Autumn was creeping in faster than usual.
It was only the end of september and the cold, colorful weather had already filled the city. Taeyeon always loved that about fall - it was cold, unforgiving, yet it painted everything in warm colors, leaves a rusty red and scarves and pumpkins a vivid orange.
Even with all that inspiration, she had been stuck in a rut with her writing for a while now. She had a song due for the next week, yet her mind was somewhere else the entire time. Ripping yet another piece from her notebook, Taeyeon decided it was time for a coffee break. After a few minutes of changing and brushing her long brown hair, she was out the door, headphones in.
There was a coffee shop a couple of blocks away, and she was headed over there. Slow steps allowed her to breathe in the suddenly dry air, it smelled like maple syrup and afternoons spent under covers. There was no rush to this coffee trip, as she would stop every now and then to take pictures with her phone or fiddle with her headphone wires.
Finally arriving, the warm ambience and the strong smell of coffee beans engulfed her, and she allowed herself to smile. Headed to the line, she studied the place. Small, a few tables only. A man sat on one of them, studying something on his laptop and sipping on an espresso. Two other tables were occupied, and she eyed the perfect spot. Away from the windows, next to the heater, with a few magazines on the table. She shifted her gaze towards the menu stamped on the wall, and her eyes met another pair of hazel irises.
It was one of the baristas. With her hair in a braid that rested against her shoulder, she was impossibly pretty. As taeyeon could feel her cheeks reddening, pretty barista girl flashed her a smile. Tae avoided her gaze to cover her own mouth.
Shifting her weight, she went up to the counter. Stumbling, she managed to order herself a pumpkin spice latte. Festive ,she thought. Her name? she stuttered slightly, "T-Taeyeon." On the other side of the coffee bar, pretty barista girl yelled "Jackson! Espresso for Jackson." Taeyeon shivered at the sound of her voice – even that was impossibly pretty.
She paid for her drink, mumbled something that sounded like thank you, and slowly scooted over to the bar area.
Her heart was starting to flutter.
Pretty barista girl was fairly quick at preparing her drink. Taeyeon watched carefully in the corner of her eye as her small, dainty hands filled the cup with her latte. The comforting scent of pumpkin spice hit her nostrils and she found herself a little more at ease. Pretty barista girl was making a turn to find the cinnamon and Tae could read her name tag – "Sooyeon," she thought out loud. Huh, she’s pretty and korean. Sooyeon did a 180, cinnamon in hand. "Can I help you?" she asked. Taeyeon stumbled and mumbled and Sooyeon snorted, a small laugh leaving the curve of her lips. Electricity ran through tae’s back, and she settled for a small shake of the head and turned around. I hope the fucking floor eats me right now was the only thing Taeyeon could think.
After a lot of self pity and insults destined to her own self – oh my god why am I so stupid why do I always say things out loud that girl was just working and I distracted her and she was so pretty and why did everytime sooyeon smile I feel like I’m being stabbed and why do I want more, so much more of it? – her name echoed in the small room. “Taeyeon? a pumpkin spice latte for Taeyeon, please.’’ Sooyeon placed her cup on the counter and she felt like puking. She tried holding eye contact but quickly failed. “It’s me. It’s for me, I mean. I’m…I’m Taeyeon.” – way to fucking go, you can’t even look at her in the eyes. – “Well, here you go Taeyeon! Have a nice day.”
She grabbed her drink so hard her knuckles turned white, and sprinted towards her goal spot. Once there, she talked herself through her breathing exercises. One, two, three. One, two, three. Her hands shuffled, looking for her iPod in her back pocket. She checked the time, made sure to remind herself she was real, and she was okay, and locked it.
Now getting her notebook out from her purse, she sighed. You’re okay, you know that. Stop being an idiot. Finally, she began her writing session. Well, kind of. It was hard to even press the pencil onto the paper, her thoughts felt foggy. Autumn vibes, autumn vibes. She needed a song that was both calm and extravagant, just like autumn. After a few minutes of just doodling mindlessly, she gave up and went to the bathroom.
Why did she even come here anyways? All it did was make her anxious from meeting Sooyeon.
