Page 21

Chapter Seventeen

T he lineup is so long it's literally down the street.

"Yikes on bikes," I say.

People are selfieing in front of Beanevolence. As we approach, the mention alert on my phone becomes a near constant single note. I switch it to silent, and lordy, I do not want to see what kind of photos people take of us as Dav and I squeeze past the crowd to open.

Within an hour of flipping over the sign, Hadi has had to skim the till twice, Min-soo is relegated to just grinding beans and making fresh pots, I've burned my hand on the steaming wand, and we've stopped making baked goods because there’s literally not enough time to get into the back to mix dough.

We're slammed until all the out-of-towners who'd made the journey from all over Upper Canada to check out the business-of-the-week have made like a Hobbit, and have gone back again. By mid-afternoon, our espresso machine is overheating . I didn't think that was possible.

The bean-roaster may be overheating, too; when I head into the kitchen—which is a furnace , why won't he open the back door, the paranoid bastard?—Dav's stripped down to just the tank-top.

Christ on a whole-wheat cracker, he looks tasty.

"Hey handsome," I say while he takes a moment to catch his breath. "You're sweaty."

"I never thought my abs could be sore from fire ," Dav admits.

"I'll kiss 'em better later," I promise and he sends me a sharp, cheerful leer. "What do you want for lunch? Min-soo's doing a run."

"I can—" he starts, wiping his sweaty forehead.

"Nuh-uh, Mr. Martyr. You're taking a break if I have to shove you outside myself."

"Are you accompanying me?" he asks, eyes dropping to my mouth. How can he say so much without saying anything at all?

"Nah, I can't abandon Hadi yet. But she's started looking at resumes."

"That's good." Dav regards the empty space in the corner pensively.

"You can still take up a table every morning." When I tug on the front of his tank top, Dav bends down and lets me have his mouth for a few long, beautiful minutes. Then I push him toward the back door. "Go cool off."

"I'll miss being in the kitchen," Dav admits as he cracks it. The breeze that churns in feels like a blessing, sweet as a kiss. Though Dav's kisses taste more like smoke and char lately, caramelized like a fine scotch.

"It won't stay busy forever. Eventually the novelty will wear off, the roaster will come in, and I'll be able to sneak you back here for other reasons."

"That sounds promising. If not hygienic." He leans against the doorjamb. I reach out to loop my fingers into his belt, slide my hand over the slinky tilt of his hips, lean up for—

"Colin!" Min-soo shouts from the other side of the kitchen door. "Order!"

"Roasted veggie sandwich with salad!" I shout back.

"How vulgar," Dav says, teasingly. He's genuinely annoyed—his manners are so easy to offend—but he doesn't actually care that much. He crosses the room, provides his order in normal tones, and slips a hundred dollar bill into Min-soo’s hand, insisting he pay even though Beanevolence is making more than enough scratch to buy our lunches in return for missing our breaks.

When Min-soo returns, we rotate through who sits out back to eat. I'm just coming back inside when a black woman with wild eyes and a massive grin slams herself against the side of the counter in a skidding slide.

"You cured my allergy," she says, breathlessly. "I drank your coffee and it cured my peanut allergy!" She dances in a gleeful circle, arms thrown wide. The scattering of patrons still in the café all turn to look at her, murmuring and, in one case, recording.

Oh, great . More Internet bullshit.

I'd already read a dozen posts from people claiming they slept better, and they felt healthier after partaking at Beanevolence.

Which was a whole big pile of malarky because yeah, no, as much as coffee was touted as a miracle cure when it was first introduced to Europe a billion years ago, it's still just caffeine-laden bean-infused hot water.

"I did a study and everything." the woman says.

Now that she's not thrashing around in a horrifying victory dance, I recognize her.

She's one of the pharmacology grads interning at the drug mart around the corner. She’s their afternoon coffee-bitch.

"I saw the rumors online and I thought, well, why not try? "

"By risking anaphylaxis?" I ask, horrified. While my food allergy is bad, at least it doesn't make me stop breathing .

"This is crazy," Hadi says, leaning on the counter, intrigued.

"Crazy, but plausible. I've had two cups every day since you changed the formula," the young woman says. "And I've been keeping a blog about it. This morning, I had peanut butter for the first time in my life, and look at me!" She turns in a circle again, braids spinning out.

Dav has frozen just this side of the kitchen door. His face is shuttered, his mouth pinched. Something in my gut lurches. Shit. I think we're in trouble.

