Page 5 of Naked Coffee Guy

“What do you mean?” I ask. “Like, in the time you’ve been at work, she’s moved all her stuff out?”

“Well, not exactly,” Nina says. “I guess she’s been chipping away at this for the past week and I just haven’t noticed. She says it’s because I’m a slob and always stealing her stuff.” She shrugs, then reaches across me to grab her coffee from under the counter. Of course it has no lid, and it sloshes on the shelf and across the floor. Nina doesn’t notice, though. “I think she was just looking for an excuse to move in with her boyfriend.”

“You think so?” I ask, wiping up the spill. I’m only half in this conversation. The other half of me is thinking about how to insert myself as a prospective roommate. Even though Nina really is a slob. Even though, as I’ve just noticed, she’s wearing the exact same shade of lipstick that I am, which most likely means she went in my purse while I was on break.

Even though Nina is difficult and half the time I don’t like her, and if I live with her, I will be around her—All. The. Time.

“It’s fine, though. Really. I have nowhere to put most of my clothes, and they’re all over my living room while I reorganize my closet. But with Jess gone, I don’t need to reorganize anything because I can just use her room as my closet.”

I snap out of my thoughts and re-enter the conversation, unsure if I heard her correctly.

“Wait. You’re willing to take on Jess’s portion of rent just so you can have a closet? How much did she pay, anyway?”

“$700 a month.”

I widen my eyes. That’s less than what I’m paying now, and just a fraction of what I’ve seen on the market. I’ve been to Nina’s place. It’s a huge, beautiful Victorian, albeit a mess. But there’s room to move in there, even with her shit everywhere.

“How much is it to rent the whole place?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “Nothing. It’s my grandma’s house. I inherited it when she died, and it was fully paid off. I only have to pay property taxes and utilities, and this job and Jess’s rent more than cover that. Well, now, just this job since Jess it out.” She shakes her head. “Regardless, I’ll be fine. But you’re a good friend for worrying.”

Chapter Three

Maren

I never did ask Nina to give up her dream closet in exchange for me living with her. It’s like the old Maren has died, and this new Maren is weak as shit. Seriously, I can’t figure out what’s wrong with me.

Actually, I can—I’m triggered. All of this brings me back to those days I had to survive on the street, all because my parents wouldn’t take me back. When I’d go days at a time without eating. When I’d spend sleepless nights in my car. When the only thing that could take the edge off was a bottle of whiskey I’d swiped from a store and the Xannies in my pocket.

And now I’m here, facing the same situation—but sober—and I can’t for the life of me put myself in a position to asking for help.

Because what if they say no?

I hate that this is even an issue, that something so small is keeping me from asking for help. I just don’t know how to get past it.

I climb the stairs to my apartment, and that’s when I see it. The envelope taped to my door. Looking down the line, I see I’m not the only one. We all have envelopes, and I know exactly what’s in each one.

With shaky fingers, I take the envelope inside and lock the door behind me. I tear into it and pull out the letter, hoping for at least more time. Nope, it’s still thirty days. That asshole Brock must have known about this for a while, and he only told me about it this morning.

Fuck that guy.

I look around the apartment. At my various plants around the room. At the modest couch and the simple kitchen. At how clean everything is and in its place. At my idols looking down at me from the walls.

“I guess it’s really over,” I say to Shirley, Hayley, and Chrissie. My guitar sits in the corner, and I instinctively move toward it so I can partake in a little musical therapy. But inside, there’s this ache that won’t go away, that needs something stronger than guitar strings to carry me through.

Which is why, an hour later, I find myself at Torches, a rooftop bar overlooking the city side of Sunset Bay, a glass of red wine in my hand and a million stars overhead as the ocean crashes in the distance. I see none of it, only the wine.

So far, I haven’t had a sip. I know once I do, I’ll give up seven years of sobriety—years I struggled through to make it to this day. But everything feels so stupid right now. Like, why was any of it worth it if I was just going to lose it all in the end? I’ve had to fight my whole life for everything. Nothing has come easy. I’ve watched kids I went to school with go out and make something of themselves and afford lives beyond anything I could imagine, all while I’m stuck making coffee for the elite masses of Sunset Bay.

My dreams don’t even require much. A simple life funded by my music, with enough money so I can quit my day job. If I hadn’t been kicked out, I would have been happy living in my small apartment forever.

Everything I touch turns to shit, though. I’m still playing the same venues to the same people. I’m still serving up coffee. And in thirty days, I will be living in my car because I can’t ask my best friend to crash on her couch, I can’t go back to my parents, and I can’t ask Nina to give up her closet.

I lift the wine to my lips, the earthy scent traveling straight through my nose. Why I chose wine, I don’t know. It had never been my drink of choice before. This is more Claire’s style, not mine. I guess I didn’t want something I’d go back to again. Tomorrow, I’ll return to sober life. Today? I drink.

But I never get the chance. Someone bumps me from behind and wine sloshes down the front of my shirt. Today, of all days, I’m wearing white instead of my usual black. Now it’s a deep shade of maroon, splattered across me like a gunshot wound.

“Watch it, asshole.” I whip around to tear the offender a new one, but nothing prepares me for the man in front of me. And when I say man, I mean that all my life I’ve been surrounded by boys, and they don’t even come close to the specimen I’m facing. He has long, wavy dark-blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail, deep blue eyes, and his Viking-like beard is trimmed close on the sides and long in the front, reaching to the top of his solid chest. I mean, add some dirt and a few weapons, and he could be sailing off to pillage and plunder.