If Tom had to admit one thing, it would be that despite the guilt & existential crisis that comes after quitting your job; it’s just too damn good to be able to do nothing on a Tuesday morning while the world outside whirls on. Especially during the Autumn winds.
There he is, enjoying breakfast in a little corner café. Mostly quiet now that everybody either went to work or their classes or wherever else, save for him & a couple on the other end of the shop. He enjoys this place, it’s cosy enough but not suffocating & the smell of baked goods is pretty much heaven to him. Actually, it might just be heaven. Period.
The bell above the café door startles him out of his daydream about croissants & cake. He looks up instinctively & doesn’t seem to be able to look away for a while.
The cause of his disturbance turns out to be a man.. A very good looking man if he’s allowed to say that, fluffy brown hair swept to the side, blue eyes so light they seem to glow in the bit of sun coming from the windows and when he smiles at the barista taking his order Tom feels himself smiling too. He doesn’t know why but there’s something so familiar and warm about it all. Tom watches him walk from the bar & the man settles on the small table next over from him, he sits by the window facing Tom, or probably facing the warmth of the sun.
He drapes his brown jacket over the back of his chair then pulls out a book from his messenger bag and just gets lost in it.
Tom gets lost in him.
For the next ten minutes Tom tries to focus on his tea & the blueberry cheesecake he wasn’t planning on ordering but that man’s face is way too familiar it’s driving him insane.
Where has he seen him before?
He knows it wasn’t here, he would’ve remembered. And it definitely wasn’t at his job, he doesn’t look like the kind of man who would get arrested for anything, Tom thinks.
Then it hits him!
Of course, how could he forget? He had stared at the man then just as he’s doing today but his friends dragged him away to visit another tourist attraction & he never got to ask him what he wanted to ask at the time. What are the odds that he’s here too at the same time?
He’s not gonna let this happen again, he made up his mind.
Tom quickly finished his cheesecake and went up to Julia, the barista, to ask for a tea refill as an excuse to move from his table. Once she tells him she’ll come right up to do it, Tom almost throws away the whole idea to just go back to his chair & not bother the man but then he turns around to find those intense blue eyes looking right at him, looking away after a second too long. So despite his heartbeat ringing in his ears & his palms beginning to sweat, Tom smiles and moves towards him anyway as if being pulled by a magnet.
He’s met with those eyes again when he’s standing at the man’s table and Tom manages to get out a small “Hello”
The book is turned closed with a delicate hand as a bookmark, “Hi..”
His voice fits him, he thinks, soft but commanding somehow.
“I’m so sorry to bother you, um, I was just meaning to ask:” he takes a breath, “you wouldn’t have happened to be in Italy this past summer, would you?”
The man looks surprised and a bit confused as if that’s not the question he was expecting, though Tom wouldn’t know what question anyone could expect from a total stranger just suddenly popping up next to them while they’re trying to enjoy some coffee
“I was actually,” he’s smiling slightly, still looking confused, “but I wouldn’t exactly say it was summer yet”
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right, it was more like late May, I saw you in Rome? Forgive me I can’t remember exactly which museum it was but you were sitting there in front of one of the statues, drawing it and I thought it was beautiful.”
Tom doesn’t know he managed to get that out without tripping over his words and can’t get himself to care right now because the man is smiling all the way now, eye crinkles and all, it’s honestly one of the prettiest sights he’s ever seen, museums & cathedrals be damned.
“Thank you, that’s really kind of you to say.. Sorry, I didn’t catc-”
Julia calls for him, breaking the little haze he was in, “Tom, would you like me to bring your cuppa?”
“Right, I’m sorry, I’ll let you enjoy your coffee now”
“Nonsense. Please.. Join me” he’s looking at Tom all sincere and well..
How could he say no to that?
“Alright then!” turning his head to Julia again, realising he’d kept her waiting, “Yes, I’ll have my cuppa here, J. Thank you.” She smiles and rolls her eyes at him but brings his cup freshly filled with his favourite tea so he mutters another thank you as she leaves them.
“I’m Patrick by the way” fuck, he forgot he didn’t even introduce himself
“Oh, sorry. Tom Burgess.” extending his hand for the ma- no, for Patrick with a sheepish smile which he gladly takes and gives a firm handshake.
Tom can’t help but notice how soft & how much smaller Patrick’s hand feels compared to his own before they let go.
“Nice to meet you, Tom Burgess” he puts on a deep posh accent when he says his name which gets them both laughing
“So what do you do? Something that sent you too to Italy?” Patrick asks him once they’ve each had a sip of their drinks
“Oh, god no. I’m not that lucky. I was there on a holiday with some of my mates, but um,” Tom clears his throat, starting to fidget a little. “I used to be a policeman” that earned him raised eyebrows from across the table. “What?”
Patrick immediately blinks & shakes his his slightly as if to shake the expression off his face,
“Nothing! It’s just.. I don’t know, you’re not exactly the image that comes to mind when I think of a copper.. You’re not like the ones I’ve had the pleasure to meet anyway”
The way he says that last sentence lets Tom know exactly what kind of policeman Patrick has probably met in the past, he knows it too well. Patrick pulls him back from his thoughts
“But you said ‘used to be’? Did something happen?” he seems to think better of it and continues: “you don’t have to tell me anything of course, I’m just curious.” and he does look genuinely interested to hear whatever Tom will tell him. But he can’t talk about it without so many emotions rising to the surface. Some he understands, others he doesn’t.
