☕ 𝙹𝙴𝙵𝙵'𝚂 𝙹𝙾𝙴. — vi & naomie lexie [ closed starter 4 @cag3dfate ]
Waiting was the hard part. Without the softening agent of alcohol present to convert her surroundings into a maddeningly vivid kaleidoscope of slosh, Vi held a modicum of composure greater than the night before. Remembering her self-initiated appointment with Lexie had only been a recallable fact due to the smear of ink she’d awoken to on her chin, which she eventually deduced had been cradled against her hand during a 3 hour half-committed sleep in the early hours of the morning. She found the main scrap of evidence branded on her palm in blue pen: LEX @ JOE 12P. Underlined and retraced at least thrice, her stomach had clenched with nausea as memories of the club came flooding in. The bar, the approach, the stars, the room, the breath, the invitation, the escort: consequent barhopping, pertinaciously devoted to chugging liquor in an effort to erase body heat with liquid heat. A heat she could handle swallowing, flinch and all. A freshly sober mind exacerbated the fragments still palpable, forming an unreachable itch of guilt that she could not scratch alone.
At the whims of an early bus schedule insistent on damning her agitation further, Vi arrives at Joe’s 45 minutes earlier than agreed upon – or was announced a better term? Could she even call it a plan, if she’d been the sole springer of the news? Met a question with another question, used a date to punctuate sidestepping the sticky strings of opportunity that ended in fingertips on flesh beyond her own, tripping to the exit with hands caught soaked with red all the same. In the aftermath, the charge driving her erratic pulse had not been numbed. Though her mind was clearer, each irresponsible feeling attached to every reflective thought simply served to reengage the nauseating churn dug out behind her ribcage. In the sunshine flooding through the cafe windows, there would be no follow through, no grand gesture, no backpedalling. Only thoroughly rehearsed apologies and a new roster of subjects to pussyfoot around would suffice. A hope – sore with the amount Vi had retraced, prodded raw, and re-opened the wound – Lexie would forget her hesitance as the preemptive misgiving it was. It was presumptuous to assume the other woman would (could) understand, in a uniquely customer-inundated way, but Vi liked to think she must have had clients with similar grocery lists. Services with similar parts. Dirty laundry that needed folding, not washing. Vi’s head spun in circles as she mechanically situated herself at a corner table with two chairs. She began facing the entryway, but the anticipation had proven too insufferable. Instead, she pivoted her chair to sit in-profile to the front of the cafe, just enough so she’d catch any direct approach in her peripherals yet enough of a strategic angle to not tempt any prolonged staring at the door.
In the five minutes following, she thought it best to order them four drinks each: coffee, herbal tea, orange juice, and cranberry juice. Unwilling to assume, with no indication or familiarity as to whether Lexie held a coffee or tea preference, forgoed caffeine, preferred vitamin water, or could benefit from more fighters on her personal UTI defence force – choosing all of the above felt like the natural best option. Nervousness saw Vi’s third glass emptied down to ice, then second, shortly after. She hesitated to consume the first and last in any rush. Foremost: she was decidedly not a coffee drinker but fancied the idea of holding a cup in solidarity if it was Lexie’s choice, to give her palms something warm and grounding to hold. As for her stance on the tall glass of ruby red, Vi worried the cranberry might be too tart and potent, liable to lull her into too tranquil a state. Once upon a time she’d written it down on a list of sleep aids and mounted it on her fridge after manically pawing through a book of holistic remedies she’d stashed away from an overdue library haul. It hadn’t worked then, but she wasn’t taking any unnecessary risks now.
Thirty minutes there, and the familiar draft of fear crept in behind the latest non-Lexie patron to last enter. Or maybe that was just a side effect of the ice cube rolling around her mouth. There was an undeniable chance, no matter how slim, that she would not show up. She had no obligation to, all things considered. Vi had tried her hardest to make it worth her while, willing to pay with uncapped abandon and let the other woman choose when the numbers should stop climbing. It felt just and right to let her control what decisions should be made: Lexie, already submerged, digging beneath the crust of rock bottom to stir the deepest and most primal bedrock of human psyches and desires, compared to Vi’s stringent clinging to the shallows and buoyant excuses. Vi was forcing them both to come up for air, in the daylight hour, which was as much an eyesore for Vi as she guessed it might have been for Lexie.