Work Text:
Another day, another dollar—another opportunity for Jess to be just about the worst barista in the world while somehow never getting fired. There had to be a serious lack of applicants for the location she worked at for her not to be exchanged for, if not a younger and shinier model, at least someone that could actually make a flat white without messing up both the texture and temperature of the milk. In fact, Jess struggled to make pretty much any common coffee orders. Something was definitely off with the consistency of her cappuccinos, and despite her best efforts, she’d never learned how to make latte art.
Work had always been a slog, but at this point clocking in felt synonymous with a humiliation ritual. Still she persisted. She turned up every morning, mostly on time, with a smile on her lips and her ponytail swaying excitedly back and forth in step with her as she scurried between the barista machines. Today, however, her blonde hair had been put into twin braids that just about reached her shoulders. She’d agonized for at least ten minutes about what hair ties to use, ultimately deciding on a pink pair adorned with little bunnies. The hair ties came with matching clips, so she’d thrown those on as well for good measure. One could never be too cute.
So far the day had been slow. She’d served coffee to a couple of businessmen in fancy suits—no cream, no sugar—and a young couple on a date had swung by—the girl had gotten a hazelnut chai latte, and the boy a lemonade. She was pretty sure she’d messed up every single one of those orders, somehow. She drummed her fingers against the counter, staring at the door, eagle-eyed as she watched the passersby outside. Her regular should be popping in any time now.
Jess had been told sternly, multiple times, that she was not allowed to flirt with the customers and that she was not to encourage them flirting with her either, under any circumstances. As a rule, she did as she’d been told. Except, of course, when her regular came in and she lost all semblance of control over her own mouth. Because her regular was, not to put too fine a point to it, mindblowingly attractive. This girl, because of course it was a girl, always looked put together. She had silky black hair that shone under the coffee shop lamps, manicured nails, and oozed suaveness.
“Excuse me— Anyone home?”
The voice, curt and clipped, cut through Jess’ daydreaming and she blinked the world back into focus only to be met by her. Emily. Of course Jess knew her name, considering how often she got to write it onto a cup, dotting the I with a heart. Sometimes she’d add a smiley, and once or twice she’d written an excited exclamation. When she’d spelled out “Seize the day!” she’d been rewarded with a raised eyebrow, and at “Looking hot!” Emily had smirked as if she knew something Jess didn’t.
“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry— I was all zoned out!” Jess chirped, voice going up an octave.
“That’s fine. But if you’re back to the world of the living I would like—“
“Your usual? I’ve got it!”
In an instant Jess had whirled away to make Em’s order. She’d memorised it a while back, though when Em had just started frequenting the coffee shop she’d had to write it down. The post-it note with instructions had been stuck to the coffee machine for months now, wrinkled with age and moisture—the text was barely legible, which bravely suggested that it had been readable before (it hadn’t, at least not to anyone other than Jess).
“Right, you remember how to make it now—for the most part. I would’ve been impressed if I didn’t know it took you the better part of three months.” Despite the harshness of Em’s words, she sounded amused rather than annoyed. A smile played at the corners of her lips.
“I’d lose my head if it wasn’t attached to me,” Jess said over her shoulder, repeating a sentiment her mom had echoed many times.
“Well thank god you’re pretty.”
Jess nearly dropped the empty to-go mug, her palms suddenly slippery.
“Right!” She laughed, though it sounded hollow and nervous. “It’s actually encouraged, off the record, to look good at work. Our manager says it brings in more customers, but I don’t know if that’s actually true. It does bring you in though, so I’ll consider it a possibility. Oh, and actually people tip better when I’m wearing some mascara and lipgloss. It’s true, I’ve been keeping track.”
This was what they were good at, what they’d turned into a proper routine; lobbing lukewarm flirtations back and forth whenever Em came into the shop and Jess’ Supervisor wasn’t listening, like two tennis players passing a ball back and forth. Jess’ metaphorical score had never moved past ‘love’. Jess had the shop all to herself today—there was no one around to tell her off if she showed a bit of personality around a customer.
“Is that so? I won’t burst your bubble then,” Em trailed off, batting her ridiculously long lashes.
