faded. In ten years, she’d be forty-three. Her thoughts suddenly shifted, moving from the future of The Standard to the future of Jane Pumpkin.
Forty-three.
The thought gave her anxiety. She had her success, her business, and more money than she’d ever need for one lifetime… but she had no one to share it with.
She’d had one serious relationship in university, but broke it off after graduation when she started making plans for the business. Since then she’d dated several girls, with nothing ever really going anywhere. She found it hard to maintain relationships; most of the time she just lost interest, and these days she found that many of the women who tried to initiate something with her were more interested in Jane Pumpkin, CEO of The Standard than in Jane Pumpkin, regular girl.
Being forty-three and still single frightened her. Starting a family had always been one of her dreams, but as the years ticked by, she started to feel like it was becoming less likely to happen.
She glanced at her watch—it was already noon. She wanted to take a walk around the neighborhood to get a feel for the other local businesses and to find that coffee shop that Lyle had mentioned. She definitely didn’t want to get caught in a down mood.
Jane headed south down the street, and immediately began to feel her anxiety dissipate. There was no use worrying about something like that right now. It was a beautiful day outside, she was back home, and life was great.
She was interested in experiencing this veteran shop. Of course, she felt a little remorse that her place might be causing difficulties for senior competition, but that was just the way of business. Any places that were experiencing a downturn would’ve gone through it regardless of The Standard being there or not; it was just a matter of time. If the customers weren’t visiting, that only meant a failure to understand their needs, and that was something Jane was an expert at. She almost had a sixth sense about reading the trends, but most of it came from good old-fashioned research and knowledge. This place—if it really had been the place people used to go to for good coffee—would be brimming with experience. She wanted to know how long they’d been in business, and what she could learn from them.
“LeFlorette’s Coffee Shop,” Jane said, reading the painted red sign up above the café’s entrance. The door and front window frames were coated in a faded shade of forest green that gave the place a very quaint and homely appearance, and felt more like something she would’ve expected to see in a New England city. There was a sign in the window that said, “Freshly roasted coffee” and below it another read, “Homemade grilled sandwiches.” Just from the front of the shop, she knew she was going to like it. She turned the brass doorknob and went inside.
“Hi there!” the man behind the counter called out in a cheerful voice. “Good afternoon.”
“’Afternoon,” Jane returned pleasantly as she quickly assessed the interior of the café.
It was small but not cramped, with a row of tables against the left wall and another small cluster on the right with two couches. There was also a bar wall with stools, and two customers—the only ones there besides herself—were engrossed in their cell phones. On one wall, there was a cork board filled with old photographs taken inside the café of people who Jane guessed were regular customers. Also on the walls were a few generic oil paintings of city street scenes, and some other framed black and white photos. Overall, the feeling Jane got from the place was that it was nostalgic and comfortable, but more than a little outdated. She wouldn’t have been surprised if the décor hadn’t been updated since the place had first opened, which she felt had to have been at least two decades ago. It had a very different ambiance from The Standard.
She took in the rich aroma of fresh coffee mingled with the savory scent of toasted bread, grilled onions, roasted meat and other spices, and felt her stomach grumble. She walked to the counter and glanced at the chalkboard menu hanging above the register.
“What can I get you?” the man asked with a bubbly voice.
“Well, I don’t know, I’m not sure,” Jane said. “This is my first time here. What do you recommend?”
“Oh! Well, first of all, welcome. Are you here for lunch, or just for coffee?”
“I’m here for both. Are you the owner?”
“No, I just work here. I’m Jackson,” he smiled. “The owner isn’t in today. I make a kickass latte that I know you’ll love, and our spicy chicken melt will completely blow your mind. It’s our signature sandwich.”
“Okay, Jackson. I’ll take your word for it. I’ll have both.”
She paid for the meal and sat down at one of the bar stools as she watched Jackson’s handiwork. He apparently was the only person working today, because he danced back and forth between the espresso machine and the kitchen, balancing both with practiced expertise. Jane was disappointed that the owner wasn’t in—she was really hoping to have a chance to chat with them.
The coffee tasted excellent and Jackson had done some nice latte art of a rose, but the real prize taker was the spicy chicken melt sandwich. He’d grilled the bread to crispy perfection, and when Jane picked up one triangle half of the sandwich, a decadent line of melted asiago and gruyere cheese stretched between them, threatening to pull out the reddish-orange pulled chicken, tomato and what smelled like a spicy mayo filling. The bread crackled musically as she took a bite, and her eyes widened as the rich flavors of the sandwich exploded through her mouth.
