The Barista Is Not Okay

It had been two weeks since the rain.

Two weeks since the café filled up like Noah's ark and strangers huddled together over coffee and banana bread. Two weeks since Abi and Louise barged in soaked and chaotic. Two weeks since everything felt a little louder, a little warmer, a little more alive.

And two whole weeks without a single sighting of that guy.

Not that I was keeping track. But also, yes — I absolutely was.

I didn't see him on my walks to work. Not by the store where he usually bought his black coffee sachets. Not by the basketball court in the afternoons. Not even a wave from a passing tricycle. It was like the island had swallowed him whole.

The worst part? I hadn't realized how used to him I'd gotten.

Not in a dramatic, rom-com montage kind of way. Just… the little things. The weight of his glance from across the counter. The awkward wave when he caught me staring. That quiet nod like we were in on something neither of us could name.

Without him around, the days felt a bit off. Like I was wearing socks that didn't match, still functional, just weirdly incomplete.

The first week was just inconvenient.

My period arrived early. Lucy used all the hot water before I could shower. We ran out of banana bread mid-morning rush. The espresso machine choked on a grind too coarse and made a noise like it was dying of heartbreak.

Even the cat, Purrin, rejected me by sleeping in Lucy's laundry instead of mine. Rude.

By Thursday, I was two missteps away from emotionally combusting. Sleep-deprived, bloated, and working a double shift because Jules had to go to a last-minute family reunion.

"I'm going to turn into a cappuccino and no one will notice," I muttered, refilling the sugar jars.

Abi had texted a half-hearted "you okay?" earlier, followed by a meme of a goat screaming into a microphone. Which, to be fair, was actually pretty accurate.

Even Lucy noticed. She offered me the last piece of fried chicken at dinner without a single sarcastic comment. That's how I knew I looked like a shell of a human. 

But the second week?

That's when things started to fray.

A group project blew up because half my classmates disappeared right before the deadline. I stayed up two nights in a row rewriting the report myself, only to get a barely-passing grade and a snide comment about formatting. I missed two quizzes, one because I forgot, the other because I accidentally slept through it.

At work, Jules caught the flu, which meant double shifts for me. I became the barista, server, cashier, cleaner, and human complaint box. All in one apron.

My back ached. My skin broke out. My hair rebelled. My dreams were just montages of ringing bells and spilled coffee.

By Friday of the second week, I felt like I was running on the emotional version of leftover rice, a bit hard around the edges, clumped together, but still pretending to be edible.

The café was nearly empty. The chairs were scattered with crumbs and forgotten receipts. Outside, the sky was that indecisive shade of gray, like it was choosing between sulking and sobbing.

I stood by the window, forehead pressed to the glass, stirring the last of my watery iced coffee with a plastic straw I'd been chewing on for thirty minutes.

The quiet didn't feel peaceful today.

It felt heavy.

I wasn't sad, exactly.

Just worn.

That kind of tired that doesn't come from one bad day, but from too many in a row. Tired from pretending I wasn't overwhelmed. Tired from holding things together in a way that didn't make noise. Tired from waiting for something to feel better — even if I didn't know what that something was.

I didn't hear the bell.

But I heard the voice.

"You always stare at the window like that?"

I turned.

And there he was.

Standing by the door like the past two weeks hadn't happened. Like his absence hadn't filled every quiet space I'd been tiptoeing around. He was wearing a white shirt with 'PhilIsla Bank 20th Anniversary' printed across the chest — the kind you get for opening a savings account and surviving the heat stroke of their annual fun run. His hair was windblown. His face a little tanned.

He looked like he'd just stepped out of a dream I'd been trying not to have.

I blinked.

He raised a hand, sheepish. "Hey."

My voice took a second to catch up. "Thought you got abducted by the sea."

He gave a small laugh and stepped inside, closing the door behind him. "Almost. Boat engine died halfway to the next island. Got stuck helping my cousin. No signal, no power, just a lot of fish and terrible jokes."

I crossed my arms. "And no way to say you weren't dead?"

He rubbed the back of his neck. "Didn't have your number. Thought about yelling from the next island over, but figured it might scare someone.

I hadn't gotten anything, not that there was anything to get.

But strangely, I wasn't angry anymore.

Something in me — tight for days — started to loosen. Not all at once, but enough to feel it. Enough to breathe.

He stepped closer.

And for the first time in what felt like forever, the air didn't feel so heavy. He didn't say anything magical. He didn't need to.

He was here.

Solid. Real. The kind of presence that didn't ask much, just made space for you to show up exactly as you were.

"Missed your coffee," he said softly.

I raised a brow. "That all you missed?"

He gave me a slow smile.

And somehow, in that quiet, I smiled too.

Because even if I was frizzy-haired, sleep-deprived, and emotionally duct-taped together — he came back. And it felt like the universe had just handed me the smallest lifeline.

For now, that was enough.