”Wow. You should be awarded saint status from that alone,” Jess replied, smiling wide. “And if you’ll excuse me for a moment? I have to make this drink, you see, and the girl that ordered it is very particular.”
Em rolled her eyes and made a shooing gesture with her hand, urging Jess to get on with it. Jess got on with it. While the coffee machine gurgled happily, she got the rest of her things in order, like steaming her milk. Em’s go-to order consisted of a cappuccino with three extra shots of espresso to keep it dark and bitter despite the milk. When the coffee was done, Jess got to pouring it into the cup, before carefully adding the steamed milk, making sure the foam on top was perfect. Once the drink was assembled, she quickly scribbled something onto the side of the mug, mind on autopilot, before turning back around. She beamed at Em as she handed it over.
“Here you go—cappuccino with extra espresso, coming right up!”
As she handed it over their fingers brushed up against each other, and Jess practically felt sparks flying. Em must’ve felt it too, because she looked at Jess with something akin to surprise. God, was she pretty—the soft slope of her nose, her warm brown eyes, the softness of her skin…Jess especially liked her full lips, and how they pursed as she brought the cup to her mouth and took a tentative sip. A small crease formed between well plucked eyebrows, but then she pulled back, and gave Jess a small smile.
“Just how I like it,” Em declared with the regal air of a king bestowing benevolence upon a court jester. Then she took a closer look at the cup, eyes widening. “Are you flirting with me?” she asked, raising an eyebrow as she gave Jess an appraising look.
The directness of the question threw Jess for a loop, and she had to steady herself against the counter, holding on for dear life. “I’m not allowed to flirt with the customers,” Jess said, replying with the speed of someone that’d gotten caught doing exactly that.
“That’s not what I asked. Also, I’m asking because you wrote this on my mug,” Em said, angling her cup in such a way that it allowed Jess to read back what she’d written not even a minute ago.
Her own handwriting stared back at her but it wasn’t, as expected, letters—it was numbers. Together they formed Jess’ number, the number that could be used to call her on her mobile.
“Listen,” Em said, before throwing a brief glance at her wristwatch, “I’ve got class pretty soon, but I’d love to ask you out sometime. Also, if you’d want to, we could have a quicky in your break room.”
All of a sudden Jess had been thrown into the deep end, when she’d previously thought she’d been knee-deep in the kiddy pool. Her mouth fell open, drier than a desert, but no words came out. The strong scent of coffee that permeated the air around them, that clung to all of Jess’ clothes, suddenly felt overwhelming. Or maybe it was all caused by the way Em was looking at her; evident interest, biting her lip.
“The lunch rush isn’t going to be here for another half an hour,” Jess finally answered, a little breathless.
—
Jess wasn’t entirely the type of girl to accept a proposal like that—a little crude, very forward—yet somehow she found herself in the staff lounge engaging in a makeout session with Em mere minutes later. The room was hardly more than a cleaning scrub, and they kept knocking into shelves and rickety furniture as they kissed. At least one of Jess’ braids had come undone, probably because Em was wearing the stolen hair tie around her wrist like a hunting trophy.
“I’ve wanted to do this since the first time I saw you,” Em muttered, as she undid Jess’ other braid. She ran slender fingers through Jess' blonde hair, untangling it, tugging on it. “You always keep it up—it’s infuriating.”
“I want it out of my face while I’m working,” Jess explained, pulling down the zipper on Em’s tight jeans and wriggling a hand down in between the denim of Em’s pants and the cotton of her underwear. She curled her fingers, feeling her way to the prize.
Em was, not surprisingly, starting to soak through her panties. Still, it was flattering to know Jess could elicit such a reaction in a girl this cool. She pressed her fingers against Em’s sex, finding just the right spot, before she started moving her fingers in a circular pattern. It must’ve felt good because Em arched her back, pressing her pelvis into Jess’ touch, with a needy whimper.
“Yes, right there—“
Despite her noises, Em’s facial expression was schooled into one of mild exertion with a becoming blush dusting her cheeks. Jess knew that, had the roles been reversed, she wouldn’t have been able to go back to work afterwards, but Em looked like she could’ve walked out at that very moment with no one the wiser.
