Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Faye
Iwake up on my sister’s couch and the first thing I feel is a heavy exhaustion weighing on me—not just from lack of sleep, but from everything.
I’ve been crashing on Willow’s obscenely expensive, yet wildly uncomfortable couch for the past thirty-eight nights. It’s starting to take its toll.
My sister and her husband have been great, but our lives don’t match.
I’m up early every morning to open the coffee shop and they’re up late from all of their lawyering.
Greg comes home from work around midnight every night and he likes to watch Blue Jays games to unwind.
He usually falls asleep in his chair, which means the TV is on all night, which means I keep dreaming of baseball.
Last night I was running around the bases the wrong way.
It’s too early in the morning to decide if that’s a metaphor for the way my life is going.
I think I need a break from my life. I wish I could be someone else, just for one day.
But unfortunately, that’s not how the world works. Every morning I wake up and I’m still Faye, the newly single, twenty-six-year-old coffee shop employee who lives on her sister’s couch.
I quickly get ready and slip out, breathing in Toronto’s crisp morning air as I head to work. Willow’s place is only a ten-minute walk from the shop, which is a nice change. No more buses for me, thank you very much.
I walk along Queen Street West past all the fun restaurants, hip music venues, and trendy art galleries. Everything is so quiet and peaceful in the early morning. The sun is rising, giving the city a warm, hopeful feeling. Anything is possible today.
I breathe that optimism into my bones as I walk, trying to spur myself into a positive mood.
It’s been hard to be positive lately. I moved all of my stuff out of Alex’s apartment three weeks ago. My parents were kind enough to let me leave everything in their garage, and I’ve been living on the bare minimum out of a suitcase at Willow’s.
She’s been so supportive, letting me stay with them even though I know I’m cramping their style, setting up camp in their living room. I think she’s so happy she’ll never have to see Alex again that she’s willing to put up with anything.
Speaking of which. I haven’t spoken to Alex since the move. He’s so stubborn, but I did hope a little that he would fight for me. Even the bare minimum of a fight. Maybe not John Cusack holding a stereo on the front lawn, but maybe a tiny version of that. Something to show that he cares.
But he didn’t. So, it’s truly over.
I don’t even miss him. The longer I am without him, the more I’ve been questioning why I stayed so long.
Why did I say yes when he asked me to marry him?
How could I have possibly thought that was a good idea?
“Good morning,” the elderly Korean man opening the juice bar says with a big smile as I pass. “Good things are going to happen to you today. I can feel it.”
I laugh as I pass him. “You promise? I could use some good things.”
“I promise. The universe promises. The world is yours for the taking. Grab it.”
“Oh, I will,” I say, laughing as I walk backwards. “I’ll grab it by the balls!”
He laughs and gives me two thumbs up. “That’s the spirit!”
I’m smiling as I walk the rest of the way and open the coffee shop like I do every morning. I’m the first one here at six, opening, getting the pastries ready, brewing coffee, stocking the fridges, receiving deliveries—that sort of thing for our opening at seven.
Honey and Isaac roll in at six-thirty, yawning and looking half asleep. I have coffees ready for them, which they greedily slurp down.
“Any luck with the apartment search?” Honey asks as she ties her apron.
“I found a one-bedroom basement apartment with rent that would take ninety-two percent of my income and would only be a ninety-minute commute each way. It sounds bad, but the apartment is famous. I believe it was the set for a Law and Order: Special Victims Unit episode where a single woman got murdered.”
Honey chuckles. “That bleak, huh?”
I let out a long breath as I stock the fridge with milk. “Last night I was watching YouTube videos on how to covertly live in a storage unit.”
“Come live with me,” Isaac says as he takes the chairs off the tables. “There aren’t any rooms left, but you can fit a cot in the upstairs hallway.”
“How many roommates do you have?” Honey asks him.
“Eleven,” he says, “but we’re always looking for more. Three hundred and fifty bucks for a hallway bed.”
I hate that a tiny part of me is considering it.
“She’s not that desperate,” Honey says, laughing as she heads into the back.
I wait until she’s out of earshot and then I lean in and whisper, “Let me know before you give up that hallway spot.”
Fifty years ago, I would have been able to afford a four-bedroom house on my salary, but now I need to have eleven roommates to get by? Wasn’t technology supposed to make things better for people? Where the heck did that go wrong?
“Oh shit,” Honey says, rushing back with a huge grin on her face. “I totally forgot. Look at this!”
