fic fic

Cappuccino


The finished series on LJ:

[Part 1: I deserve a try, honey, just once]

[Part 2: And any talk of healthiness, and any talk of connectedness]

[Part 3: When they said I should feed my head, that to me was just a day in bed]

[Part 4: I hate the books you read and all your friends, your music's shite it keeps me up all night]

[Part 5: Everbody wants to be, wearing jewellery]

[Part 6:You're just a little queen, dirty-mouthed and mean]

[Part 7: There will be no white flag above my door..]

[Part 8: I have a feeling if I gave you some, you'd probably want some more..]

[Part 9: They tell me you're in love with me, that you can't take your pretty eyes away from me]

[Part 10: Somebody better give me some gas money, we're sitting here like fools]

[Part 11: Take a second just to breathe

*

Coffeeshop AU... Nsync. Bitchy barista!JC. and Nick is in it too.

(inspired by the fabulously snarky girls in my local coffeebar, from this entry. Warnings: AU, WIP. Sex.)

Part One: I deserve a try, honey, just once.

*

JC liked the loud slurring noise the cappuccino machine made as it frothed the milk, because it meant he didn't have to listen to the customers.

He could still hear them, of course: mumbling, asking inane questions, someone in line thinking he could shout his order while JC was preparing the ones before him, but the noise from the frother let him pretend he couldn't hear them, which was the best thing about cappuccinos.

"Chocolate sprinkles?" he asked, as he spooned froth on top of the two coffees. The lady looked momentarily panicked, as if he'd spoken in a language she didn't understand but should. He sneered, and held up the jar. "Choc-olate? On top of your cappuccinos?"

He waited for her to nod. One day soon he was going to stop asking. They all wanted chocolate on their cappuccinos. Where did management think this was - New York?

"That's 6.50." The lady started digging into her purse as if she hadn't realized there was going to be money involved. Her bag was hideous and blue. JC gave her a distasteful look. "Thank you. He moved his attention to the overeager man behind her.

The receipt said 1.30. One and a half hours till his break. Five hours till he could go home.

*

The black-haired guy with the really pretty friend came in at 2:00 like they always did. JC thought they must work together and always have their break together, but he doubted they were a couple. The pretty one was very much out of the black-haired one's league.

"Hi." He smiled. "What can I get you today?"

The pretty one smiled back. JC knew his name: Lance. But he always thought of him as "ohh, pretty".

"You. To go." Unfortunately it was Chris, the not so pretty one, who did all the flirting. JC snorted at him, and let his gaze linger on Lance.

"Just a mocha and an almond cappuccino, please," Lance said, politely. His cheeks were pink, warm and flustered. His voice was low and soft and sounded like sex. The boy really had the most amazing eyes.

"Finally Friday, huh? You doing anything this weekend?" Chris's voice was not like sex at all. More like cartoons in bed. Cartoons in bed after your lover's failed to get it up.

JC gave him a quick, dismissive glance. "Maybe." He turned back to Lance. "You guys doing anything?"

"Yeah, we're going to Days. Probably." Lance's cheeks took on a deeper shade of pink, because Days was the biggest gayest club in town, and Joey and JC went there one Saturday a month and always had a great time. JC liked those odds.

"That's a good place."

"It's a great place." Chris leaned up against the bar disk, butting in. "But don't get your hopes up. He's only going to be nice to me. I'm the gay one."

"Sure." JC couldn't care less whether Chris was gay or straight and he didn't need some spiky-haired loser to crush on him. What he did need was a nice blowjob and he knew exactly which cocksucking lips would be perfect for that. He smiled at Lance and made his voice warm and melty. "Whipped cream?"

"I… s-sure." Lance blushed. The guy looked good blushing, and JC liked to imagine his weekend was going to be Lance tangled up in his faded bedspread.

"He really is straight," Chris said, when Lance had walked away from the counter. He was leaning up against the bagel-stand, looking at JC with his dark eyes.

JC glanced at Lance sipping his mocha. "Sure."