“So, when are you free for that date? This weekend? I’m off on Saturday,” Jess said, making casual conversation as her hand continued working at making Em come undone.
“Fuck yes— Saturday’s good, want me to pick you up?”
The knowledge of Em possessing a car with a matching drivers license felt unbelievably attractive for some reason—probably because Jess enjoyed being driven around like some high-rolling canine actor with its own limo. To show her appreciation, however nonverbal, she increased the pace of her fingers, adding just a bit more pressure. Em’s skin had taken on a soft sheen of perspiration, though not enough to mess up her makeup. Jess had to remember to ask her for her choice of primer and setting spray.
“Yes, please,” Jess trilled.
She dove back in for a kiss—one of Em’s hands were holding onto her shoulder with a grip that threatened to bruise, while the fingers of the other were nestled close to Jess' scalp, a level of control in the way it allowed Em to move Jess’ head this way and that. They had good chemistry when it came to intimacy, as it turned out—kissing, nibbling, licking, sucking. Jess wondered what they might get up to when neither of them was on the clock, and when utilising a proper bed. As was, Em sat, legs dangling, on a foldable table that strained under her weight. It said more about the table than Em.
“The service here is great. Do you do this for all of your customers?” Em teased, before pulling at Jess’ bottom lip with her teeth.
“God no, can you imagine? Just you, babe,” Jess purred. That must’ve been exactly the sort of comment Em had been fishing for, because she visibly relaxed, and allowed herself to get lost in the pleasure again. “You look so hot like this. I mean, you’re always hot, but now your lips are all puffy and you’re blushing—“
“Shut up,” Em interrupted, pressing their faces together again. Jess couldn’t tell if Em had been embarrassed by the compliments, or whether she didn’t care for that sort of thing. Either way, she wasn’t complaining.
It wasn’t long until the movements of Em's hips turned wavering, and it became clear she was close. Jess, in typical Jess-fashion, leaned in to nip at the side of Em’s neck, careful not to leave a mark. Her arm was beginning to cramp a bit, and her fingers felt stiff, but she wasn't a quitter. Another few back-and-forth movements of her dampened fingers and Em let out a high pitched whine, body tense like a bowstring, before she crumpled into a boneless heap on the table. The table creaked menacingly.
Jess got in a final kiss, this time connecting her lips directly with Em’s, before retracting her hand. A bit of moisture sparkled on the tips of her fingers as she held them up for inspection.
“Kinda wish you were my manager right about now. This might’ve gotten me a promotion.”
It took Em a moment to answer, still gasping to catch her breath, “There’s a career ladder to climb at a place like this?”
“Nope. Still, would’ve been nice with a pay increase,” Jess mused with a sigh. Then her eyes widened in abject horror, her mouth forming a distraught O. “Your coffee! It’ll be cold now—“
“Oh, that? That’s fine.”
“No, no. I have some professional pride, mind you. You gotta let me make you another one, a new one, a better one!”
Em had a twinkle in her eyes that suggested she found the whole situation rather amusing, and the corners of her mouth twitched as if wanting to twist into a smile. Jess responded with a look of suspicion, her gray eyes narrowing.
“What? What’s so funny?” She asked.
“Nothing, it’s just…you’ve never actually learned how to make my order. You give me something completely different each time I come in here—all to say that I don’t really need a new mystery drink, I’ll happily drink my old one. Even if it’s cold.”
Jess, equal parts offended and charmed, gave Em a halfhearted shove, to which Em laughed. It was one of the best sounds Jess had ever heard.
“You said it was just how you liked it! You liar!”
Em raised a finger of objection into the air, “I did no such thing. I said it was just the way I like it, because when you’re the one making it I know I’ll like it.”
It was suddenly Jess’ turn to blush, though she was pretty sure she went beet-red rather than dusty-rose-pink. She had red undertones, which meant she never flushed in a way that would be referred to as pretty. Even on a good day, it just looked like a bad sunburn.
“Oh,” was all she managed to get out, the butterflies in her stomach making her come over all wobbly.
“Yeah, you could say that. So Saturday, when am I picking you up?”