Page 53 of Of Literature and Lattes
Jeremy waved his card away. “Whatever you like. It’s on me.”
George dropped his eyes to his credit card and carefully placed it back within its sleeve. He looked back to the menu board. “What do you recommend?”
“How about this? You go sit and I’ll bring you something.”
George nodded.
Four minutes later, Jeremy dropped into the chair beside him at the fireplace. He put their white china cups on the small table between them and reached to turn on the fire. “It’s more for the look than anything in the summer.”
“A fire always makes a place homey.” George shifted forward in the deep leather chair to reach for his cup.
Jeremy gestured to it. “I heard you order a cappuccino the other day. Today I used a new bean and gave you just a hint of foam, thinking you might like it the way I do, pretty dry. Let me know what you think.”
George settled back and closed his eyes with his first sip. “Delicious. I’ve always liked coffee. It was rationed in the forties, and when it came back it felt like a great luxury. I was a kid then and didn’t drink, but I watched my dad.” He took another sip. “As soon as he’d let me, it became our ritual. A cup together at our kitchen table every day. Reminds me of him even now.”
“I feel that way about it too. I started working for a coffee shop in my neighborhood when I was fifteen. I think my foster mom thought it’d keep me out of trouble, and it did. I loved that place and I understood the beans.” Jeremy chuckled. “Odd as it sounds, there’s no other way to say it. Smell, touch, taste, when they’d pull dry, when they’d sour; there was an art and chemistry about it, a relationship I understood.” He leaned back. “Says something, doesn’t it? My best relationship was and probably still is with a coffee bean.”
“Ah... Foster care... I have three kids who started out there. Good kids, good adults now. I wish back then they’d had something as simple and as complex as that—a relationship with a bean.”
“They had each other.” At George’s questioning glance, he held up a hand. “I’m sorry. A friend, Alyssa Harrison, was in your son Devon’s high school class. She mentioned him and that he had two siblings.”
“He did back then. Now he’s got five. But you’re right—they started out together, just the three of them against the world. We had some rough early years with that crew.” George chuckled with the memories. “They’re all coming back now. I... I need to call Devon today. He was coming this weekend, but sooner might be better.”
“That’s wonderful.”
Something flickered in George’s eyes as he looked to the fireplace. Jeremy got the impression that the homecoming wasn’t “wonderful” after all. He searched for a new, and lighter, topic.
“Is it really awful without the pillows?”
George chuckled. “Told you about that too, did she?” He waved away Jeremy’s nod. “I was being a grouch that day. I’m finding it hard to let go of stuff these days.” He lifted a shoulder and let it drop. “I’m sorry about what I said your first day open.” He looked around. “It’s a fine-looking place. Not what anybody would expect in poky old Winsome. Kinda puts us on the map, doesn’t it?”
“From what I hear, you did that when you were mayor.”
“Folks are being nice. We have a good community here, always have, and it’s different from all the other towns around Chicago. We’re less of a thoroughfare. I tried to build on that sense of home, of community, especially in town here, so that people didn’t necessarily need to leave to find work. There’s something good and fundamental about living and working in the same community. But things change... We can’t even fill that Chamber of Commerce position. It’s been vacant for almost six months now.”
He looked past Jeremy, who turned to follow his gaze.
Outside the window, two people approached the door. George pushed himself up. “They’ve found me... That’s Bella and Michael, kids five and two, as I call them. I’m surprised it took them this long to get here.”
“Do they want a coffee?”
“No... I’d best get going. Thank you.”
Jeremy stood. “I hope you’ll come back.”
With a nod and a wave, George headed out the door to meet his children outside. Michael swung his arm around his father and Bella looped her arm through George’s on his other side.
The sight froze Jeremy in place. There was nothing “wonderful” about it. It was heartbreaking and evoked a memory he never knew he held. A crack in the wall. Someone once did that to him. He was shorter, younger, but someone swung an arm around him and someone else, on his other side, had tried to tuck him close. And even though he couldn’t recall the exact time or the place, he knew when it had occurred—the day, or soon after, his parents died.
Last night’s glow and that chink in his own memories had sustained him all morning—until now. If he was right, and someone was stealing from him, much more was wrong with his shop than he ever anticipated.
Jeremy looked up from his computer. The numbers were swimming before his eyes, and none of them were good. 10:45. Alyssa wasn’t coming.
Jeremy pushed his way through the swinging door. Something had to be done. Bottom line: over five thousand dollars was missing, his books were a mess, and Ryan’s constant second-guessing and complaining, not to mention the ever-present tension between him and Brendon, was becoming unbearable. It was time for a talk.
Ryan caught his eye from a group of people standing near the front door, and Jeremy motioned toward the office door. But rather than nod and follow, Ryan shook his head as another man stepped between Ryan and Brendon, who seemed to be facing off at the center of the group.
“What the—” Jeremy headed toward the men, noting that every eye in the coffee shop was on them.