She thrusts a magazine into my hands. Madame Gossip.
A close-up of Owen’s beautiful face is staring back at me, those gorgeous blue eyes shining in a way that can only be achieved with Photoshop, or in his case, extraordinary genes.
“Toronto’s most eligible bachelor,” I read.
She laughs as she yanks it from my hands and flips it open to the article. “You have to read it. It’s hilarious. It makes him out to be some romantic Casanova. I knew these magazines were bullshit, but holy shit, this is excessive.”
She thrusts it back into my hands. A smile hits my lips when I see the photo of him standing in front of the Temporary Ink sign, arms crossed, head tilted with a slightly ambiguous look on his face.
I can tell why they chose that photo to open up the article.
That look can be seen as mischievous, even a little sexy, but I know Owen well enough to see the irritation behind it.
The way his eyebrows are furrowed. The pursed lips. The tightness in his shoulders.
I know what he’s thinking: Go away and leave me alone.
Everything is pretty much ready for the opening, and I have about fifteen minutes until we unlock the doors, so I grab a cappuccino and sit down at a table with the magazine, letting Honey and Isaac finish up.
At first I look at the pictures, getting a backstage glimpse into that mysterious man’s life.
I run my fingers over the glossy page, smiling at the sight of Owen in the lab. It’s like spotting a rare animal in its natural habitat.
“Oh man,” I whisper as I read the article with a grimace. There’s no way he said any of this. That woman really took some creative liberties in writing this up.
It says that Owen loves walking through local markets on weekends.
I giggle while imagining that man suffering through a crowded market, someone trying to sell him a thirty dollar loaf of handmade artisanal bread.
He would probably interrogate them about the sterilization process of their kitchen until they asked him to leave.
I read more.
Handwritten notes are underrated.
I smile, wondering if he really said that, although I doubt it. However, I could see Owen leaving his girlfriend handwritten notes. They probably just wouldn’t be very romantic.
Your toothbrush was touching mine again. The average toothbrush can harbor more than one hundred million bacteria. Keep it away from mine!
“Hilarious, right?” Honey says as she comes over. “If he’s the city’s most eligible bachelor then there’s not much hope for us single girls.”
“He’s not so bad,” I say as I look at the photo of him walking down the street. Everyone else is blurred, but Owen is in focus, looking hot in a fitted dark blue suit. He’s looking at something to his left and his face is all sharp, pleasing angles. “He’s just misunderstood.”
“That’s an understatement,” she says with a snort. “He’s like a sheep in wolves’ clothing. You think you’re going on a date with a rich, hot guy and then he ends up interrogating the waiter on the temperature of the margaritas you just ordered.”
“Did Isaac stock the almond milk?” I close the magazine and get up, trying to change the subject.
My protective instincts are firing from listening to Honey bash Owen.
I’m sure he hasn’t had an easy life despite what it looks like on the outside, and I don’t want to get into it with her.
I don’t have the energy to be arguing with a coworker all day.
“Isaac!” Honey hollers. “Did you stock the almond milk?”
“On it!” Isaac shouts from the back.
“Alright, it’s seven,” I say. “Let’s open up.”
I wander over to the shelf of books along the wall while Honey opens the door and flips the sign to OPEN.
This shelf was my idea. Customers take and leave books all the time. It’s like a mini-communal library. I browse the titles wondering which book Owen would choose to read. That man is such a mystery to me and that article on him has only left me with more questions.
“No,” Honey shouts. “No! Out! Get. Out!”
I whip my head around and see her struggling to hold the door closed as Alex pushes his way in.
“I just want to talk to her!”
“Customers only,” she says, pushing her shoulder into the door. “You have to buy something.”
“I’ll buy a coffee,” Alex says, squeezing his arm in.
“And a pastry.”
“Fine,” he says. “Just let me in.”
He pushes the door open and steps in, out of breath. Honey gives him a dirty look and mumbles something about getting him a decaf as she walks behind the counter.
My stomach drops as his eyes meet mine.
“What are you doing here?” I ask bluntly as he walks over. He’s wearing his uniform for the tire repair center and it looks like he hasn’t washed it since I left.
I haven’t seen him in weeks. I was worried seeing him would make me want to take him back, but looking at his face right now is making me glad I left.
He sits down without asking and stares at me. “You took the mattress. I want it back. My back has been on fire from sleeping in the guest bed.”