After doing her business, she went to wash her hands, and with her hands on the sink countertop, she stared at herself and chuckled. She looked kind of, well, really bad. A lot of sleepless nights forcing herself to create and write, she was running on the 5 cups of coffee she had every day. Her hair was messy, and the bags under her eyes seemed eternal. She was poking at her face with her brows furrowed when the door opened, and Sooyeon walked in.
She laughed. “Sorry. Am I interrupting something?” Taeyeon merely looked away from her. “You’re Taeyeon right? I made you a PSL earlier.” Sooyeon said while washing her hands. “It tasted prett-I mean it tasted nice.” Taeyeon blurted out. “You’re welcome, Taeyeon.” A friendly smile came from the caramel haired one. “I-I have to go, I’m working on something.” Just like that, Taeyeon was off, out the door.
Taeyeon sat down, put on her headphones and focused. For the next few hours, she managed to write a few lines, which was actually pretty weird, considering she was mostly thinking of Sooyeon the whole time. She was getting to the bridge when someone poked her shoulder. Speaking of the devil.
“Hey, we’re closing. I need you to leave, unless you wanna spend the night.” She had changed out of her uniform, and was now wearing ripped jeans and a hoodie. Her hair was also freshly out of the braid, which made it wavy. Taeyeon got up and gathered her things. “I didn’t even notice it was already dark outside, what the hell.”
Taeyeon planned on just leaving, but she couldn’t help but watch the other girl while she closed the shop. She took a few steps and leaned against a building’s wall, intently observing Sooyeon’s details. That felt kind of creepy, and she walked off, mentally cursing herself once more.
Meanwhile, Sooyeon smiled to herself. That was such a cute girl.
Jessica was getting a little impatient with herself. All she wanted was to be a designer, and she was always stuck inside that coffee shop. She was even scared her friends would find out she was working such a lame job, and used her korean name while working.
She sighed. It was 4:30 PM, which meant she would have a couple more hours until she had to rush into university for her classes. Today was going to be a long day.
“Sooyeon!” her co-worker calling her pulled her out of the trance. She had to make a cappuccino. Quickly working around the counter, she found everything and made the drink no problem. She smiled. She knew just who this was for. “Tiffany! Cappuccino for Tiffany.”
“That’s me!” a bright girl with a crescent moon eye-smile appeared and picked up her cup. “I know, Tiff. Don’t need to yell.”
A few minutes later, Jessica took off her apron and made herself an espresso, sitting down across from her friend on a table near the corner of the store. She was the only one from university who knew about her job. “You’re working too much, Jessie.” Tiffany said, while Jessica moved her head around, earning a series of cracks from her neck muscles.
“I need to get my student loans paid, you know that.” Tiffany smiled at her. “Yeah, but I haven’t seen you outside these four walls in like, months. I miss our wine hangouts every week. Besides, what even happens here besides rude customers?” Jessica thought for a few seconds before she found something worthy of telling her best friend. “Oh yeah, this cute girl came in on Monday. She was like, really really cute. Seemed like a writer of some sort. Kind of glued to her notebook the whole time.” Tiffany was already at the edge of her seat. “And did you talk to her?” Jessica sipped on her coffee. “Yeah, kind of. She stayed here until the shop closed and I had to send her home.” Tiffany sighed, way more dramatically than necessary. “And here I was thinking you had finally gotten a date.” “You know I don’t have time for that.” Jessica was pretending to be uninterested, fixing her ponytail, but she was obviously flustered.
“There’s always time for true love, Sica.” Tiffany teased. Jessica laughed so hard she snorted. “I gotta get back to work, it was nice seeing you.” They hugged, and each one went their separate ways. Of course, Tiffany waved her off a million times before officially crossing the street and walking towards her dorm. Jessica was laughing and pretending not to know her the whole time.
When she finally got off, it was 7:30 already. She was late for her first class, and her entire body hurt. She ran as fast as possible to her bus stop, but she didn’t make it. The bus left without her, and it would take about 30 minutes for another one to show up. “Fuck! Oh my god I’m gonna be so late..” She dropped her bag on the floor and took her phone from her pocket, ready to text Tiffany an apology because she obviously wasn’t gonna make it.