"No, really. He's got a girlfriend."

"We'll see."

Chris rolled his eyes. JC wilfully forgot the almond syrup in his cappuccino.

*

3:00 pm and he made himself an espresso. Then he grabbed his cigarettes and cellphone from behind the cups tray and went to sit down at an empty table. He had half an hour for lunch, but he usually ate some of Joey's mother's pasta when he came home and only had coffee and cigarettes during the day.

He moved some empty cups and paper plates and put his phone on the table, willing it to ring.

Joey was having a prolonged one-night stand with an actor from the Lyceum, and he was going to call on JC's break - which he always had at 3:00, no matter how busy – to tell him if he had managed to score them cheap seats for tonight's show. JC and Joey both loved musicals and JC had encouraged this fling more than any other guy Joey had ever dated.

He finished his espresso and the phone didn't ring. He stared at it, twisting his lips sullenly. If Joey had forgotten or not been able to get the tickets, their weekend would be beers on the tarmac in front of their building and re-runs on Sunday night. It was 8 days till payday.

He looked up when he heard Sandra say "oh, right, you're starting your shift, I'd almost forgotten you, sweetheart," and saw a guy he hadn't seen before standing behind the counter in the assigned brown apron, looking nervous. He was tall and blond, with pretty eyes and nice arms. JC threw a quick look at the clock and grabbed his cigarettes.

"I'm going for a smoke," he said, as he squeezed past Sandra and the new boy.

"Yes, oh, but JC, do you think you could show Nick some things when you come back?" Sandra said. "Right, sorry, this is Nick. Nick this is JC. Could you? I'm a bit busy, I've got to do the timesheets."

"Sure." JC unlocked the backdoor and nodded at Nick. He banged the door shut behind him.

The yard was small and cemented and smelled of garbage, but it was quiet and usually shaded in the afternoon. He lit a cigarette and leaned back against the wall. The phone rang when he had two minutes left of his break.

"Did we get them?"

"No, sorry." Joey was shouting above the sound of machines in the background. Joey was some sort of machine operator, working with fish, of all things. JC wasn't sure exactly what he did, because it was fish and he never went there to visit Joey. But it earned him enough to take them both clubbing one Saturday a month, which was great.

He sighed. "Fuck."

"Sorry. Adam didn't get back to me."

"You think he's on to us?"

Joey laughed on the other end, a rich and warm laugh, and there was a reason all the guys fell in love with him. "Could be. I'll have to be sneakier about it."

"Yeah. And maybe a bit more enthusiasm sucking him off, baby. Fuck it, for front-row tickets, I'll even-" He became aware of a small movement out the corner of his eye, and when he turned the new boy, Nick, was standing in the door, looking like he wanted to disappear into the wallpaper. "Hold on, Joe." JC lowered the phone. "Yes?"

"Um, uh. Sandra said to tell you that, uh, your break's over."

JC snorted. Sandra was a bitch, and he lifted the phone to his ear again. "I gotta go, Joey."

"Ok. I'll come by for a coffee after work. See you, sexy."

The rest of the day was showing Nick the ropes. He was a bit shy but pretty good, and JC put him on machine-cleaning duty and had five cigarettes out back when Sandra was busy in the office.

*

A week later, he had taught Nick everything there was to know about mixing coffees and ignoring loud customers, and he had also flirted some more with Lance, and Joey had managed to rip down their shower curtain when he and Adam were "not having sex, just cleaning up, honestly."

The thing with Lance was the only remotely exciting thing that had happened to him all week.

"JC, no chewing gum while you're serving." Sandra had a way of hissing at her employees that she for some reason thought customers wouldn't be able to hear.

JC whirled and spit the pink gum into the trashcan behind him. It didn't matter. He'd gotten most of the taste, anyway. He finished off the Latte and put a lid on it, handing it to the customer who had just paid Nick. "Here you go, sir," Nick said, and he was smiling at the man, which JC thought looked stupid; as if the man had done Nick a favour and not the other way around. He shimmied up beside him,

"You should clear some of the tables."

