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Posted by Robin on November 5, 2009 23:15 in short stories, feedback (4)
Coffee
"Oh my..." Jerry said softly, with a cooing quality embedded deeply in his voice, showing approval. He held the cup with both hands and with loving care sniffed the fumes coming from it. "Oh... my..." he repeated after a meaningful and well-practiced pause.
You see, Jerry loves coffee. And not in the general sense. One could quite factually state that Jerry's interest in coffee borders on an obsession. A very persistent one at that, as he's been a coffee aficionado for far too many of his years. He has a specific flavour for what day of the week it is, one for every holiday and a very special blend only to be used on his birthday. Where a typical rich American housewife would have a walk-in closet for her supply of shoes, enough to allow half of Africa to walk comfortably, Jerry's walk-in closet is filled with an almost limitless variety of coffee. Which, by the way, would be enough to wake half of Africa during a week's worth of mornings.
Some of the coffee in there is bog standard, some are mildly exotic and then there's the wildly exotic and rare (and not to mention far too expensive and in some cases, disgusting). One of his favourites, his birthday coffee to be precise, is Civet coffee, which is coffee ground from berries that have been eaten and subsequently passed through the digestive tract of Civets, weird little mammals who look like what would result from a cat making love to a very ugly raccoon. Bloody expensive stuff, and the process by which it is produced by itself limits its consumption to a handful who are willing to drink what effectively boils down to mammalian poop java. Jerry is among that handful, and he's okay with that.
It's his love, after all.
Today was a special day for Jerry, though. Instead of going to one of many places he frequented for a good cup of coffee, he had recently found out that a new coffee house had opened near his residence. Intrigued by the possibility of perhaps finding a new blend, a new and undiscovered flavour, or simply a better version of what he's had elsewhere, he couldn't resist popping in as soon as he found himself able to.
Leisurely perusing the menu, he had noticed a blend he didn't recognize. Seemingly it was coffee from the Himalaya region, grown at high altitude. Upon reading this, his mouth started watering, and he signaled one of the waitresses, who, upon closer inspection, was without a shred of a doubt, his type.
"I'd like the Tibetan Highland blend, please. Make it large." he said sweetly to the black-haired girl.
"One Himalayan coffee coming right up," she said pleasantly.
Watching her as she walked towards, and then went behind, the counter, he wordlessly voiced a blessing for this day. A new flavour, a new coffee house, and on top of that, an attractive girl who he was bent on flirting with until she'd go out with him.
When the black-haired girl returned with a cup of coffee, he waited until she had put it down and asked him whether there was anything else he wanted before asking her whether he could interest her in a break, to be spent with him. You can say a lot about Jerry, though mostly about his obsession, but if there's one thing everyone who knows him will tell you, it's that Jerry goes for what he wants.
"Uhm..." she started while a blush started forming on her cheeks, "I'll have to ask my supervisor if it's okay, but if it is, sure. I'll be right back." And she turned to ask her supervisor.
Jerry chuckled and took a careful sip of his fresh coffee.
"Oh my..." Jerry said softly, with a cooing quality embedded deeply in his voice, showing approval. He held the cup with both hands and with loving care sniffed the fumes coming from it. "Oh... my..." he repeated after a meaningful and well-practiced pause.
After a few minutes the girl returned without her Java House apron, of which Jerry had decided before entering that it had the worst logo he'd ever seen for a coffee house, and sat down next to him. After some pleasantries, their conversation turned somewhat more informative and personal, and both Jerry and the coffee girl seemed to be enjoying where the conversation had taken them.
As they continued their talk, Jerry learned that the girl's name was Rebecca, that she was a philosophy major at the local state university, that she was only two years younger than he was and that she enjoyed long walks on the beach and hot baths. He also learned that black wasn't her natural hair colour but she refused to tell him what colour it should have been. This annoyed Jerry slightly, but he then decided that he liked black hair and stopped thinking about it.
Rebecca, in turn, learned that he went by the name of Jerry, was currently enrolled at a nearby college where he studied psychology, that he had an intense but entirely wholesome and far from obsessive interest in coffee, was therefore not only a connoisseur but also a purist when it comes to coffee, and that he also enjoyed long walks on the beach (but preferably not too long). She didn't learn much about his hair colour as there wasn't much to comment about. It was of no importance and had always been of no importance. Jerry was fairly sure it would remain of no importance in the near future and had therefore chosen to not comment on it. Rebecca, on the other hand, simply hadn't asked.
"Excuse me," Rebecca said, "I'm going to get a cup of coffee as well. I'll be right back." She stood up and walked towards the counter once more. Jerry allowed his eyes to wander and they were quite thankful that he did. While she walked towards the counter, her thoughts went something like the following: "He seems like a sweet guy, not bad looking at all, socially comfortable and honest." Unrelated, one single, unattached thought went "Ooh, I forgot to buy maxi pads earlier. Bugger, I'll have to get them when I go home tonight." Then her thoughts returned to Jerry and a slight smile formed on her face which she tried to hide from him or anyone else in the shop.
