Sweet Romance12 min read
I Threw Coffee at Him and Found My Future
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I still remember the exact weight of the paper cup when I threw it.
"You're breaking up with me because I'm not educated enough?" I said, my voice too loud in the café.
Lars Chapman blinked, offended. "Gina, it's not like that—"
"Then why is your newest girlfriend a sophomore with a brand-new bag that costs more than my monthly rent?" I asked, and then I tossed the coffee.
"Celine!" Lars hissed, like a boy being scolded more than a partner. "Don't make a scene."
The coffee splashed across his face and streaked Celine Wu's new LV. There was a short, bright silence, then a ripple of shocked murmurs.
"I should have known your taste would be for someone who uses his stipend," I said slowly, folding my hands like a judge. "Nine years, Lars. Nine years of me skipping nights to send you money, of me telling your mom you were studying while you were just... changing girlfriends."
Lars paled. "Gina—"
"My receipts," I said, and I slid a folded list across the table. "Every transfer, every ticket, every dinner. 'Repay' isn't a concept you understand, apparently. So pay back. Now."
Celine squeezed Lars's arm, eyes wide. "Gina, you don't have to—"
"Do I look like someone who can't do math?" I asked. "The bag will be cleaned with your money. The skirt you stole with my PayPal? Also paid back. Just Venmo me."
Lars looked like a man who had been punched where everyone could see. He fumbled with his phone with shaking hands, trying to pretend the payment was about dignity, not panic.
"You're cruel," he whispered.
"You're a liar," I answered. "Same difference."
"Give it back." Celine's voice cracked, and for a second I felt a flicker of pity. Then I remembered the photo she had sent me the week before—a kiss, proud and smug, right after he said he'd apply for the PhD funding. Nine years of promises dissolved into that photo.
"Sorry," I said, and I felt nothing, which surprised me. I had expected my chest to split open. Instead, there was a cold clarity. "If you're going to spend what I worked for, the least you can do is sign the invoice."
Lars paid.
"You should keep the skirt," I told Celine. "It'll match your new life."
After that, the cafés, the late-night calls, the plans we had made—everything folded like thin paper and blew away.
"Are you okay?" my friend Tova Mendez asked later. Tova had thrown down her sheet mask and grinned when I waved the itemized list.
"Better," I said. "At least now I know who I was supporting."
Tova clapped once. "You should've done that years ago."
I found an apartment, a small one, in a building where the landlady knew how to bargain and the elevators didn't play music. I took the job at the bank's asset management desk and doubled down on my life. I didn't date. "I want wealth," I told Tova. "Men baffle me. Money doesn't disappoint."
"Then let me match-make you," she said aloud one night on the subway. "Good-looking, stable, guaranteed."
I scoffed. "If he looks like the guy in front of us, fine. Anything less and he's out."
Tova elbowed me. "You're impossible."
Then the handsome man she had noticed before—the young new hire—looked our way. He had dark hair, a strong nose, and the kind of quiet presence that made the subway car seem suddenly smaller.
"Don't look," I told myself. "You're an adult."
He glanced briefly, then returned to his phone, eyes smart and kind. He got off at our stop. Later, at the company introduction, Octavio Romano, our manager, smiled and said, "Gina, meet Hayes Masson. He just joined finance."
Hayes bowed like a student meeting a teacher. "Thank you. It's an honor."
"Hayes," I said, because the polite world required names.
"Thanks, Gina," he said. "But you don't have to call me anything formal. Just Gina is fine."
He was twenty-two, classically trained at a top finance program. He laughed sparingly and listened more than he spoke. On our first company lunch, he kept noticing what I liked: "Pineapple? I just grabbed one for you."
"Why?" I asked.
"You said it once on the subway," he said, as if it were obvious.
He was helpful. He was soft. He was alarmingly present.
"Is he available?" Tova whispered later.
"Leave me alone," I said. "I'm buying a house."
Then the CEO sent Hayes to shadow me on a client presentation. He learned quickly. He asked gentle questions. When we returned late one night, the office suddenly plunged into darkness.
"Looks like the power's out," I said.