"Yes. Sure. Ok."

He liked how Nick was all clumsy and nervous around him. He wasn't really JC's type, but he was sweet. Boys with crushes were sweet. And he did everything JC told him to do.

That was mostly why he wondered if Nick might not be a possibility after all. It was another Friday night and the thing with Lance was going nowhere, and Joey was working hard and fucking Adam even harder for those tickets they hadn't managed to get yet, and JC wanted something fun to get his mind off work for a while.

Then someone called out, "JC! Wooh!" and he turned around.

"Justin! Oh my god!" JC came around the counter and caught Justin in a hug, "Wow. I didn't expect to see you here."

Justin laughed and caught his sunglasses just before they were swept off his face. "Hey, baby."

Justin had worked in the coffeshop when JC had just started. They'd immediately gotten on and had only fooled around once, which for Justin regarding gayboys working there, was practically chastity.

"How are you? What happened to New York, man?"

Justin shrugged. "Meh."

"So you're back?"

"Maybe. I think so. You know if there's any chance-" Justin stopped as Nick came out on the shopfloor, holding a tray and a cloth. He blinked. "Oh, hello."

JC grinned. "He's new."

"He's nice."

"Hm." He kissed Justin on the cheek and moved back behind the counter. "I get off at 4 today. You wanna hang around?"

Justin nodded. "Sure. I'll hang around..." he looked over at Nick clearing the tables, "take in the view... Oh, hello, fair Sandra." He raised his hand in a wave as Sandra came out of the small office, glasses perched on the tip of her nose.

"Well, look who it is. Hello to you too." Her tone was somewhat poignant. "Back already?"

"You know it, gal."

Sandra and Justin hadn't got on, but that was simply because Justin had worked there two years longer than Sandra had when she started as manager, and anyway, Justin hated every manager by default.

JC was still smiling widely at Justin. "What can I get you?"

"JC," Sandra hissed in 'that' tone, "the other customers first."

"I'll have a cappuccino," Justin said, squeezing past the people in line. "And dry, baby. Dry. I've been to New York, remember."

*

"Would you like to come by our apartment after work today, Nick?" JC asked, when he was ticking off his timesheet. "Just for a few beers. If you don't have anything else planned."

Nick had only been in Orlando for three weeks, and JC knew he hadn't hooked up with anyone since moving there. Nick had told him so when they'd been out back, stealing a few minutes' break. JC had told Justin and Justin had begged him to fix them up.

Nick looked a little surprised, but he nodded quickly. "Sure. Yeah. Cool. I don't really have any... um."

Already half out the door, JC turned and grinned at him. "Wait here after you've finished. We'll come by and pick you up."

Joey was out with Adam and that meant that JC was broke, so he and Justin went to the corner shop and had cheap beer and chicken pasta for dinner.

Justin insisted he should be the one to go and get Nick at 5 pm, and JC took the opportunity to shower and get the smell of coffee out of his hair. He had another beer and sat in the opened window, looking down at the busy street below, letting the sunlight slowly dry his hair.

He could see that Justin already had his arm slung around Nick's shoulders as they came walking up the street, but they weren't alone. Two other people were walking with them and JC meeped as he recognized Chris and Lance.

He jumped off the ledge and ran into his room, pulling his t-shirt over his head as went. He had nothing clean to wear and his hair was a curly half-dried mess. Quickly, he grabbed a bandanna and one of Joey's tight t-shirts, and thought of killing Justin.

"Hey, JC, man," Justin shouted, cheerily, "I met some guys, Chris and Lance," the door slammed and there was a shuffle of feet, "they were in the café. We thought the more the merrier."

JC came out into the livingroom, nodding coolly at them. He only realized how one of the tight t-shirt Joey wore for clubbing and a bandanna might look when he caught Chris staring at him, but it was too late by then. Lance had on a white shirt and blue jeans and JC thought oh, pretty, and then he said, "That's cool. Who wants pasta?"

