“Maybe. I don’t know. I can’t really see his face.” Not even considering the masks, the lighting in the rooms is too dim, I could barely make out his features. Other than his green eyes. 

A smug smile creeps onto Mason's face as he leans back again. “Who cares, you don’t need to see his face when you’re in bed with him.” He makes a gesture with his hands and laughs at himself. The way this guy was able to build a 7 figure company from scratch with the brain of a 10-year-old is beyond me.

I lean both of my elbows on the table and motion at the folded card in front of us. “Didn’t you hear the rules? No solicitation of sexual acts inside the premises.” 

He rolls his eyes. “You really think these guys aren’t taking these sexy bunnies back to their hotels and fucking them?” He nods his head towards something behind me and I turn to see one of the guys from the table near us sliding his server a piece of paper. His bunny picks it up to read then whispers into his ear, who then smiles and nods at the other guy sitting at his table. Then they both get up and all three of them walk out of the room.

“No solicitation of sexual acts inside the premises.” He taps on the table with his index finger and emphasizes the word inside. “If they didn’t want solicitation of sex they would have said ON the premises not inside. Or just no solicitation of sexual acts period. Guys can take one step outside that front door and be like, “Yo. Let’s fuck.” and that’s fine because it’s outside. It’s worded that way as a loophole.” 

“Wow, we got Sherlock Holmes over here,” I say wryly and focus back on the menu. “Maybe I should have studied business law like you.”

He tips his invisible detective hat and pretends to blow smoke from his imaginary pipe. 

Moments later the kitchen doors swing open and out walks our bunny with two drinks in hand. “Picon Bière for you. And a Chardonnay Cocktail for you.” He sets both of our drinks down in front of us and wipes the condensation from his hands onto a dishtowel. 

Mason picks up and tips his glass towards him. “Merci…er what’s your name?” None of the servers are wearing name tags and he never told us his name. 

“You can just call me L.” He replies as he finishes wiping his hands. 

“L,” Mason repeats while shooting me an amused look. “Merci beaucoup. For the lovely drinks.” 

We both take a sip of our drinks and I have to try my hardest to stifle my reaction. I’ve tried all sorts of wine, almost every type you can think of. But I’ve never been able to enjoy any liquor other than red wine. It’s as if red wine colonized my taste buds and now they reject every other type of alcohol. Every wine I try that isn’t red tastes repulsive to me - and this one is no exception. I keep sipping though because when I look up, out of the corner of my eye I see him watching me. I try my best to not contort my face but it’s obvious I’m grimacing because his mouth pulls up slightly into a small laugh. I put my glass down and scrunch my eyebrows. “It’s good,” I say, hiding my pain. 

“Sure.” He laughs, not even trying to hide the mischievous smirk plastered across his face. Placing both of his hands on his hips he turns to Mason. “What do you want to eat?”

Mason sets his almost-empty drink down and flips open the menu. We both tell him our orders while he looks at us and nods his head. “You’re not going to write any of this down?” Mason gives him a puzzled look. I just noticed he doesn’t have a pen and paper in his hand. 

“I don’t need to.” He taps his head.  “I have a good memory. I’ll remember it.” We both shoot each other a skeptical look considering Mason just ordered a steak with seven different customizations. Well done, no onions, extra mashed potatoes, extra gravy, exchange peas for corn, no steak sauce, light butter. Unfazed, L looks between the both of us.

“Is that all?” He asks. We both hesitantly nod and he says he’ll be back. 

Once out of earshot, Mason leans in and lowers his voice. “There’s no way my order isn’t getting fucked up.” 20 minutes later, his order comes out exactly as he described it. 

Over the next hour, L comes to our table twice asking how we’re enjoying our meal. Both times I wanted to make conversation past our food. I wanted to ask him his actual name, where he’s from, and how old he is. But I don’t know what they consider harassment here and I wasn’t exactly keen on breaking rule #1 and being banned on my first visit. I also didn’t want to be a nuisance in case he was busy with other tables. Even at the end when he brought our check and told us to come again I wanted to ask him when he’ll be working again. But I didn’t. 

Mason jokingly suggested I wait outside for him until his shift is over but even I know how fucking creepy that would be. In the end, we gave a $200 tip and left without seeing him again.

