Love And Coffee: A Cup Of Grace Romance Series Book 1 (2 page)

CHAPTER TWO

              And that’s how I ended my brief seven-year tenure with The Daily News.  Over.  Kaput.  Just like that.  I had walked out of that place with a cardboard box filled to the brim with plants, cute magnets, coffee cups, and personalized sticky pads.  Yeah.  I had personalized sticky pads.  I hugged so many people that I couldn’t remember who I did or didn’t hug.  An awkward silence permeated the building as the ones that got to keep their jobs tried to behave as if everything was normal.  Those of us who were laid off sobbed.  No use in pretending.  It hurt.  Where would we go from here?  The question was in each person’s eyes as we said our good byes.

              On Sunday I sat at church and watched the clock turn over to 10:00 AM, and then I got up and made my way to the podium.  I couldn’t remember what I had done the rest of the day Friday or all of Saturday.  It was all just a blur.  But I was at church on Sunday and I picked up my notes and I made the weekly announcements.  A carwash fundraiser.  Prayer on Tuesday evening.  A baby shower for an unwed mother. 

Then I looked out over my church family and felt so much love wash over me.  Call me silly, but I suddenly thought that at least they wouldn’t lay me off from my job here.  They wouldn’t kick me to the curb like yesterday’s trash.  And I cried.  Yes, I did.  Right there in front of God and everyone.  I cried.  And I said, “I got laid off from my job Friday.  And so did Kathryn and Jillian.”  And I stood there and cried like a fool.

I guess you could say that I pretty well stunned everyone because there was silence.  Well, except for the sound of my uncontrollable sobs.  Then Kathryn got up and hurried to my side.  She hugged me and ushered me back to my seat.  Thank goodness she did, because to be honest with you, I think I might have just stood there and cried for who knows how long.

Then the pastor got up and said something about being sorry and everyone prayed for us.  I mean, it was really nice, and I’m really glad they did, but I couldn’t believe I had embarrassed myself that way.  I had had no intention of ever saying a word about being laid off.  To be honest, I was embarrassed that they laid the three of us off and kept Kenny Jones.  Kenny Jones would sneak off whenever he could and hide in the copy room to play games on his phone.  Not only that, but he’d also call in sick nearly every Monday due to a heavy weekend of video game playing.  Yeah, they had kept him over us.

“I’m sorry,” I sobbed in a whisper to Kathryn.  “I’m sorry.” 

Kathryn took my hand and squeezed it and Mrs. Webb turned around from the seat in front of me and patted my knee.  I guess I was glad to have the support, but I wish I had handled it better.

I didn’t hear a word the pastor said through the whole service. I just kept wondering what I was going to do with myself with nowhere to go and nothing to do every day.  And no cute little Victorian house with cute frilly curtains that I had conjured up in my imagination.  No lily pad shaped pool.  What was I going to do?

After church, Jillian, Kathryn, and I decided to go to the coffee shop down the street and get a coffee.  I wanted the biggest chocolatiest coffee they made.  I know what people were thinking.  I have no money now!  How could I spend what little I did have so frivolously?  I don’t know, but it seemed like the only thing to do at the time.             

I got a Mocha Latte, Kathryn got an Espresso, and Jillian got an iced coffee.  We hunkered down over our drinks and cried into them.  Or over them.  Or whatever it is that people that drink and are sad, do. 

“So what now?”  Jillian asked.  “We need to do something.”

“I guess we need to figure that one out,” Kathryn said, taking a sip of her Espresso.

“Apply for unemployment,” I said.

“I did that Friday.  I am going to get less than half of my pay from the paper.  And that’s before they take out taxes,” Kathryn said.

I sighed.  How would I pay my rent, let alone anything else on that sum?  I forced myself to smile.  My parents had raised me to look on the bright side of things.  And I had my faith in God.  So why be down?  Except that I was, and my smile quickly faded. 

“Maybe now is a good time for us to explore other career options,” I said absently stirring my latte.

“Like?”  Jillian asked.