"Let's take the stairs," Hayes suggested.
I took his hand to steady myself on the stairs. His palm was cool. For a moment, somewhere between the eighth and the seventh floor, he froze—pale in the flickering emergency lights.
"Hayes?" I asked.
He gripped my hand like a frightened child. "Sister," he said, voice rough with something that wasn't fear but longing. "Sister."
I didn't understand at that moment. He held me as if he would never let go, and when the light returned, he looked down at our joined hands and said, "Thank you."
He walked me home.
"You're enjoying this," Tova said, when I recounted the walk. "You're keeping it in check. Leave it be."
I did. For a while.
We walked into work together more and more. He carried my heavy plan folders, sent me funny memes, and once—without saying much—threw me a rabbit-shaped cake on my one-month anniversary as his trainee.
"Hayes, you know I have a mortgage to think about. You sure this isn't a bit much?" I teased.
"If you like it, then it's worth it," he said simply.
I knew about the gap between us—age, experience, expectations. I told myself I wanted nothing but stability, but his care felt different. It was precise, a kind of small, steady devotion that didn't demand a leap.
Then one evening, as I walked out of a team-building escape game, someone slammed into Lars and Celine, who were having a very loud day outside a jewelry shop.
"What are you doing here?" Lars stammered when he saw me. "Gina—"
"Celine, your dress looks cute with the ring. Did you get it?" a passerby asked, and Celine blushed shyly, her finger bare. Suddenly it all sank into my stomach like ice.
"You're back with her?" I said.
"Stop," Lars said. "I'm trying to fix things."
"You fixed nothing," I said. "You fixed bills with someone else's money."
He wanted to make things right. He wanted to beg. Instead, Hayes stepped forward, voice low and oddly calm.
"You can't harass her," Hayes said. "Leave."
Lars's face crumpled with shame and anger and fear that I might do something stupid. "I'm sorry," he said. "I made a mistake. Gina—"
"Don't," I said. "Just go."
Hayes reached for me, and instinctively I let him. I felt what everyone kept saying: his hands were honest.
After that night, everything accelerated.
Hayes started bringing me tea. He stayed late to help with models. He was attentive without being invasive. He was patient when I was guarded, and he teased me gently about my practical spreadsheets and mortgage timeline.
"You're not a charity case," he said once, handing me a cup of chamomile. "You're the smartest person I know."
His words had the sound of truth.
One night on the elevator, I caught him looking at me differently. He blinked, then said, "Gina, will you let me be useful?"
"What do you mean?" I asked, though I felt the question like a hook.
"Let me take care of you," Hayes said simply. "In the ways that matter."
It took him two sentences to make me bend.
"I have a mortgage," I said.
"I'll help," he said.
We argued. We negotiated. I was hard. He was softer and relentless.
"I've liked you since I was seventeen," he confessed one evening in the office kitchen, where the hum of the copier kept our voices private.
"You were seventeen?" I said. "Hayes—"
"I remember the 5D theater breakdown at the amusement park," he said. "You were there. You were upset because someone stood you up. I sat next to you. You smelled like white tea."
It was ridiculous and fragile and real. It rewired me. Suddenly, all the small kindnesses made sense.
"I liked you first?" I laughed, actually laughed, like a small creature freed from a cage. "You should have said something sooner."
"I thought you had someone," he said, "so I just held on."
I thought about my nine wasted years, about the man who had used my money like confetti. I looked at Hayes: young, earnest, and steady. Against the grain of everything I had been taught about caution, something inside me broke open.
"Okay," I breathed. "Let's try."
Hayes kissed me outside in the warm glow of the streetlamps, and it felt right. Simple, irrevocable.
We moved fast. He introduced me to a house that was already in his name—a secret he had kept because he wanted to surprise me. He helped me handle my mortgage the practical way: transferring accounts, calling lenders, and quietly settling the whole mess.
"Hayes," I said one afternoon, "this is too much."
He looked at me like I was the only thing real. "You did your part for years, Gina. Let someone do theirs now."
We were married three months later.