— Tuesday, 2 days later

I walk through large double doors and make my way through a sunlit courtyard.  The campus is mostly empty today, with only the students here for summer school around. I exit under an arch with a sign that reads Silverwood University.

 Next month my little brother, Jamie, is moving in with me to attend this school. I came to fill out some paperwork and get everything in order for when he comes. Even though this is the biggest college in the state, the acceptance rate is highly competitive so I’m an exceptionally proud big brother.  

On Facetime with him and my mom last night he told me he couldn’t wait to live with me again. To which my mom gave him a shocked look and said, “So you can’t wait to leave me too, huh?” Jamie squeezed our mom’s shoulders and kissed her face 20 times. “No mama I’ll come back and visit you every weekend I promise, I love you, mama.” Both of them were on the couch in the living room of our childhood home, a 2-bedroom flat in the suburbs 50 miles outside of Kyoto.

I told her she had to let Jamie fly the nest sooner or later and she scrunched her eyebrows, confused at that idiom. “It’s like when a bird mom pushes her babies out of the nest so they can learn to fly,” Jamie told her, to which my mom started saying a prayer in Japanese in response. I smile at the memory. 

Weaving through a crowd waiting for the bus, I cross the street and make my way down the road toward my car a few blocks away. I reach another intersection just as the light changes from the green walking man to the red man standing still. The college campus buildings are spread throughout the neighborhood in between grocery stores, bookshops, and bars so there’s a vast array of demographics at all times of the day. Businessmen in suits in the morning, moms with strollers taking their newborns on walks in the early afternoon, and college kids in the evening.

The green walking man returns as I and five other waiting pedestrians cross the street. Directly at the corner of the opposing street I spot a coffee shop and hold the door open as a short older lady walks out with a cane in one hand and a coffee cup in the other. “Thank you handsome man.” She smiles up at me and I return the smile. Inside the small coffee shop are only a few tables, half filled with college kids tapping away on their laptops. There’s a counter with baked goods and a menu behind it, and one guy working the register. 

I recognize him the moment I walk in. 

I’m in line behind a mom whose kid has her face squished up against the glass, eyeing their baked goods. “Mommy, Mommy, I want this one! No, wait, this one!” She exclaims, pointing from a brownie to a muffin. “Sweetie, pick one, if you want the other we can get it another day.” The mom squats down next to her girl to look behind the glass. I’m now face-to-face with the cashier at the register. 

Behind the counter in a long black sleeve and blue apron, is our server from the restaurant. Even though I only saw his features on a half-covered face in the dark, I immediately know it’s him. From where I am standing, which is about ten feet from the counter, the same eyes from that night look back at me. With a small beauty mark under his right eye that I couldn’t see because of the mask.

I can tell he recognizes me too because I catch a quick flicker in his eyes, but his overall expression doesn’t change. I don’t even know what the hell the expression on my face looks like right now so I eye the menu above his head to redirect my attention. That night when we left I thought I would never see him again. Now I randomly run into him in a city of over two million people at the exact time he’s working? I’ve never been one to believe in fate but...

The mother stands up and returns to the counter. She tells him her order and he repeats it back to her. 

Yeah, it’s definitely him. That’s his voice. 

A woman in a matching uniform who looks to be in her late 20’s comes up next to him to whom he repeats the order to. She nods and moves behind the counter to start preparing whatever the mom ordered, who is now walking with her daughter towards the order pick-up area. 

I’m up next. I close the 10-foot gap and directly in front of me is the gorgeous guy from the other night. He looks up at me over his dark eyelashes, his piercing green eyes fixed on mine. He wears a blank expression that I can’t decipher. I’d give anything to know what he’s thinking. “What can I get you?” I look up at the menu on the wall again, feeling his gaze still on me, waiting. 

After a few moments, I meet his eyes again and answer. “Just a black coffee.” 

He looks down and starts tapping on his register. “Sugar, creamer, milk?” I watch his fingers move. Same voice and the same fingers from that night when he held my menu. I reply with no and he tells me my total to which I pull out the exact change and hand it to him. He deposits it into the register and states he’ll be right back. 

I stand there watching him make my coffee, using a bean-grinding machine to make it from scratch. Moving effortlessly between the machines, syrups, cups, and everything else behind the counter, he finishes in less than 30 seconds. After popping a lid on the cup he walks back over to the register and sets it down on the counter. “One black coffee.”