"Coffee can't cure allergies." I want it to come out casual and self-assured. Instead it sounds like I'm choking on my own teeth. "Trust me, if they did, I'd already be eating chocolate."

"But you are," Hadi cuts in, straightening. "You had that latte."

"That's not—"

"You see!" the young woman says, pointing to me with a finger like a sword—sharp and dangerous.

"There's other research, too. I shared it with my journal group—" Dav makes a sound like a kitten that's been stomped on, slumping back against the wall.

He's gone so pale, his freckles stand out like gold shavings.

"—and everyone's dying to know what you've done differently.

Can I have a sample of the beans, before and after roasting? "

"No!" Dav shouts, and then slaps his hands over his mouth, mortified at his ill manners. "I, no," he repeats, at a more civilized volume. "You can't."

"What's your name, hon?" Hadi asks the young woman.

"Pedra," she says, taken aback.

"Pedra," Hadi says. "Min-soo is going to get you a cup of whatever you want. Have a seat and I'll come talk this over with you in a bit."

"Sure," Pedra says, cutting her gaze between Hadi and Dav, finally cluing in that the staff of Beanevolence are not as thrilled with her discovery as she is.

"You two," Hadi snarls, turning to us. "Kitchen. Now."

Dav and I march to her orders like two naughty little boys.

Which, you know, we kind of are.

She stomps right over to the fridge and pulls out the box of chocolates that Dav had given me a few nights ago. One of the truffles is gone, but the other one is still nestled in the purple paper grass.

"Eat it," she says, shoving the box under my nose.

"What?" I ask, hands up, don't shoot. "No, I—"

"I will shove it down your throat myself if you don't."

"Now wait a moment, here," Dav cuts in but Hadi puts a hand on his chest, halting him on the spot as he recoils from her unexpected touch.

"Eat. The. Chocolate," Hadi snarls.

I don't have to. That's the thing, we all know it. Hadi won't actually hold me down and force it. But I'm curious, and if it does make me sick then all the weird stuff online will pipe down.

I pop it in my mouth.

Ugh .

It's everything I can do not to spit it back out. It tastes like hours of stomach aches, things exiting my throat in the wrong direction, and blinding headaches.

Also, a bit of raspberry.

"Colin!" Dav yelps. "You stupid man, what are you—"

I swallow. Dav frets and fetches a glass of water for me.

Hadi throws away the packaging. I lean against the fridge, wrap my arms around my stomach, squeeze my eyes shut, and wait.

And wait. And wait. After about five minutes, Dav puts his hand on my shoulder, thumb sweeping over my jugular sweetly.

"Colin?"

"I… I'm fine," I admit slowly. I relax from my anticipatory clench. "I've actually never felt better. Never mind the chocolate, I haven't had a middle-of-the-night anxiety attack in…" I check the tracking app Dr. Chen recommended. "Uh," is the only noise I can make when I figure out the day.

"Uh, what?" Hadi prompts.

"Uh, since Dav started roasting."

"No," Dav says, panic crawling across his face. "That can't be happening."

"Just because a dragon is handling the beans does not make my coffee magic ," Hadi says. "What… the fuck … is going on?"

"This can't happen," Dav says desperately.

"But it is," I say gently. "Did you know?"

"Of course not!" Dav protests, wringing his hands. "No one has ever… how could I possibly...?"

"Tell me the truth," Hadi says. "Because I’m starting to think Pedra's not full of shit. I’m sleeping better, too."

"No." Dav's fingers go to his hair, clenching. He looks like a trapped wildcat, eyes darting as he turns in panicked circles, with nothing to lash out at and nowhere to run.

But Hadi is relentless. "My insomnia is gone . I haven't had heartburn once since you started, and I used to go through a pack of Pepcid a week. Colin had chocolate and didn't get sick. Twice."

Dav looks at me, helpless and pleading.

"I think we should 'fess up. If you want to. It's your secret."

"Explain!" Hadi roars.

"It was meant as a joke, you see," Dav says, wild. "I was only going to do one batch."

"Yeah, but then it was good ," I cut in.

" What have you been doing to my beans?"

Dav checks both the doors are closed before picking up the cauldron of beans he had been preparing before Pedra's shouting pulled him to the front. Hadi opens the chute cap on the manual roaster, but Dav shakes his head, and backs into the corner, as far away from us as he can get.

"What's he doing—" Hadi says, but I interrupt her with a murmured: "Just watch."

My hands are shaky. My heart is kicking hard. I can't seem to get a deep breath. One stupid joke, and suddenly Dav— my Dav, my dragon—is cowering in a corner.

What have I done?