“I have no idea,” I said with a sigh.  Just then, the coffee shop door swung open and in walked Matt Stevenson.  He was the cute guy from the advertising department at the paper.  Had he been a part of the layoffs?  My brows furrowed as I tried to remember if he had been in that conference room of doom.  But I had no idea if he was or not.  I had been too wrapped up in my own fate.

He looked in our direction and I smiled at him.  He gave me a half smile back.  But there was no enthusiasm behind it.  I guessed that he had indeed been in that room of doom.

He stepped up to the counter to place his order and I decided that my latte needed freshening up with some cocoa powder.  I got up and sidled up to him while he waited for his coffee.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey,” he said back, barely glancing in my direction.

We were great conversationalists.

“So, um,” I started, and then looked down at my coffee.

“Yeah.  It stinks,” he said and looked away.

“Yeah.  It does.” He seemed standoffish, but then we had never truly held a conversation of any kind.  Occasionally we would run into each other in the office kitchen and would say excuse me to keep from colliding with one another, but that was about it. 

I was interested in him last year, but Kathryn went snooping for me and found out that he had a girlfriend.  No use in pursuing that.  I wondered if he still did.  He was tall, dark haired and oh so cute.  And he was polite.  He always said excuse me before reaching across me to get a plastic spoon in the office kitchen.  What more could you ask for?

I wondered if he had been laid off for sure.  He wasn’t being terribly talkative as he waited for his coffee.  But maybe that was because he was sad over the layoffs.  Or maybe he had been able to keep his job and he was just sad for me and my friends and the rest of those laid off.

“So, um, I didn’t happen to notice, but did you get laid off?” I finally asked after I had sprinkled enough cocoa powder on the top of my coffee to make it look like a solid mass.

He looked at me.  “Yeah.  I got laid off.”

“Oh me too!” I said with way too much enthusiasm.  Stupid!  “I mean, I’m sorry to hear that.”

“You got laid off, too?” he said as he was handed his drink.  I took a mental note that he liked his coffee dark and unsweetened.  That information might come in handy some day.

“Yes, and Kathryn and Jillian did too,” I said, nodding my head in my friends’ direction.  Both of them sat watching me.  Jillian waved when she saw us look over at them.  I ignored her.  This was no time to be jovial.

“I’m sorry to hear it,” he said, and looked at the floor.  “I guess I’ll be going.”

“Oh, do you need to?  You could come and sit with us.  I mean, if you wanted to.  Misery loves company.”

He gave me a half smile.  Only it was more like a quarter smile.  “Sure. I guess I have a couple of minutes,” he said, and then we headed toward the table.

“Hello, uh, it’s Matt, isn’t it?”  Kathryn said when we got to the table. 

“Hello, yes, it’s Matt,” he returned as he sat down. 

I sat across from him and realized that I was suddenly feeling much more up.  Something about a cute guy does that to me.

“We are wallowing in our misery,” Jillian said.  “So nice of you to join us.”

“Matt got laid off, too,” I said, still a little too happy. 
Stupid!

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Kathryn said.  “Do you have any idea what you will do?”

“No, not really.  It’s kind of fresh yet.  I guess I need to figure that out.”

“Us too,” I said.  “You know, I was just saying that now would be a great time to really figure out what it is that we want to do with our lives.  To, you know, figure out where we want to go in life and do something meaningful.”  Always the optimist, you know.

“I agree,” he said and looked at me thoughtfully.  “I think that’s a great idea.  What is it that you want to do with your life?”

“Well, to be honest, I hadn’t given it a lot of thought yet.  But I always kind of had it in my mind to, well, to…” and I trailed off.

“What?’ he asked, interested.

“To open, well, a coffee shop,” I said, realizing that it might sound a little ridiculous since we were sitting in a perfectly good coffee shop right at that moment and there seemed to be a coffee shop on every corner in this city.

“Oh,” he said, looking at me.

I suddenly felt really dumb about saying it out loud.  But it had been something that would come and go in my mind over the past five years or so.  I could always think of improvements to whatever coffee shop that I happened to be in at the time.  I just kind of felt drawn to it. 

