Chapter Text
Go in, order, pay, wait while answering a few questions without sounding too awkward, don't stare, get out.
As simple as it gets, right?
Todd agreed
This was his second cup of the day.
The first time, he had been atended by a new bartender, which had resulted in Todd having to repeat his order at least three times from the top while the poor guy tried to figure out where the heck the buttons he needed were.
He'd missed hearing " Same as always?" along with a certain smile from a certain someone. Even though Neil, otherwise known as Todd's favourite bartender, had told him last week that he would be switching hours with a coworker.
That meant that Todd wouldn't get his daily good morning anymore. However, knowing he'd see Neil after his classes made his mornings much more bearable.
Todd had almost arrived, thinking about the perfect tone to use when saying "hi".
He opened the door and hurriedly entered, looking straight at the counter, not noticing the wet floor below his feet.
He felt his left foot slip, and take him down with it. He felt the floor disappear and rapidly managed to press his arms against his face in an attempt to soften his inevitable fall.
"AhHH-!"
thump.
Floor.
"Fuck...my head.." mumbled Todd. He felt his head heavy, making it hard to act. He heard a couple sneers and eventually decided to try and get up as slowly as he could as to not injure himself further.
"Oh god! Are you okay, sir??"
He recognised the worried voice and straightened up as fast as he could before more eyes turned to him.
"Todd?" Todd shifted his eyes, still foggy from the rapid movement, stopping when they met Neil's. Brown, pretty, shinning puppy eyes staring right at him. He was holding a mop in his right hand and looking at Todd as if he had just stabbed him.
"Hi-I..!." his voice betrayed him and let a childish, high-pitched sound out.
Neil looked for any signs of discomfort without noticing anything too serious. He then proceeded to lower his gaze and stared at Todd's light blue sweater, the one Neil knew he mostly used on Fridays, when he was way too exhausted as to think about his looks. The sky-colored fabric was soaking wet, and had mostly turned into a deep blue sweater. Neil's worried expression slowly shifted to a light smile, which ended up in him trying so, so hard not to laugh at the boy who was still as much of a customer as anyone else.
"Are you hurt, Todd?" he managed to spit out between giggles.
Todd could swear this was the single most embarrassing situation that he had been in. Maybe since 4th grade when Barry the hamster, the class pet, had scurried out of his hand and fallen to the floor in front of the whole class. He spent at least 30 minutes sobbing, thinking he was going to jail for arson.
But despite feeling the reddening of his cheeks, he couldn't help and chuckle along with Neil.
"I-. I'm fine, my butt hurts a little but I'm fine."
Neil, who had stopped giggling, went straight into laughing again, covering his mouth with his hand before his manager got mad at him.
Todd looked at him unsure on what to do, trying to make out what had sent Neil into a laughing fit, again.
"Are you seriously laughing at butt?" asked Todd, feeling too stupid as to stutter.
"I am so sorry" said Neil while curling into his stomach. " I feel like a 6 year old" he excused himself while tears threatened to spill out.
This is stupid, thought Todd.
Now they were both trying to hold their laughter while coughing like crazy.
"Neil! Your turn to serve," they both shot their heads up, still teary eyed.
Neil's manager , Todd supposed, a tall and properly imposing woman was approaching them with an annoyed look.
"Yes Miriam, sorry," half-whispered Neil, wiping his eyes before shooting her an apologetic look. He turned his head as to look at Tood, without an ounce of regret in his stare "You coming, Todd?"
Neil gave the woman, Miriam, the mop amd they both started walking to the counter. Neil was moving forward with no rush while Todd looked straight at the floor, blushing, trying to ignore the confused, judging and invested eyes of other customers in the coffee shop.
"Same as always?" Asked Neil already behind the counter.
Todd just nods, quickly and nervously, not wanting to mess up further. He'd already caused Neil's manager to get mad at him. Maybe if he never came back she'd forget it all. Neil would forget. Yeah, he could come back in two years with a new haircut, change his name.
The last thing he needed was to bring chaos into Neil's lif-
"I missed you," Neil commented as casually as someone could.