My God, she marveled. This is ridiculously good! She took another eager bite. This is so good, I don’t want it to be over.
“How is it?” Jackson called from behind the counter.
“Ahmahfing,” she said with her mouth full. She’d already planned to come back again to try to catch the owner, but now she knew she’d be back for the sandwiches too. She took another bite, and closed her eyes in absolute bliss.
Wanting to draw in her experience with that little piece of heaven for as long as possible, Jane set the sandwich down, sipped her coffee and took a moment to soak in the atmosphere of the place. She felt a very strong feeling of warm comfort that seemed to radiate from every corner of the café, from the near-kitsch décor to the simple classic deliciousness of the food and coffee. She really liked this place, she decided, and in that moment Jane had completely forgotten that this cozy little mom and pop café was on the verge of being edged out of existence—and it was all because of her.
That evening, Jane stood amongst the stacks of yet to be unpacked moving boxes that cluttered her condo living room, like Godzilla surrounded by the skyscrapers of Tokyo. She’d been so caught up with getting the San Diego office set up that she’d hardly had any time to do anything at home. Everything had been unpacked on a need-to-use basis. She scanned over the labels she’d affixed to each box, looking for her gym gear as her mind turned over her visit to LeFlorette’s.
Back in San Francisco, she’
d of course dealt with plenty of competition, some from shops that’d been there for years, some from other startups trying to make it into the market, and making friendly visits to them all had just been a normal part of her routine as an entrepreneur in the same field. She wanted to see what they were doing wrong and on what areas she could improve with her store, but more importantly she wanted to see what they were doing right. There were lots of quality places that she’d enjoyed, but none of them had made any real impressions in her mind—until today.
She was having trouble pinpointing why LeFlorette’s had stuck with her. After all, she’d been to plenty of places just like it that had never made any lasting impact. All she knew was that that little café had somehow maneuvered its way into her consciousness, into a spot of concern that The Standard had exclusively occupied. She liked the place, and the most difficult thing about it was that she did feel a strange conflict about feeling this way towards a competitor. She knew what would happen to LeFlorette’s in the end, and normally that wouldn’t have affected her one way or the other, but right now she actually felt… bad.
They’re only competition, Jane, she reminded herself. And in this game, there’s only room for one to win. That’s how you were able to get to this point in the first place.
She finally found the cardboard box with the label, “GYM/BOXING” neatly pasted to the front, and separated it from the rest of the pile, pulling out the blue gym bag that held her boxing gloves and other gear. Boxing had always been her main outlet for stress relief, and it’d been far too long since she’d had a go in the ring. She needed it now. Tonight, she’d slam out all the pressure that’d built up on her shoulders over the past couple weeks. She had a technique for eliminating her stress at the gym. She’d always imagine her target—whether it be minutes in the ring, punches to the bag, or reps at the deadlift rack—as one source of stress. With every second, every punch, and every lift survived, she pictured that stress being chipped away. Destroyed by her own willpower.
It had been some time since she’d been to the gym, and she could see the effects on her waist and thighs. She was eager to get in there and bash into stress. There was one target in particular that she’d been taking on for a while now, and no matter how hard she worked herself it always seemed to linger on in her mind.
Time.
Or lack of it. Ever since turning thirty, Jane had felt like she’d boarded a bullet train to the end of the line and the years were rushing past. She didn’t want to pass the station where it’d be too late for anyone to hop on and join her on the journey. It seemed to all be coming so quickly, and her business was all she had.
Would she be satisfied if that were all she had in the end?
Jane passed by her bed, just a mattress on the floor, the unassembled frame standing propped against the wall. She flicked off the light in the living room and shut the front door behind her, plunging the condo into empty darkness except for the orange glow of a streetlight slanting through partially shuttered blinds.
Three
Bethany sat in her car in the gym parking lot, watching the steady flow of people in their workout clothes moving in and out of the building. Truthfully, she didn’t want to be here tonight. It’d been an even slower day than usual at the shop, putting another tick in the downward trend of her daily revenue. Another year of this and she didn’t think she could afford to keep LeFlorette’s open. And that was if things didn’t get worse.
She felt somewhat guilty coming to the gym or doing anything that didn’t involve thinking about her situation, like she didn’t deserve to be doing anything else as long as the business was suffering. It’d taken a major effort to work up the motivation to leave her spreadsheets and remind herself that no matter how hard she stared at them, she wasn’t going to suddenly achieve some revelation on how to get things back to normal.
You could’ve checked out The Standard yesterday. Maybe you would’ve learned something about how to save your fucking business.
