Chapter One…
Treating myself to my signature cinnamon latte, I grabbed a mini carrot cake from the pastry case—it was time to celebrate. I had officially been working at Cafélicious for twenty-four months and they had been two of the best years of my life. Who would ever think that I would be slinging coffee grinds as a barista for a career? Not my fellow classmates and, definitely, not my parents… well, my mother and father didn’t actually know where I worked or what I did. They knew I was happy, that I had a roof over my head, and that I didn’t ask them for money. Happy wasn’t even the right word for my status—elated… delighted… maybe even something bigger.
“You can’t get enough of those pastries, evil little buggers for sure,” Vixen, a waitress who mainly worked daytime shifts while her son was in school, interjected as a moan escaped my lips with my first bite.
“Yes, Marzi has turned me into an addict over the last two years.” I licked my lips, making sure I didn’t miss any of the cream cheese frosting decorating the moist cake.
“A little sweetness… sugar… yes please…” Evie, another waitress in charge of our open mic nights, started singing a Maroon Five song and we all laughed. And that right there was another reason that I have loved every minute of my life since I walked through the front door of the café.
What should’ve been a shitty day turned into the complete opposite as I found a table on a back patio where the sun filtered in through wooden slats. The perfect amount of warmth to a cooler early-summer day as I sat drinking my favorite latte and picked at a carrot cake muffin with a delicious topping. Worried about my future after just being escorted from the desk I had occupied for three years to the building’s sidewalk, I was drowning myself with two sweet treats.
Being an analytical, logical creature of habit, I pulled a pen and notebook from my bag and began to make a list. I had obligations and limited savings. The last item wasn’t a wise decision on my part, but I hadn’t anticipated losing my job.
Straight out of college, I stepped into a great paying job with a company I had interned for on every summer break, for a total of five summers. Upon receiving my MBA, they offered me a permanent office space—small… tiny, but not a cubicle. The starting salary and benefits package was what I had worked so hard to secure and achieve. It also kept me from returning to my childhood bedroom once I completed all of my schooling. And within my first year I traded my rent payment for a mortgage on a great condo complete with a bay view.
I was so proud of myself. I had purchased my very own place of residency as an amazing investment for my future. It was close to the beach, walking or biking distance. There were restaurants, schools, shopping, and it was a reasonable commute to downtown San Diego and surrounding industries. Three bedrooms, three baths, a nice size kitchen with high-end, stainless steel appliances, a dining room, and a living room with a wood burning fireplace. One of my favorite elements was glass doors that led out to a balcony that extended the length of my unit and had a plexiglass wall framed with steel for a barrier. The bay scenery was visible from every room in my condo except for the guest bedroom and an additional room I used as a home office. Waking up in my master bedroom was a joy, I could see the bay through glass sliding doors. I was thankful for my existence every day.
Then boom, major layoffs and I was low man on the totem pole, as they say in regards to seniority. It didn’t matter that I had been with them for three years as a dedicated full-time employee and an additional five years part-time—I was expendable even if I was dependable. They didn’t care that I was depending on my job to take care of my living expenses. Not that it made any difference to them, but they would probably assume that I had major savings. That was where I had gone wrong. I never imagined the rug being pulled out from under me.
Sitting in the café on that fateful day in desperate need of a position before my minuscule savings ran out, my pondering was solved. Overhearing a couple of similar looking girls talking about needing a lead barista, my ears perked up.
“I cannot handle the office shit and making the coffee orders… along with running everything else. No more students in charge. They have their studying to worry about, not the inventory,” the one with jet-black haired said.
“Flower, listen to yourself! You need a barista that handles everything up front; managing the coffee makers, resupplying the coffee condiment bar, and keeping track of inventory for you. You should be managing the café on a whole. Meeting and greeting, running the coffee as a backup. You cannot do it all,” the lighter haired one replied.
“Ha!” The one being called Flower poked the other one. “Good one, Marzi. Why don’t you practice what you preach and get some pastry interns to help you more often with baking?”
It was me that halted the possibility of Marzi—who I guessed was the café baker—from retaliating as I inquired about the position of lead barista. A job I had no idea about, but I had managed a few summer interns and I did make myself coffee at home—how hard could it be? I was in business attire, having just come from being let go from my company, so it seemed like the perfect moment for an interview.