They ate what was left in the fridge while they listened to Justin bitch.

"Yeah, so I worked there for about four weeks, and god, it sucked. Like, no money. And you just sit around waiting to pull a lever. And it's not like you get invited to the afterparties." Justin was perched on the arm of the chair Nick was sitting in. He was slouched back enough so that his arm was almost around Nick’s neck, and he was talking, but his eyes skidded over JC occasionally, and JC recognized the glint in them. He wondered if Nick knew what Justin was doing.

"So do you want to be an actor?" Lance was sitting next to JC on the couch, and he smelled clean and of some fresh citrusy perfume. Unisex, maybe. His shirt was unbuttoned at the top and JC thought about leaning over and licking his collarbone.

On the other side of Lance, Chris was sipping his beer and laughing at Justin. He had on a t-shirt and cut-offs instead of the office clothes he usually wore, and he seemed to think Justin was hilarious. Good, JC thought, because maybe then he'd start hitting on him instead.

"Nah, not me," Justin said, cheerfully, "I just wanted to, like, work in that environment. I'm not really any good at acting."

"You could probably do ads or something," Lance said, and then he blushed as Justin beamed.

"I lived in New York for five year," Chris said, when Justin had finished preening.

Justin made big eyes. "No shit?"

"Nope."

"Did you like it?"

Chris shook his head and took another sip of his beer. "I fucking hated it." He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, "You think it was bad now, you should try it in winter." JC pursed his lips. He wouldn't be surprised if Chris started wiping himself on the couch cushions any minute now.

Justin shook his head. "Five years. Why did you even stay?"

"I had to. It was for work."

"No, man," Justin kept shaking his head, "nothing would make me stay in a place I didn't like that long."

Chris just shrugged, but he looked amused.

JC turned to Lance. "So have you ever-" He was interrupted when Lance's mobile phone suddenly rang – a shrill sound from his shirt pocket, and Lance immediately jumped up.

"Sorry."

On the other side of the couch, Chris grinned at JC as Lance got up and answered his phone with a low "hello", then disappeared into the kitchen.

"Probably his girlfriend," Chris said. JC ignored him.

On the chair, Justin had leaned a fragment of an inch closer to Nick. "I'm staying with some friends for now. Gonna see if I can get a job at Disneyworld." JC noticed that Nick's head was resting against the back of the chair now. So he probably did understand what Justin was doing.

"You got any credentials," Chris asked, "Anything special? I could have a check for you at our place."

"Well, I make mean cappuccinos, just ask C." Justin smiled as his hand finally moved into Nick's hair.

Lance came back from the kitchen, folding his phone and a frown on his face. "I better take off. We... yeah, I'm sorry. I have to go." He touched JC's arm quickly and waved at Nick and Justin.

Disappointed, JC stood up. "Oh. Do… you need a lift?" He didn't know why he asked. It wasn't like they had a car.

Lance shook his head. "No, it's fine. Chris, I'll see you tomorrow, alright." His shirt slid open as he raised his hand to wave again. "I'll see the rest of you soon. Thanks for the beer."

And he left.

JC thought his weekend would probably not be Lance wrapped up in his bedspread, after all. He sighed deeply.

"I should probably take off too," Nick said. "Got an early shift tomorrow." Nick had all the worst hours, which JC didn't feel bad about, because he had schemed hard to get his weekends off.

"I'll share a cab with you," Justin said, quickly. "Which way are you going?"

"East," Nick said, and Justin nodded,

"Me too."

JC had no idea if that was true, but he pointed out the cab office, which was just down the street, and which was relatively cheap. Justin looked excited and pretty sure of himself, and JC was only a little envious as he kissed his cheek and promised they'd talk more later.

"Hey, man," Justin clasped Chris's hand, "we'll have to meet up again. Talk about New York. You have a phone number?"

As Chris and Justin changed details, JC started gathering up the plates and bottles and carried them into the kitchen. It wasn't that late and he wasn't very tired, just a bit listless. It was Friday night and he had no money and no rich boyfriend and everything seemed to be happening around him, to everyone else.