“I think that is an awesome idea!” Jillian said enthusiastically.  I could always count on Jillian for encouragement, and I smiled at her.

“Well, I’m sure that’s a great idea,” he said, but he didn’t sound like he meant it all that much.  But at least he was trying to be supportive. 

“I think that’s a great idea too,” Kathryn said, and she reached out and squeezed my hand. 

“We could all go in together and open a coffee shop!”  Jillian said.

“Yeah, I guess we could,” I said. 

And an idea was born.

CHAPTER THREE

Kathryn and Jillian showed up at my apartment at 7:30 the next morning.  I would have been a little put out by that, since I had stayed up late the night before feeling sorry for myself, but they came bearing coffee. So who was I to bark at them?

“What’s up?” I said yawning.

“Well, we decided that we needed to get together and brain storm,” Kathryn said.

“What do you mean ‘brain storm’?” I said, opening the lid to my coffee and sniffing.  “Vanilla?”

“Yeah, we decided that you could use something a little different,” Jillian said as she plopped down on my couch.  “You have anything for breakfast?”

“Yeah, I think there’s some Rice Crispies in the cupboard,” I said.

“Oh.  No muffins?”

“Nope.”

“Forget breakfast,” Kathryn said, heading to the kitchen and grabbing the box from the cupboard.  “What we need to do is figure out what we are going to do for jobs.  We need to come up with some money-making opportunities.  And I need real money.  I’ve got rent to pay.”

“Well,” I said, pausing to take a sip of my coffee. “We could always apply for another job.”

“No.  That’s boring.  Come on, Tara. Let’s think creatively.  I really liked your idea about the coffee shop yesterday,” Kathryn said.

I picked up my laptop off the coffee table and opened it up.  “That’s just crazy talk.  We don’t know anything about going into business.”  I pulled up the state unemployment site and started my claim.

“No, why is it crazy talk?  I mean, you can learn anything there is to learn online these days.  We can just teach ourselves what we don’t know.”  Kathryn stuffed a handful of Rice Crispies into her mouth.  She was quickly losing her manners with being unemployed and spending time alone.

“Well, I think we need to look at more normal modes of money making,” I said as I began entering my information on the website.  “Let’s see, reason for termination of employment…sucked at job.”

“Stop that, Tara. You didn’t suck.  You were great at your job.  We all were. They just couldn’t keep everyone,” Jillian said, trying to sound reasonable.

“I know, I know.  I just feel really low right now.” I felt myself start to tear up.  I still wasn’t over losing the chance to own that cute Victorian.  Maybe if I had been a little bit more social with upper management, they would have kept me, I thought.  Or put in more overtime.  Or smiled more.  Or something.

              “It will be all right. We will figure something out,” Kathryn said.

              “Yeah,” I said, tapping out my personal information on my computer keyboard.

              “You know what I think we should do?” Jillian asked.  When no one asked her what she thought we should do, she continued anyway.  “We should get an apartment together.”

              “What?”  Kathryn said.  “Are you crazy?  I haven’t roomed with anyone since college.  I kind of like my apartment and having it all to myself.”

              “Yeah, but you know none of us are going to be making anywhere near the money we use to make.  At least not for a while.  And it’s a waste to spend it on three separate apartments.  Besides, it will be just like college, all of us together again.”  She smiled really big and sat back.

              Just then the amount that I was eligible to receive in unemployment benefits popped up on the screen.  I sighed.  “Maybe she’s right,” I said with dread in my voice.  That wasn’t enough to raise a hamster on, let alone pay the rent and support my coffee habit.  Maybe opening a coffee shop wasn’t such a bad idea.  At least I could get my coffee at cost.

              “That’s a crazy small amount of money to try and survive on,” I said after a moment of trying to process it.

              “Isn’t it though?” Jillian said.  “Depressing is more like it.”

              “Yeah, we could blow through our retirement funds in no time if we don’t find a way to make some money.  And fast,” I said.

              “We could sell Avon,” Jillian said.

              Kathryn and I looked at her, our mouths hanging open.  Avon? 

