Daily Casting
Melzi is dragging himself home after a brutal day and a night and a day of work, classes, more work and more classes (he probably dragged himself home at some point for sleep, but if he did he can't remember it) the first time he smells it: dark and rich and tempting as sin, wafting from a gently lit store front. Melzi’s fried brain conjures an image of the smell, a cartoon billow of delicious smoke licking at his top lip, dragging him by the tip of his nose to the glass door. The edges of his toes float over the sidewalk, as if the smell is lifting him, delivering him to its source. His mouth waters as he reads “Javalounge” printed thickly over the front door. Weak name, Melzi thinks, but the smells emanating from the building are strong enough to pull him through the door anyway.
The cup of coffee Melzi buys isn’t so much coffee as it is pure and utter ambrosia. It’s blacker than anything Melzi has seen in this world or any other, thick and heady with dark spice. He feels a little drunk after two cups: flushed with warmth, frenzied, happy. The sound he makes, slouching in a chair at a table as he bites into a flaky pastry is, frankly, a little inappropriate for someone initiated into the Secrets of the Universe.
Fuck it, this coffee was worth it.