She tensed as the thought scathed her, and she drove a palm down onto the steering wheel in frustration. The horn let out a brief report, startling a couple who were passing by the car. Bethany gave them an apologetic wave, and then with a resigned sigh, scooped up her bag from the passenger seat and headed out to the gym.
The clank of iron and light smell of sweat and exertion welcomed her back. Frank spotted her from across the gym and came over to give her a firm clap on the shoulder with a meaty hand.
“Good to see you in, Bethany,” she said.
Bethany gave him a nod of acknowledgement, but her thoughts were floating around somewhere else.
“Let me tell you, I was worried about you,” Frank continued. “Build up too much steam and you’ll pop. Ain’t nothing better than to let it off into somebody, that’s the truth.” Frank grinned and shot out a few mock punches to Bethany’s stomach. “See you in class.” He clapped her on the arm and gave her a friendly wink before strolling off.
Bethany headed to the locker room to change her clothes. Even when she set down to her usual free weight routine, her mind was not entirely there. She hoisted two fifteen pound dumbbells off the rack to start her warmup, but a flurry of thoughts weighed down each pump of the iron. Going harder didn’t help. She exchanged the dumbbells for the squat rack, grunting with exertion as she took on her max weight, but her mind still refused to focus in and empty itself as it usually did when she lifted.
She exhaled sharply, lifted the barbell off the rack, and squatted into her third rep. Her legs burned with the burden of the weight, but she kept her form clean and precise. Her thoughts were distracted, but not enough to get in the way of discipline. That was just not how Bethany operated.
With a sharp clang, she lowered the bar back onto the rack, pulled her towel from where it was hanging and wiped the sweat from her forehead. She glanced at her watch—class would be starting soon.
“Are you still using this?” A voice came from behind her, and Bethany turned around to face a tall, platinum blonde haired man with chiseled muscles and a jaw that looked like it could cut through granite. He flashed a warm smile.
“No,” Bethany said. “Go for it.” She turned to leave.
“You know,” the man called after him. “I don’t want to sound like a creep, but I’ve seen you around here before. I couldn’t help but admire your…” The guy’s eyes made a quick flick up and down Bethany’s body, and he knew at once what he was after. “…technique.”
“Thanks,” Bethany said with a slight smile, and again made her way to leave. Yeah, she knew what blondie wanted… and was entirely uninterested. Bethany still was aloof to the idea of romance. She didn’t have time or energy to spare. Besides, she wasn’t into men.
“What’s your name?” blondie asked, stopping her with a touch on the arm.
Just someone who wants to work out in peace, Bethany thought, ignoring the question. She gave him a nod and a polite smile, and moved to go back to the locker rooms.
“I’m Kevin. You can call me Kev. Or Kevy, Kaykay, whatever you want.” He followed Bethany. “You know, if you need a workout partner, I’m one hundred percent available. I can spot you.”
“Thanks,” Bethany said. “I prefer to work out alone, though.”
“How about this then. How about I get your number, we can meet up for coffee. I know this great new place. The Standard. It’s nearby and—”
Bethany’s eye twitched, with any desire to stay polite and patient sucked away as suddenly as a pile of dust into an industrial vacuum. “Not interested,” she said. The ice in her tone was enough to make blondie take a step back. “Look, I’m here to exercise, not get hit on. Take that shit to a bar if you’re so desperate to meet someone, don’t bother me with it.”
“Well my bad,” Kevin huffed, putting his hands up in a sorry to offend gesture. “You could, you know, appreciate the compliment.” He sauntered off to find someone else more receptive, apparently having never intended to use the squat rack i
n the first place.
“This is why I don’t date,” Bethany muttered under her breath as she briskly strode back to the locker room. She was annoyed, but at least she was now in the mood for some boxing. She opened the locker, pulled out her water bottle and took a long draw from it. She then took out a protein bar from her bag and sat down onto the metal bench in front of the locker to eat it. The sharp click of high heeled shoes sounded on the locker room’s tile flooring, and a slender woman in a tailored dress shirt and slacks took the locker next to Bethany’s.
Bethany found herself watching the woman simply because she found it interesting to see someone wearing such sharp clothing into the gym. The woman had a gym bag slung over her shoulder that seemed as tastefully expensive as her attire, and she slid it off her arm and set it onto the bench beside Bethany. She then opened it, removed a set of workout clothes and shoes, and then unbuttoned her dress shirt, revealing the swell of her breasts. Bethany took another bite of her bar. She wasn’t as entranced as she looked like she was; it was more that her eye was caught and her brain was still distracted with all the usual, and so it might’ve seemed like she was staring. The stranger’s eyes met hers, and she smiled.
