18. Release The Professional Birthday Celebrant #2
“What? No!” She couldn’t possibly know that it was almost his birthday, and he certainly didn’t expect a gift. He knew what her budget looked like because it was the same as his; luckily the thrift stores in Eugene and Portland were adequate for their shopping needs.
By now, Lily was grinning at something over his shoulder.
Jonathan turned.
Lily had been grinning at someone, and his name was Connor.
He wore a backwards baseball cap, a gray T-shirt from the band Glitterfox that would be acceptable if he hadn’t ripped out the arms, and black shorts.
He carried a cardboard tray filled with paper coffee cups in one hand, and a plastic container of something that looked suspiciously like cookies tucked against his body.
“Thought you might be, I don’t know, grumpy? Maybe you’d like something from the Connor delivery service?”
Jonathan stared at the four drinks.
“This one is an Americano with a dash of cream,” Connor tapped the lid closest to Jonathan. “And this one is a nonfat latte. These are a few chocolate chip cookies I baked for the break room.” He put the container on the counter. “Nothing significant. Not a special day. Yet.”
Menacing? For a birthday?
“Stop,” Jonathan whispered. “She’ll know something is going on. She’ll ask me.”
“I should take them back?”
“Not if you wish to live.” He’d already pulled the plastic container closer.
It was a tiny bit warm, as if Connor hadn’t even let the cookies fully cool before packaging them.
He would not moan here, at least not at the desk, but Connor always sprinkled flaky French sea salt on top of his hand-chopped chocolate chunk cookies, and Jonathan was definitely low on his flaky sea salt quota today.
If he was going to have a cookie, he might as well have a vat of milk, that’s what the picture books told him, so he wiggled one of the latte cups from the tray. He sensed his traitorous co-worker approaching even before Connor grinned and said, “How do you do, fellow librarian?”
Jonathan covered his face with his empty hand. “Connor, this is Lily, my evil conscience and support group hater. Lily, this is Connor, my walking, talking, middle-aged meme user.”
“We’ve met. You introduced us at Pride,” Lily said.
He’d forgotten. “I know, but I wanted to insult you both and it was the most efficient way.”
“Lily, would you like a latte? I wouldn’t take the Americano, in case Jonathan needs another dose. But these two are unclaimed.”
Before Lily could fawn on Connor enough to justify her free coffee, Boss Becca also arrived. Jonathan had to make more introductions, although this round involved fewer editorial comments.
“I remember you. A Lee Child and the Cat Sebastian New York City romance, which you came to the Children’s Services desk to borrow.” Boss Becca looked between them. “You fixed things?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Connor nudged the drink tray’s last remaining latte in her direction. “It’s a two-percent split shot. I was trying for the middle ground. Didn’t know what you might like.”
Jonathan watched her mouth soften and then she reached for the tray and his cookie container. “Shall I take those to the breakroom.”
Per her usual style, it wasn’t a question. Get back to work sooner rather than later was implied by the firm emphasis on the I and the look she gave Lily, who promptly headed for the supply closet to look for copier paper.
Neither of them spoke until Becca and Lily were out of listening range.
“Circling back to the topic we discussed this morning. Have you told Lily about tomorrow?”
Jonathan slumped. “I have not.”
“Do it.”
“I will not.”
“Then I’ll have to.” Connor’s voice had deepened, and he sounded mildly threatening. Over a birthday. Jonathan’s birthday.
“It’s no big deal.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.” Extraordinarily, Connor’s expression had edged into Russian coach territory, as if birthdays brought out a wildly controlling side of a man Jonathan usually found to be easy-going.
Connor left quickly enough that neither Lily nor Boss Becca had re-emerged, and the remainder of the day passed uneventfully.
There was only one sanitation emergency in the men’s restroom that he had to address, which was a cheerfully low number for a Wednesday, although not as low as Sunday when he didn’t work.
That evening he and Connor took Ribby for a short hike in the gap between work and dinner, and Jonathan learned how to put protective booties on dog feet, because it was totally normal that Connor had a high maintenance dog.
The man clearly excelled at caring for needy companions of all numbers of legs.
Then they stopped at a pub with a large outdoor patio that Jonathan had wanted to try, but not alone, before they went back to Connor’s house. There were times Connor might have been inquiring about returning to Jonathan’s apartment, for a change or maybe for a next-step thing, but he ignored that.
If Connor saw his place, so small and filled with used furniture and silly decorations and too many clothes, he’d know Jonathan wasn’t remotely his equal.