“Sooyeon?” she lifted her head in confusion to see a figure wearing heavy winter clothes in front of her. “Taeyeon. F-from the, coffee shop the other day. Ev-everything okay?” Better now that you’re here, she thought, and quickly dismissed. “Yeah, it’s.. I’m okay, just late for Uni. What are you doing here though?” Even though it was dark, Jessica could tell the other was blushing. “Oh.. I was just.. passing through here with my bike.” Only now Sooyeon noticed the bike Taeyeon was holding in place.
“Do you, um, do you want a ride? I could drop you off at your university.” Jessica’s eyes lit up. She really needed the attendance. “Would you do that?” Taeyeon scratched her head. “Sure, I’m just passing by anyways. Hop on.” Jessica took her bag from the floor and placed it on the bike’s basket, and sat behind Taeyeon, who was already in her seat. Jessica wrapped her arms around the others’ waist, and she could feel Taeyeon shivering. She smiled. “R-ready to go?” Tae asked. “Yeah.” Jessica leaned against her, and felt strangely at home.
Taeyeon felt lucky and unlucky at the same time. Was that even possible? God, whatever.
She had been decisive on going back to the coffee shop today. She put on her winter jacket and a beanie, and out the door she was. She had barely gotten any sleep last night, meaning she wanted to get there faster, so she took her bike this time. In a few minutes, she was standing outside the coffee shop. But she couldn’t move.
Her heart felt heavy, her legs were shaking. She knew what was coming. Her panic attacks weren’t happening as often lately, but they still exhausted her. Her head started spinning, and she leaned against a wall. Fuck, breathe. Breathe in, breathe out, remember the exercises your psychologist told you to do, you can do this, it’s alright. Why isn’t it working? I should be calming down by now. I’m such a piece of shit I can barely get myself to stop panicking. Why did I even come here? She felt her stomach growl. She was gonna throw up.
After a few minutes, she wiped her mouth with her hand and finally sat down on the street. She had barfed up her breakfast, her hair was extra messy, she was still dizzy, but she made it through. Panic attacks were the worst. She definitely couldn’t see Sooyeon like this.
Instead, she took her bike and parked it in front of the coffee shop (so she would be forced to come back later), and walked away in silence. She didn’t care where to.
Fast forward to 7 pm. She was back, staring at at Sooyeon through the glass doors of the coffee shop. I am officially the most lame person I have ever met, she thought. Still indecisive, she stood there until 7:20, when she realized they were closing up. Then, she took her bike and went the other way, finally giving up.
That was the unlucky part of this situation. She had a panic attack, recomposed herself but way too late to make the cut and actually talk to Sooyeon. The lucky part came about 10 minutes later, when she was passing by a bus stop.
“Fuck! Oh my god, I’m gonna be so late..” she turned her head towards the familiar voice. “Sooyeon?” she called.
Apparently, the other girl had been running late to her university classes, since they took really long to close up the shop. Taeyeon took all the strength left in her after such an emotionally draining day and managed to blurt out, “Do you, um, do you want a ride? I could drop you off at your university.” She then realized Sooyeon was keeping her eyes so directed at her face that she hadn’t even noticed the bike. The thought made her blush, even more so when Sooyeon’s eyes lit up at the suggestion.
They were now both riding her bike, sharing the small seat. She convinced herself that was the reason why Sooyeon was holding onto her so tightly. Sooyeon studied at the Fashion Institute of Technology, probably design. It was about 15 minutes away, but for Taeyeon, it felt like hours. The other girl’s heat and her arms across her waist were so comforting, so right. The night was chilly, but not too cold. She never wanted it to end.
When they finally arrived, Taeyeon felt a lot better.
Sooyeon, on the other hand, seemed a little nervous. She got off the bike quickly, and opened her purse, getting a small notebook out.
“Thanks so much for the ride. I really can’t thank you enough, so how about I take you out to dinner on Friday? Here’s my number. Call me, yeah?” she handed Taeyeon the piece of paper, and she picked it up with shaky hands.
She couldn’t believe it. “Ah, umm, th-thank you. I’m really looking forward t-to that.” Sooyeon laughed at the other girls’ embarassment. “See you later, Tae!”
After she made sure Sooyeon was inside, she did her own small victory dance, even though everyone was watching. She didn’t care.