A Pass Day for Coffee and Donut Duty

This morning is dark. Darker than I’d prefer. But, then again, what do I expect? Daylight Saving Time always starts far too early for anyone who wakes up early to enjoy it. The warm glow of the approaching sun hasn’t even peaked its light towards the horizon by six in the morning, when I’m out of bed and moving towards work. Busy day. Very busy. Like every day. Stripping off my clothes, slightly stickier than they have any right to be, I head into my bathroom and turn on the shower. I make a mental note that I really should talk to Maintenance and Management about the heat at night. It’s getting warmer and wetter outside earlier in the year, they’ve got to remember to adjust things.

I let the water wash away the sweat from the night as I stare into the middle distance. The water swirls as it passes my eyes, as though nature isn’t quite comfortable with what my gaze can see, though I see nothing. Not now, in any case. At other times, who’s to say. Besides me, of course. After washing myself thoroughly, a much more careful ordeal since my head started thinning out more than I’d like up top, I step out into the bathroom and begin to dry off. I wish I was still working out of our Tower over in west Texas. Never had to worry about drying off so much there. The air would take care of that for me, wicking all moisture off my body and out of my hair almost instantly. For the most part, having to dry off manually is no big deal. But I have to dry my hair, and much like washing it, I must be ever careful not to lose any hair I will never get back but don’t need to lose in that endeavor.

Mostly dry, I head over to my closet, carefully picking out my outfit. Today is my pass day. I need to pick up pastries for my circle. Which means people I don’t know will actually see me. And also means no visible signs of our cause and purpose. Ugh. Shoving aside the standard fare, I begin looking through my more interesting outfits. And, by interesting, I mean socially acceptable to wear while walking around town. I decide on a nice, lightweight suit. Leaving it on the hanger for the moment, I pull on a thin, solid T-shirt with a deep V-neck. Then, overtop, I put on my suit. Checking myself in the mirror, I give the great looking guy in the glass a smile. Many places around the world, I might look ridiculous. But this is Miami, baby. The strange convergences of styles is one of the few truly great things about living in this swamphell of a city. I grab my keys, wallet, and pass, then walk out my door and down the stairs of our building.

Stopping by the office on the way down, I see Polly, too, up early and looking overworked. She sees me and smiles. “Lawrence. What brings you to me this early?”

I smile right back. “Polly dear, as much as I’d love this to be a friendly visit…” I trail off, pulling out my pass.

“Coffee and donut duty again?” she asks as she begins to write down some notes in her ledger.

I give her a little shrug. “Hey, it’s rough in the morning, but I get the pass for the whole day.”

“And? It’s not like you’re going to go out tonight.”

I furrow my brow slightly. “What?” I spit out, “Maybe I’m going out? I don’t know, partying or whatever people do around town.”

She couldn’t help but burst out with a chuckle. “Sorry,” she says, “But you do realize there are people out there doing those things around town.”

“And?” I ask, “I’m great with people.”

“These are people that actually like Miami,” she jokes. Well, half-jokes.

I give a mock spit take. “There are people who like this hellscape!” I jokingly shout in shock. Well, half-jokingly.

We both laugh as she finishes up counting and passes over some cash from the box. “Remember to keep your receipts,” she reminds me.

“Yeah, yeah, and don’t spend it all on useless stuff. I know the drill.” I roll my eyes.

She smiles. “You sure? I always figured memory started to fade with one’s hair,” she says with a coy little smirk.

“Rude,” I reply with a grin, “Besides, I figure the hair falling out is just my head making more room for my mind to move in.” I take the money and put it in my wallet. “Enjoy your morning,” I add as a farewell. Putting the wallet in my jacket across from my keys, I take a breath.

“You too,” she replies with a little half wave. She knows I’m in a bit of a rush if I ever want another pass day.

I hurry out of the office and towards the front door of our complex. Swiping the pass at the front door, I can hear the whirring as the doors unlock, as well as the faint fizzing of the seals being suppressed temporarily. I step out through the wooden doors, closing the glass façade behind me. Behind me, there is no indication of the austerity from our interior. Instead stands a glass office building. Swirling with many things that only a few truly capable people like myself can see, but a standard office building none-the-less. I’ve been told those swirlings are important, to hide what it is from some hunters of some kind, but I’ve never seen one, and if they’re really supposed to hunt us, I’d assume they, too, would be able to see what isn’t. But that’s not my field of expertise.