I hold his eyes as I grab my cup. “Thanks.” 

The lady from before, who I’ve now deduced is his manager, arrives back at the register placing a hand on his back. “Leo, babes take your break you’ve been working all morning.” 

Leo. 

So that’s his name. 

He turns to her. “I will in 30 minutes after lunch rush.” 

Leo. L. Leo. L. He couldn’t have made it any more obvious. 

I lift my cup to my lips and turn to suppress my smile, walking towards the door past the four other people now in line. All the way around the corner until I was out of sight, I could feel his gaze on the back of my head. 

More than the shock of seeing him again, I’m just confused. 

Why is he working at both a coffee shop and a restaurant? And I’m assuming he goes to school, so how does he manage all of that? From the tone of his manager’s voice, it sounds like he’s been working there for some time. I make it back to my car and realize I didn’t check what the name of the coffee shop was and there’s no logo on the blank coffee cup, so I make a note of the intersection name.

— Thursday

Two days later I’m at the coffee shop again. 

Okay, but listen - I’m not a creep. I had an appointment a couple of blocks down the road and needed some coffee to beat this afternoon’s slump. Coming here makes more sense than going to my usual coffee spot further away.

I’m just here for coffee. 

And this is the closest coffee shop. 

It was just convenient. 

No other reason, really.

If Mason was here right now he’d be dying of laughter. I can almost hear him in my head: “Right if telling yourself that helps you sleep at night.”

Surprisingly, the shop is nearly empty. At the window by the entrance sit two women sipping on iced drinks. On the opposite end, at one of the tables against the wall is an older man reading the newspaper. I walk towards the counter and just like last time there’s one woman in front of me. She finishes as soon as I step behind her so I step up to the counter. 

Also just like last time, Leo is working the register. I’m starting to wonder if he’s the only one who works here other than his boss. This time instead of the long sleeve he’s wearing a tight black tee under his apron. He’s also smiling at me this time which catches me off guard. 

“Black coffee?” He asks, looking down to enter it in the register. 

“No sugar, creamer, or milk,” I say before he does. He doesn’t look up but I catch his lip curling up and a glint of his teeth. He turns and starts working on my coffee as I reach into my pocket and feel for the dollar bills and the scrap piece of paper. 

Over a phone call last night I told Mason about seeing Leo and off-handedly mentioned how I’d love for him to model for me. 

“Why don’t you just ask him?” Mason simply stated. 

Why don’t I just ask him? That’s a good question. If I had asked him the first night at the Rabbit Hole it might have been fine. 

But I’m at his place of work for the second time this week. I look like a goddamn stalker. If I asked him if he’d let me photograph him he might call the police. Practically feeling his eye roll through the speaker when I told him all of this, Mason argued that I should just take the chance anyway. “If he calls the cops just run, he doesn’t know anything about you.” Thanks that’s amazing advice, I thought, saving my sarcasm. 

But I guess I’m following his advice because here I am, with a piece of paper in my pocket that I scribbled, I’d love to take your picture sometime. I’m not a creep I promise, on with my phone number at the bottom. I know it’s unbelievably childish, but I haven’t had the opportunity to talk privately with him. And although the coffee shop is almost empty today, it’s not boisterious enough to where conversations can’t be heard. There’s also a line forming behind me now. If I asked him out loud, not only would I hold up the line, but everyone in here would hear. So other than waiting like a weirdo until his shift is over, this is the best option. 

Leo returns to the counter, coffee cup in hand. “Sorry about that.” He closes the cup with a lid. “The machine has been acting up recently.” Instead of setting the cup down, he grasps the top of it and hands it to me. “No worries,” I reply, grabbing the bottom of the cup, slightly brushing his fingers. Reaching into my pocket, I retrieve the folded $5 bill which has the piece of paper inside, and hand it to him. “Thanks. You can keep the change.” He thanks me back and starts to put the money into the register when he sees the folded paper. As if he was expecting it, I see him pocket the note without hesitation when I turn to leave. It’s all up to him now.

— Friday

I’ve decided I’m going to give it one more shot. It’s Friday night and I’m walking down a sidewalk lit dimly by street lights and fluorescent restaurant signs.