On the spot, I filled out just enough prior job experience info on the application so I didn’t seem totally overqualified and then I fibbed a bit saying that I didn’t have a résumé. Then I fielded questions from the owner, Pansie, and her cousin Marzi, the baker. I couldn’t be without a job, not even for one day. I had been steadily employed since I was sixteen years old and I had never been fired or removed from my position… until that day. I was loyal, faithful, and a hard worker. I was also good with my words and that skill, I believe, got me hired on that very day for just over minimum wage.
I hadn’t really thought that offer and acceptance through logically since even with a full-time schedule, I would not be able to afford my condo for long. Refusing to back out of the position, refusing to deplete my savings, and refusing to move back home with my parents, I asked Marzi and Pansie where they found interns. It was obvious I was going to need roommates. I could’ve gotten them through my connections, but I didn’t want to run the risk of having to answer questions about why I was no longer working in the financial market.
So after shaking hands and committing to return in appropriate café apparel; jeans, sneakers and a standard Cafélicious t-shirt, I went home and called around looking for students in need of housing. In luck, I found two students immediately that were planning to attend some colleges in the area and then a recent culinary grad that had a job at a hotel nearby. The two were willing to share a room, but the other one was not and she had her own furniture which worked out perfectly since I had no bed in my office and twin beds in my guest room. My master bedroom also had an unfurnished sitting area so I moved my living room furniture into that space, and we all were set within the month.
Meantime, I had been doing research online about being a barista as well as grasping every element from the other girls working the counter. We did have guys working every so often, but they never seemed to stay very long. Vin, the café’s chef and his assistant were the only constant male employees. Refilling jars, bottles, napkin holders, etcetera and restocking supplies was a breeze—no studying needed for that part of the job. And dealing with customers, I loved that part of the position, it was so much fun. I had never worked a place that involved interacting with customers… socializing with people. I was a numbers girl stuck at a desk all the way back to my first job.
My mother’s parents were boating people that owned fuel docks that sold fishing bait in three different harbors in Southern California. During the summers and weekends I did the bookkeeping for them, tucked away in their cramped office. On my breaks and lunch hours, I wandered around the nearby amusement park and imagined working the ice cream stand. People were always smiling happily when buying cones, smoothies, or frozen bananas dipped in chocolate and covered with nuts and sprinkles. There was the boy factor as well and interacting… flirting with them. I never got to do any of that while calculating profits and losses.
At twenty-nine years old, I was finally having fun working a job I should’ve had as a teen or college student, and loving every minute—I didn’t miss my corporate job at all. And I didn’t really have a reason to, eventually, as I took on the task of doing the café’s bookkeeping and developed a system for her. Hearing her complain one too many times about being disorganized and hating that part of owning her own business, I confessed to having a Master’s degree in Business Administration and volunteered to help her. She said forget helping, take it over, and to name my price. Agreeing to a figure that worked out for both of us, the café kept me busy.
And I was even busier when tax season rolled around—working extra hours as a private tax accountant/consultant. Several of my fellow employees wanted assistance and even a few customers including Vivienne, a beauty engineer and best friend to Pansie, who owns a salon a few doors down from Cafélicious. They all kept my head in the bean counting… or orgasm cookie counting game, according to Marzi who bakes mouthwatering cookies that she has coined with that name. Fun accounting services! A completely different playground than financial banking, but it still had me crunching numbers and figuring out ways to make bookkeeping easier for owners.
Speaking of things being a whole lot easier, meeting men or simply flirting with them was plentiful. Running the counter, I got an eyeful up close and personal along with conversing. There were downsides to it when undesirables wouldn’t take no for an answer, but it never got too bad. Dating customers was not always a great idea either when you no longer wanted to see them. I learned that it was best to be honest at the beginning and make an agreement that if things went terribly wrong, he had to find a new place to get his coffee fix. Then again, I started steering away from dating and just enjoyed the sexual bantering part.
However, not all bantering was as pleasant, namely from a big, gorgeous, asshole, brute, gorgeous… gorgeous man that frequented the café on a pretty steady basis. His verbal skills left something to be desired—rubbing me in the wrong way with his slickness. I was certain that he often tried to push me to the limits and yet I couldn’t stop myself from letting him get under my skin—no matter how hard I tried.
Oh how he infuriated me!
Oh how I wanted to spit right into his cup before placing the lid on it!
But, in the end, it was my better judgement that stopped me along with the fact that I couldn’t afford to lose the job or all of its connections. So I endured Slick—my code word for asshole—to stay working in a place I truly loved, surrounded by people that I adored.