His brain recognized that he was stalling.
For the whole better-person-better-life experiment to succeed, for this to become the version of more that his brain and his stomach told him could be possible, he was going to have to invite Connor all the way in.
But Connor and Ribby were a package, and neither his apartment nor his possessions were dog-friendly.
They were his, after all, and he wasn’t particularly dog-friendly.
In short, nothing was unusual about Wednesday except maybe for Connor’s insistence on paying attention to Jonathan’s upcoming birthday and having a very stern expression whenever Jonathan balked.
It was such an intriguing reversal that Jonathan balked more, and Connor got sterner, and a very different cycle ensued that worked out for everyone. Twice.
Wednesday had started like crap and ended very well indeed.
Thursday, the day of Jonathan’s actual birthday, started with a bowl of raspberries picked in Connor’s yard, mounds of softly peaked whipping cream, and homemade scones that steamed when Jonathan cut them open.
Then it went to hell thirty minutes before morning story time.
First, a woman and a boy wearing a Lego Darth Vader shirt approached the desk where Jonathan was emptying and scanning the overnight drop-box contents. If Jonathan brought his professional knowledge to the assessment, the kid was approximately five years old.
“Are you ready?” the adult asked.
Jonathan smiled, and nodded encouragingly, and the boy took a deep breath. “Why did you invite a muchroom to your party?”
“I don’t know. Why did I?” Jonathan shrugged. Better than a knock-knock joke.
“Because he’s a fun guy!”
“That’s great! I like mushrooms. I think the story today is about a walk in the woods, maybe there will be a picture of a mushroom.” He felt zero guilt about making a promise on Lily’s behalf.
He hadn’t scanned in more than four books when another woman and child, this one a girl, came up. The girl was grinning and clutching a toy rabbit with long, floppy ears. “Are you Librarian Jona-THAN?”
“Yes, I am.” He pulled out a sticker and offered it to her. “How may I help you?”
“I have a JOKE.” That last word came out very loudly. “For YOU.”
“I’d enjoy that.” He smiled and ignored the first suspicions that made him want to look over his shoulder to check for Connor.
These children were too young to be Connor’s students, and he recognized several of them as library regulars, so this wasn’t a Connor production. It was just two jokes in a row.
“What did teddy bear say to the CAKE, I mean, when mommy offered him CAKE?”
“I don’t know, what did the teddy bear say?”
“No thank you, I’m STUFFED.” She burst into laughter and honestly, it was cute.
The jokes continued, so many kids here for story time with a joke to lob at him like one of those slimy tennis balls Connor threw for Ribby, and each one worse than the previous until he felt intoxicated on the terrible punch lines.
When Lily announced the start of story time, Jonathan was laughing at “Happy Birthday to Moo” delivered by a kid wearing tulle wings and a soccer uniform who immediately ran away to flop into the listening circle.
A few adult patrons played along, too. A woman carrying a stack of cozy mysteries cornered him to ask why the skeleton skipped the party, and Jonathan barely refrained from saying because he didn’t want to hear another joke, when the otherwise lovely lady said, “He had no body to go with!” and cackled with glee.
By the end of story time, he was hiding, or rather, shelving, in the holds section. He did have work to do. Another family found him, a woman with a baby on her hip and a boy hopping excitedly like the rabbit in the book Lily had read. “Are you Librarian Jonathan?”
“I am.” Clearly, he was the world’s most patient librarian. Most friendly. Most fun. Also, most bewildered and most suspicious.
“Kaden, what do we say?”
“Happy Burpday!” Then he opened his mouth wide enough to show Jonathan several molars covered in an orange crust which Jonathan, to his horror, recognized as partially masticated cheddar snack crackers.
Whether they had once been goldfish or cheddar bunnies depended on the family’s views of processed food.
The boy belched. Loudly.
It smelled like fermented cheese.
“Kaden! I’m so sorry, so sorry.”
“Oh, I perfectly understand. Don’t worry. Crackers can do that.” He looked at the grinning boy and extended the hardback book he’d been about to shelve. “Young Kaden, Master of the Epic Burp, I would like to make you a Knight of the Illustrious Golden Belch Society. Do you accept this honor?”
He was definitely in the loopy zone and there was no escape.
His gut told him that somehow Connor was behind this.
There better be answers before tonight’s softball game, but until then, he tapped Kaden lightly on his right shoulder with the spine of the book, then his left, and back a third time to his right.