Todd felt himself stiffening up, eyes as big as plates. The mumbling in his mind shut up, leaving him without any word or thought. He tried to calm down before his actively increasing heart-rate caused his heart to implode.
Tick. Tack. Tik. Tack.
Neil looked back at him with that smile Todd had missed, while coffee poured out of the machine in the background.
Neil had missed him. Neil had thought about him.
Did that mean anything? Someone missing you after just three days? Had he said something flirty without noticing?? Something that Neil would want to get back at him for?
Todd looked to the side as fast as he could as to avoid having to reply, a thousand possible answers roaming in his head.
But to his dismay, the table to his side, consisting of two girls and a guy around his age, was staring at them both as if they were in a movie, waiting for the main character to say something to his long pinning-for crush. He looked back at Neil and blurted out the first response he could grab onto in the windstorm his brain was at the moment.
"I did too.," Fuck.
Who talks like that??
Neil's smile got even more sincere, if that was somehow possible. He turned back to mix the hot coffee with cold milk.
Todd swore Neil had slighly blushed, rewarding himself a point in the "He loves me" score board he was mentally keeping.
"I'll tell you what!" Neil rattled on.
He spun around with Todd's order in his right hand, stopping when facing him . "I usually get my coffee at that one shop down the street because it's a little cheaper," he propped his elbow onto the counter and rested his cheeck on his hand." But I wouldn't mind coming here if it meant we could talk a bit in the morning! It helps to wake me up almost as much as coffe does," his gaze had softened and his smile had turned gentle, making his Todd-mind-blowing proposal easier to swallow.
Todd used all his courage to look into Neil's eyes.
"We could both, um, go to the other one if you like it better there. Their coffee is nice. I really like their, um, Caramel Latte? I think, that popular one with caramel." Todd mumbled as loudly as he could. That could've easily been the longest he'd ever spoken to Neil.
"Alright then!" beamed Neil "I suppose you only come here because of me, then." A smirk in Neil's face was rare and it always made Todd's stomach flip.
"I-um-no! I mean- you, um, I like- um, the decor!! Yeah, and the- um..-ambience?. Y-yeah!" Todd shut his eyes as hard as he could bringing his hands to his face. He messed up soooo badly.
Neil snickered, making Todd look back up.
He knew he would spend at least a month coming up with everything else he could have said at any point of their interaction. And he was sure Knox would tease him until their dorm's lights went out. But still, he smiled.
"Tomorrow at 7:30?" Neil left the coffee cup on the counter.
"Tomorrow at 7:30" Todd grabed the coffee cup from the counter.
One. Two. Three. Something. Something else. Todd. Tooodd. Stop staring.
"Um- goodbye."
"See ya, Todd"
.
..
...
"Todd! Wait up!"
Todd turned around to find Neil just a couple inches away from him, holding a moss-green hoodie in his hand.
"I was just about to let you go like that, wasn't I? I'm such a mess sometimes...," Neil complained to the ceiling before looking back at Todd. "Take my sweater!" Todd could tell Neil looked unusually nervous, but his unmatched confidence didn't falter.- "I left my coat here yesterday so I won't really need it." He explained.
Had the gods decided to be on his side today? Todd reached out hesitantly, but quickly pulled it back as he started to overthink the infinite number of negative outcomes this could result in. Losing it, fucking up the seams while putting it on, staining it-
"But, um-"
Todd tried to speak up, failing miserably.
"You can give it back tomorrow. I'm sure that way regret will eat you alive if you don't show up." Neil teased.
Todd couldn't bring himself to object, and unable to hide his growing grin, he rapidly took hold of the green hoodie and looked Neil in the eyes before mumbling a quick "Thank you.". He turned around, and quickly ran out through the door before Neil could hear him giggle like the lovesick boy he was.
He brought his hands to his face, unintentionally breathing in the scent of something resembling old wooden planks and cinnamon.
God was he pathetic.
And Todd was on his way to the huge building near, about to be the only cheery student in literary theory class.