"I should take off too." It was Chris, coming in to the kitchen with the empty pasta bowl and his half finished beer. He put the dish in the sink and ran some water over it, and JC was too tired to point out that they would get chicken pieces stuck in the drain and that Joey would be mad.

"No, it's cool," he said instead. "Finish your beer, if you want." He opened the fridge and got another one out for himself. He hadn't been drinking earlier, because he wanted to be sober when he talked to Lance, but now he decided he might as well have what was left.

Chris kissed him up against the refrigerator door, blissful coolness against his back and Chris's mouth scorching hot on his, far too hot for the Florida heatwave raging outside.

JC shoved him away. "Don't."

"I'm sorry."

Chris looked sincere, so JC smiled bleakly at him. "It's all right. Don't worry." He pressed the cold bottle against his forehead. "It's this fucking city. I could do with one of those New York winters you guys were talking about. Fucking Justin, he can never stay long enough at something to tough it out."

Chris stood weighing on the balls of his feet for a while, unsurely. "Maybe I should go."

But JC shook his head. "No, don't worry about it. Stay." It was Friday night, after all, and JC was alone and bored. "Have another beer. It's ok. Really."

It was ok. Chris was nice to just have a chat and some drinks with, and JC was maybe disappointed about Lance, but it wasn't like he was desperate or heartbroken or anything. Lance was just another good-looking straight guy who drank mocha and wore pretty shirts and went to Days on a Saturday night.

Chris talked about New York some more and about work. Then they talked about the heatwave and Joey's boyfriend who wouldn't give him tickets to his show, and Chris didn't say anything more about Lance or Lance's girlfriend.

After two more beers, JC kissed him.

They were on the couch and Chris's arm had been resting on the back of it, almost touching JC's neck. JC leaned into him, deepening the kiss, and Chris's arm went fully around him, pulling him close. JC and Joey had a rule about not having sex on the couch, which JC frequently broke and which he was pretty sure Joey did too. JC had walked in on Joey and Adam more than once and Joey had always assured him they were just about to move into the bedroom, which JC knew was a lie, and so he didn't feel too guilty about pushing Chris down and eagerly start pulling at his t-shirt.

Chris's skin was pale and it tasted like soap. His mouth tasted of beer, his hair was crunchy from styling gel and he was hot and hard all over. JC bit and licked his jaw, pressing against him. It seemed they didn't need to say anything and Chris was nice and responsive: red patches bloomed up on his skin, his breath turned ragged, his hands fisted tightly in JC's hair as he jerked his hips upwards, small grinding delicious circles. JC got a hand inside his pants and Chris shuddered and came against his palm, snapped his head to the side and stifled a long moan against the vinyl upholstery. Still panting hard, he hoisted himself up a bit and blew JC until he was crying out, eyes rolled up toward the ceiling. They had lasted about ten minutes and they were both dripping with sweat when JC let go of the armrest and collapsed back down again.

"That was nice," JC murmured as he sprawled bonelessly on top of Chris.

Chris reached up and pulled the bandanna off JC's head. "Mm, s'great."

They stayed on the couch. Mostly because the sheets in JC's bed hadn't been washed for three weeks and there was no ceiling-fan in his room to make it bearable to sleep tangled up with another person. In the morning Chris had a shower and left early, and JC crawled into his own bed and slept for another few hours. He got up at noon and had an apple and coffee for breakfast and some bagels that Joey brought with him when he came home from Adam's a few hours later. Joey hadn't managed to get any tickets, but he had some light bruising around his wrists. As far as JC knew, Joey was a slut but he wasn't particularly kinky, and he talked of breaking it off with Adam. JC told him about Chris and Joey looked suspiciously at the couch, which JC had smoothed out and wiped down earlier while he was listening to the top 40 countdown on the radio and trying to get a draft going in the small apartment.

Monday he was back at work again. He was almost relieved when Chris didn't come in for a coffee that day.

*

Next part is here

--Capp.