Page 55 of Sorry, We're Closed

I love how my entire body can fit onto one of the bamboo chairs at the café. With my knees hugging to my chest, I find myself staring into my mug of coffee which continues to swirl the fern leaf design into a creamy mess of caffeinated perfection. It’s the first thing I need this morning after a sleepless spiralling session of everything that could happen in my life. While most of it won’t, your mind can betray you into thinking the worst, and then the worst becomes the only option. What’s my worst-case scenario? I’ve never understood what a best-case scenario can be, but it seems Avory Bright could kick either into action.

Gwen’s knocking against the front door causes a shiver to spread across my entire body, forcing my mind to stop in its negative tracks. I untangle my limbs and rise from my chair, grabbing the front keys from my pocket and allowing Gwen not only into the café, but into the close quarters of how tangled my mind has become. I messaged Gwen at roughly two in the morning asking her to come to the café early if she was free, and here she stands, knowing something is wrong and often, she knows my mind better than I do. How we aren’t actual siblings, I’ll never know.

“Honey.”

Gwen is already sliding her slender body into the café before I even open the door fully. She shuts the door behind her and throws her arms around my shoulders, my arms wrapping around her tiny waist as her sweet, rose scented perfume drowns me in comfort and eases my chest. She pulls away as her hands rest on my shoulders, and her eyes follow the outline of my entire being, ending on her dark hazel eyes meeting mine.

“Sweetheart, you look like—”

“Shit?”

“I wasn’t going to say that! I’m sure my foundation can help with those eye bags, though.” Gwen’s light laugh leaves her lips as I signal over to our usual window table, two coffees ready to fuel the most difficult conversation.

Gwen sits and swings her blonde waves over her shoulder as she sips. She’s drinking something similar to Avory’s usual order and it makes my words hitch in my throat, but somehow, Gwen just knows as she reaches for my hand.

“Sawyer, whatever is on your mind right now, I want you tell me. Please tell me anything and everything that you are comfortable with sharing.”

Her thumb rubs circles over the back of my hand, and as I sip my coffee in the hopes that it’ll help the dryness which has appeared in my throat, I speak. I’m croaky and my voice cracks on multiple occasions, but I speak nonetheless, and I tell her everything. From the very beginning. My entire story, and while she has heard most of this before, she still proceeds to listen. Her eyes jump between mine and the road outside to give me time without the attention, and I will forever be grateful for Gwen.

I haven’t stop speaking or crying for an hour. From my father leaving, to mine and my mother’s relationship nowadays, to meeting Avory fucking Bright and the emotion he stirred in my stomach the first time I saw him over that very counter.

That same counter which I’ve stood at every day of my life since I was sixteen-years-old and he’s the first person on the other side of that counter who makes me feel warmth, warmth that makes me realise how cold everything has been for far too long.

Now, that same café may be closing, and it is all I can focus on. These past few years of my life, I have known nothing else, but then Avory suddenly brought colour into my greyscale life with every touch, every word, every look which he gave me, and continues to give me. From the bamboo tables, to sitting on that amp, to kissing him in the rain and every moment since, to every time my fingertips graze his bare skin – I tell Gwen everything. If I lose this café, I lose Avory, and I lose any chance of having a mother.

“And now, for the first time in the entire time that I’ve known him, he read my message and that’s it.”

Gwen’s exhales are long and clearly thinking about her next words.

“Sawyer.”

My eyes meet hers as she lifts my chin with her pastel nails. It feels completely different when Avory does it.

“You are more than this café. You are more than a barista. You are more than Tracey fucking Sombre’s son. You are Sawyer, Sawyer Sombre who clearly has strong feelings for Avory Bright.”

“Gwen, I can’t go anywhere, I can’t see him without this café, I’m not ready to—”

“Sawyer, you don’t need to say goodbye, he’s not going anywhere yet.”

“Exactly! Yet! I am obsessed with every part of him, Gwen. Everything about him has put a shining fucking spotlight on my dark and miserable life which I created by liking men like him, but I couldn’t care less. I want him to bring everything into the light. I want him to make everything so bright it hurts because it hurts so good. One day, he’s going to take that light with him, and then what will I do? Just return to the same life I had before? Instead, I can’t and won’t because she is selling the café. The one chance I had remaining at having a loving family once more is going, and she is going to want nothing to do with me then.”

When did I rise from my seat? When did I begin pacing around with such heavy footsteps that my feet burn? When did my fingers tangle themselves in my curls?

Gwen pushes her seat back and she dashes towards me, her hands pulling my fingers free as she wraps her arms around me again. Her hand strokes my curls from my forehead as the other rubs circles on the small of my back. Again, this feels so different from when Avory does this.

My arms slowly snake their way around Gwen again as she holds me tight, whispering and shushing in my ear. My eyes well up, and there is nothing I can do except let them run.

Streams run down my face and my breath hitches in my throat as I slowly speak again, “Gwen, why did you let me do this? I can’t go back to hiding, but I can’t go back if I don’t hide.”

“Sweetheart, I didn’t let you do anything. I just supported you in what you clearly wanted to do. You wanted Avory, you just weren’t willing to let yourself have him yet.”

“You handed me the poster!”

“Okay, maybe I gave you a push, but you still did this on your own. You made the decision to accept his phone number, to meet him in his studio, to kiss him in the pouring rain, to accept his late visits here. You’ve wanted him the whole time, you just didn’t allow yourself to accept your own feelings.”

Gwen kisses my cheek, my tears lining her lips and her lip gloss marking my skin.

“You should’ve stopped me back then.”

---