Walking down the street, I head into the donut place first. They make the donuts fresh, so they take a minute to make. There’s a line of four people. Standing in line feels like it takes forever. I watch as the lines that make up the air flow vigorously in the wrong direction. If I were to realign them with the echoes I can feel under my feet, I could make the world a more cohesive structure. But I know better than to play with such affairs outside of one of our Towers. Too much risk. This isn’t a controlled environ. Eventually, the line passes through to a new line, awaiting their orders, and it is my turn at the register. “Morning sir,” the clearly overworked and half-asleep cashier begins, “What’ll you have?”

“A dozen chocolate donuts with standard glaze. A dozen plain donuts with black-and-white frosting, and a dozen plain donuts with standard glaze.” I give him the order as clearly as I can.

“A dozen chocolate glazed, a dozen plain glazed, and a dozen black-and-white?” he checks with me.

“Yep, thanks.”

“That’ll be twenty-four eighty five. Name?”

“Law,” I say with a smile. I pull out from my wallet a twenty and a ten, and hand them to him. “Just keep the change as a tip,” I offer as he types it out, “For me being far too early for anyone to have to deal with all this.”

He chuckles. “Thanks, man,” he says, printing out the receipt and handing it to me before he begins counting out the tip, then looking at the queue, he adds, “It’ll probably be like ten minutes.”

I check the time. A little close, but good enough for me. “I’ll be back quickly, then,” I reply with a smile. Then, looking at the line forming behind me, I offer up an additional, “Good luck.”

He chuckles a little as I walk away. Folding this receipt, I place it in my wallet. Walking three blocks over to a local cafe that my boss prefers, I head in. THere is not nearly the line here that there is at the donut place. Probably because, other than my boss, no one in the universe actually likes this place more than any other given coffee shop in a ten block radius. But, sometimes sucking up is important. The barista, Evalynn, recognizes me from a several other times over this last month and change, since our bosses became looser about handing out passes to us riff-raff. “A dozen heavy cream caps?” she says. She makes sure to intone it like a question, but we both know it isn’t. I nod and she gets to work as I approach the counter. She rings me up as the coffee is brewing. I hand over a pair of twenties and a pair of fives. She smiles, shoves one into the tip jar, then starts printing the receipt as she heads over to finish making the cappuccinos. She has the timing down. She has to, every time I’ve come here before seven in the morning, she’s the only person behind the counter. She briefly swings past the register to hand me the receipt, which I take, fold, and lay behind the other receipt. Then she’s back to the foaming and whatnot. I head to the dropoff point, just in case someone comes in. No one does. She hands me the tray with a smile. “Have a good day.”

I smile right back. “Until next time I have to gather coffee for the office,” I joke with a little wave. She nods and I head out, using my back to open up the door. I check the time before I leave. I’m going to be cutting it close if the donut place isn’t running smoothly. But they seemed to be doing a good job with the flow earlier.

I head across the blocks back to the donut shop. Eight and three quarters minutes passed during the coffee run. I balance my tray of coffee on one hand as I push open the door and head into the store. The two of the three people who were in line before me have already left. The third already has his donuts, but he’s still stacking things to figure out how he’s carrying his order to wherever he’s headed. The line is still longer than it should be this early, though it doesn’t seem to have grown much since I left. I give the cashier a smile and nod as I head to the waiting area in the rear of the store. Once again the twinkling, empty, powerless flow in the air tempts me to fix it, whooshing past with futile aggression. It wants to be fixed. But I can’t. Not without studying the consequences. I’d hate to cause the swamp to overtake the city even more than it already has. A real possibility when messing with nature. Stretching my neck a little, I try to find anything else to focus on. But there is nothing. The people are milling about, boring and sleepy. Unimportant. The people behind the counter are glazing my donuts. Machines further back are churning out new donuts, one after another after another after another.

“Three dozen for ‘Law’,” the final donut glazer says. I step forward and carefully place my tray of coffee onto the three boxes of donuts, then lift from the bottom box. Using my knee to pull open the door, I head back to the Tower as quickly as I feel comfortable moving with three boxes of donuts and a large tray of coffees precariously perched atop one another.

As I come upon the office building, I hope that I didn’t take too long. Using my knee once more, I try to pull open the door. It’s locked. Missed the fifteen minute grace period. Crouching over, I carefully put down the boxes, walk over to the side of the doors, and swipe my pass once more. Once more I can hear the whirring and the fizzing. Walking back to my pile of unhealthy breakfast, I crouch down and once more pick it up. I pull open the doors with my knee and head up to the Experimental Library of the Tower. I have to be there before seven, when work begins. So no one complains about being hungry when we start our testing and research. When I arrive, I enter the conference room in the center of the library and lay out the boxes. Just as the other early-waking members of my circle begin to wander into the library.