“Maybe another time. How about you though?” trying to divert the conversation away from himself, almost sighing in relief when Patrick’s expression turns to one of excitement “I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say you’re an artist?” The gorgeous laugh he gets in return is worth the silly joke, ten times over.
“Oh god, what possibly gave it away?” They giggle together like children. Patrick stretches on his answer a bit more seriously, “art is basically my entire life, in all of its forms really. Be it painting, literature, music, film. All of it is just magic.” The glint in his makes Tom hang on to each word like a lifeline. “While it would be amazing to be an artist as my full time occupation, unfortunately that’s quite difficult to achieve right now. So I went and found the next best thing: get a job at the museum”
“So you get to be surrounded by what you love all day”
“Exactly right” and Tom is sure he imagined the softness that took over Patrick’s face when he said that, he pushes the thought away.
“What’s it like?”
“Hmm?”
“Your job, what do you usually do, say, in a day or a week?”
“Well, I’m a curator of paintings, which means I get to work with a team to research masterpieces of the world, putting on presentations when we’re done and helping with exhibits as well. There’s more to it but I don’t want to bore you, god knows I’d go on forever.”
Tom opens his mouth to argue but doesn’t, instead he asks another question:
“And what about your own art? What do you like to draw most?”
Patrick looks off the window, really thinking about it. His fingers drumming on top of his book, long forgotten since they said hello. And Tom is once again stunned by his beauty, he doesn’t understand how a person can look so much like a living piece of the art he admires so much.
He feels his heartbeat through his ribs again. Breathe.
“Hmm.. I’ll have to say pencil drawing, mostly. Studies of ordinary people. A tram conductor, a barman." He fixes Tom with a look over, then continues: “You'd make a perfect subject.”
“Me? I’ve never been asked to model before.” he can feel the heat in his cheeks but Patrick’s eyes don’t leave him.
“There’s nothing to it.”
“But I wouldn’t mind learning more about paintings. Art, I mean.” and he means it, just the way Patrick talked about it all makes him want to go straight to the library or the museum and experience art this way.
“That’s admirable.”
“Is it? Why?”
“Because a man should always try to improve himself.”
He matches Patrick’s sweet smile, if only because he doesn’t know what to say and he’s not entirely sure why his stomach’s been doing acrobatics throughout this whole conversation. He hadn't felt like this before, not even with his ex-girlfriend really.
The phone vibrating on the table breaks the moment too soon. It’s Patrick’s.
“Bloody hell” he looks back at Tom apologetically.
“Alright?”
“All good. Looks like we lost track of time though, god I didn’t notice” he seems to be saying it mostly to himself. “I’m afraid I must get going, duty calls.” Tom watches as he motions for Julia to get the bill & immediately insists he gets it. Man or not, his mum raised him to be a gentleman.
Patrick firmly shakes his head once. “Absolutely not!” upon noticing the small pout on Tom’s face, he just smiles, pulling his bag strap on his shoulder. “You can pay next time, promise.”
Tom pretends he’s not affected by the implication of that sentence. “Fine, I’ll take the win where I can”
“Here, let me give you my number so we can see about that portrait.”
Tom gives him his phone to type in the number and seriously wonders if he’d caught a fever from all the heat he feels in his body in late October of all things.
“There, now you can text me anytime.”
They say their goodbye and the bell signals Patrick’s departure, no longer a mystery man.
Tom goes to say goodbye to Julia before he leaves for the day as well but of course she doesn’t let him off that easily.
“So, when are you seeing him again?” unbelievable!
“How could you even know I’d see him again?”
“Darling, you held up my table for almost an hour talking about god knows what and barely even noticed when I came to refill your drinks. You’re seeing him again.”
He doesn’t address any of that and instead answers her previous question.
“I might see him soon, he said he wants to draw me.. I’m not sure I see the appeal though”
Julia’s got a smirk on her face when she hears this & he dreads whatever she’ll say next.
“He’s gonna draw you like one of his french boys?”
And there it is.
“My god, you’re insufferable. Also isn’t it like one of your french girls?”
“You love me.” he rolls his eyes at her but still smiling. “And I’m pretty damn sure girls is not exactly his cup of tea, he’s one of us”
She looks right at him when she says the last part & it makes him a bit uncomfortable.
“There’s literally only you, don’t drag me into this” the single raised brow almost intimidates him until Julia’s girlfriend pops her head from behind the pastry counter in clear Scottish objection
“Oi! Where have I gone then?”
They joke together for a couple more minutes before Tom says goodbye for real this time and walks out the door.
“Denial is a river in Egypt” her girlfriend whispers as he leaves and Julia has to put a hand on her mouth before she bursts out laughing.
On the other side, Tom contemplates the whole day whether or not to text his artist.
He finally manages to hit ‘Send’ when he’s in bed after his brain keeps replaying Patrick’s promise of a “next time” every time he tries to close his eyes.
And if that night he dreams about certain blue eyes, delicate hands and a firm, soft spoken voice.. Well, nobody needs to know.