“Excuse me?” I said.

              “Sure, my grandmother sells it and she makes bank.”

              “Define bank,” I said.

              “I don’t know. I just know she always says she makes a nice tidy little sum from selling her Avon and that it supplements her retirement income.”

              “Jillian, your grandmother lives in a house that was paid off thirty years ago and she drives a car that was paid off forty years ago.  That bank of which you so flippantly speak is probably like $200 dollars a month,” Kathryn said before cramming another handful of cereal into her mouth.

              “You think so?”

              Kathryn nodded, her mouth too full of cereal to answer.

              “Yes, I think so too,” I said.  “But we could look at online jobs.  That would be fun.  Then we could work in our pajamas,” I said, brightening.

              I finished up my unemployment application and started searching for work at home jobs.  I gotta admit it.  They all looked pretty scammy.  “Oh look, we can make $50 an hour taking surveys,” I said and rolled my eyes.  I would love to see that happen.

              “That’s not bad,” Jillian said, nodding her head and then took a sip of her coffee.

              “Jillian, you know that isn’t possible, right?” I asked her.  Sometimes the girl didn’t live in reality.

              She thought about it a minute.  “Yeah, I guess not.”  I loved Jillian, and even though she wasn’t blonde, you sure couldn’t tell it if you had your eyes closed.  But she was one of my best friends from college and I loved her like a sister.  Heck, I loved her more than my own sister.

              I closed the laptop and stretched out on the couch.  We would need to figure out something.  And fast.  Maybe moving in together wasn’t such a bad idea.

              “I know you’re thinking about it,” Jillian said.  “We need to move in together.”

              “What do you think, Kathryn?” I asked, trying to picture it.  All I could see was Jillian baking things that would make me gain forty pounds and Kathryn running around behind me with disinfecting wipes, just in case I left a germ behind.

              Kathryn sighed.  “I don’t want to blow through my retirement account, that’s for sure.  We only had seven years to contribute and I plan on living a long time after retirement.  Without having to resort to eating dog food.”

              “Well, let’s take a look then,” I said and opened my laptop back up.  I sighed.  I suddenly felt sad because now I was trying to find a cheaper apartment that the three of us could all fit into, instead of looking for cute Victorian houses.

              I pulled up apartment rentals.  “There’s some on Oak Tree Street,” I said.

              “Yuck, no!  That’s a terrible area,” Jillian said.

“What about those cute apartments on Broadmoore?” Kathryn said, coming over to sit beside me on the sofa.

              “Yeah, those are cute,” Jillian said. 

              So I pulled those up.  And suddenly I was thinking about the coffee shop.  Why couldn’t we do it?  Sure, it would be a lot of work.  But why not try it?  We could move in together to save money and then we could all work together on the coffee shop. 

              “Let’s do it.” I said.

              “Move in together? Yeah, that’s a great idea,” Jillian said, suddenly giddy with excitement.  “It will be like a slumber party every night!”

              “No.  I mean, yes.  But the coffee shop.  Let’s move in together and let’s open a coffee shop.  Jillian, you make the best cupcakes and muffins and anything that’s bakeable.  And I love experimenting with different flavors and types of coffee drinks.  And Kathryn, well you can do something, I’m sure,” I said, suddenly feeling inspired.

              “Gee, thanks,” Kathryn said.  “But we could make sandwiches or something to bring in a lunch crowd.  Nothing that really has to be cooked, but you know, easy things.  If they come in for coffee, they’ll buy a sandwich.  If they come in for a sandwich, they’ll buy some coffee.”

              “Makes sense,” Jillian said.  Everything made sense to Jillian.

              “But we need something to make it really special,” I said, my head beginning to swim with ideas.  “There are so many coffee shops in this city.  Something has to make it stand out.”

              “I know!”  Jillian said suddenly jumping to her feet.  “We can make it a Disney themed coffee shop.”

              Kathryn and I sat with our mouths open.  That was our Jillian.  Ya had to love her.  Even if she wasn’t quite fully connected to the conversation.