Jerry, in the meantime, sat with his eyes closed, enjoying as honestly as he possibly could the smell and flavour of this Himalayan heaven delight. He decided that he would come here more often. Not just because of this amazing cup of coffee, nor solely due to the atmosphere of the place, but specifically because of Rebecca. He wasn't sure, though, whether to include the horrible company logo in his reasoning.
Today was a good day, he decided before taking another careful, savouring sip.
Rebecca returned with a cup of coffee she could call her own and sat down again. "I got the same as you got, I got curious after seeing you drink it with such enthusiasm." she said charmingly. She put her cup down and subtly coughed a soft, cute cough. Jerry decided he liked soft, cute coughs.
"So, tell me about that trip to Norway you were talking about before I got my drink." She smiled at him, showing that she was going to listen intently to his every word. This pleased Jerry, and he took a sip of his coffee before speaking.
"Well, a friend of mine..." he started, but then fell silent. His jaw dropped, his eyes opened wide and a vein started to pulsate dangerously on his forehead.
Rebecca didn't notice, as she wasn't currently looking at him. She was too busy putting milk in her coffee, some sugar and a spoon. She swirled it all around and when she was pleased with the result, she looked up where she found Jerry's eyes staring at her with anger and confusion, and time suddenly ground to a standstill. Well, maybe not a standstill, but it wasn't going very fast either.
"Is he having a stroke?" she thought to herself. "Perhaps he's allergic to coffee?" she thought after that, but then concluded that she was being silly on account of her suddenly remembering that he had mentioned that he was a coffee aficionado, implying that he drank a lot of it. Additionally, she decided, it was stupid to even think he might be allergic to coffee, because let's be honest, who the hell's allergic to coffee?
The reason Rebecca had time to think about all this is simple – Jerry's brain was trying to comprehend what had just happened. It had trouble doing so, since it was rigid in its thinking and not very complex. Or trained. Or, for that matter, very well-developed. Think of a train with only one cart, but the cart is really big. Suddenly there's a tunnel, and the cart won't fit through. Instead of backtracking and figuring out a different route to its goal, like any other mind would do, Jerry's mind was already halfway through forcing its way through the tunnel violently, ripping the cart apart and damaging the tunnel's interior in a terrible way.
And suddenly the little train with the now immensely damaged cart darted back to speed, the tunnel left ravaged in the distance and Jerry's jaw closed with a snapping sound.
"What is wrong with you, woman?!" he screamed at the top of his lungs as he darted to his feet, bumping into the table and causing his own coffee to spill. Jerry looked at his coffee, his jaw gaping again. This time, however, the cart was smaller due to the damage to its structural integrity, and it flew through the new tunnel this situation had thrown at his mind.
"Look what you made me do!" he screamed even louder and tried to catch the coffee dripping down the side of the table with his hands.
Rebecca simply sat there, as it was her turn to look in amazement as this funny, entertaining and not bad looking at all fellow was flipping his wig completely.
"First you put MILK in your COFFEE, and now you make me spill MINE?" he yelled louder than Rebecca thought a human vocal chord could go without bursting. She saw that there was spittle dripping from the sides of his mouth. She also noticed that her purse was not within reach, which was a shame since she kept her pepper spray in there, which might come in handy quite soon.
"AARGH!" Jerry shouted as he angrily grabbed his coat and stomped outside. He started to cross the road but hadn't looked around very carefully, and a car screeched to a halt inches from his kneecaps. Jerry screamed at the driver to look more carefully, that drivers like him were why there were so many accidents, and that he had no right to intrude on Jerry's right to walk safely. After this, he jumped on the car bonnet and ripped off his shirt, shouting loudly that whoever wanted to take him on could "fucking well try", but they shouldn't expect to beat him since he was "king of the fucking world, bitches!"
Rebecca's supervisor came up to her to ask what had just happened, but Rebecca was at a loss for words. By the time the driver had gotten out to pull Jerry off, resulting in a foot planted right in his face, police had arrived to help the driver, now with blood streaming from his nose, pull this crazy off of his car. Screaming all the while, profanities and otherwise, Jerry ended up being body-slammed into the ground with two police officers, knee-first, residing on his bare back.
"Drink something, dear, you look really pale..." Rebecca's supervisor said to her.
Rebecca, shaking, looked at her coffee, picked it up, took a sip and noticed something on the floor. It seemed that in Jerry's frantic departure, his wallet had fallen out of his coat. She picked it up and opened it.
Stuffing the cash in her pocket, she got up and threw the wallet, now devoid of money, in the lost and found bin.
"Don't mess with a barista." She said defiantly and told her supervisor that she was going home. It was no problem.
A new story will be published next week, so check back! Thanks for reading this far!
| Jasper Coucke | |
 07/11/2009 | Huh, that was an unexpected twist... =) Quite funny, the other stories had me lulled in a false sense of security and I was expecting a happy end for this one as well. (Well, a different happy end at least. ;)) |
| roos | |
09/11/2009 | nice :D |
| Jaron | |
12/11/2009 | Heh. This has always been one of my favorites of yours. |
| v | |
24/11/2009 | good story. one thing - as far as your spelling is concerned, stick to american english or british english. |
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