On the day we went to register, the registry office was humid with summer and filled with people waiting to make their own promises. Hayes told me to breathe.
"You ready?" he asked.
"More than I've ever been," I said.
Then, like a gust of old wind, Lars Chapman and Celine appeared at the entrance—Lars pale and desperate, Celine frightened and glossy.
"Gina!" Lars called.
"Don't come near me," I said, because the registry had the kind of small, public world where every face in the room becomes a witness.
"What is he doing here?" Celine whispered.
"He's here to talk," Lars said. "We can—"
"Stop," I said. I saw the way his eyes flicked to the gold band on my hand, the one Hayes slid on at the registrar's counter. I felt the room narrow to the space between me and Lars.
"Do you remember the coffee?" I asked.
"What?" Lars said.
"The invoice," I said, and I placed my folder on the counter. "The one you paid. Everyone paid attention the day I threw coffee. But the receipts? I brought copies. Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to speak."
Every head turned. The waiting room hummed.
"This man," I said to the small crowd, voice steady, "spent years taking from my bank account. He promised to study, to build a life with me. He promised a future. He promised a PhD. Instead, he built new lives."
Whispers spread like wind through dandelion seeds.
"I have the transfers," I said. "I have screenshots of flights he booked for 'research' that were dinners with his new girlfriend. I have messages. He told my mother on the phone one day that I was 'too provincial.' I supported him through empty promises."
Lars's face drained. Celine's hand flew to her mouth.
"You're a coward," I said. "You left me after nine years. You took what I earned and turned it into jewelry. You used me like a stepping stool."
A woman in line gasped. "Oh my God."
"I don't need your pity," Lars said, voice small. "I—Gina, I made mistakes."
"Yes, you did," I said. "And the law may be complicated. But in front of these witnesses, I want you to understand something deeper. You hurt me badly. You lied. You chose appearances and excuses over truth."
Lars tried to open his mouth. The waiting room grew thick with onlookers pulling out phones.
"Do you want me to tell them about the text messages?" I asked. "The ones where you told Celine you loved the 'new life'—and planned to 'fix things' with your mother by blaming me?"
Celine's face was a mask of shock. "That's not—"
"It is," I said. "And I brought copies."
I unfolded the printed pages and handed them to the woman at the counter, who read aloud in a voice that scraped.
"'Can't tell my mom about rent. She'll freak. You look good.'"
A murmur.
"'We can go for the ring next week. I will figure out the PhD money later.'"
Silence. The registry clerk looked up with a frown.
Lars's jaw twitched. "You—you're playing this up."
"No," I said. "I'm showing truth. I'm showing all the nights I transferred money while you watched me tighten my belt. I'm showing the photo you sent me to rub it in. Nine years of making do became her handbag."
"Please," Celine sobbed at last, as if the world had fallen away. "I didn't know."
"You didn't know because you chose not to ask," I said. "You wanted the sparkle."
The cluster of bystanders started to react: a man shook his head, a woman whispered, someone took a photo. Computers hummed as strangers recorded the moment on their phones.
"What do you want from me?" Lars asked, raw and exposed.
"Public apology," I said. "Return what you can, and—most of all—tell your mother the truth."
He laughed hollowly. "You want me to grovel?"
"Yes," I said. "Stand here. Admit you used me. Admit you were wrong."
Lars looked at Celine, and something in his posture cracked. He had been used to making small-eyed bargains, and suddenly the currency wasn't cash but shame.
"Fine," he said. "Okay. I—I'm sorry."
The voice was small and didn't sound like repentance. People in line exchanged glances. "That's it?" someone whispered.
"Say it louder," I told him. "If you mean it, say it where everyone can hear and where you can see what it costs you."
He threw his hands up like a man flayed by light. "Okay! I'm sorry! I used Gina's money. I lied. I cheated. I let her pay while I chased a dream that wasn't mine. There. Happy?"
The registry clerk echoed, "That's... blunt."
"Thank you," I said coldly. "And Celine? You should know what you were stepping into."
Celine's face crumbled. Tears poured down. "I thought he was different," she sobbed. "I didn't... I didn't mean to."
A few people hissed. A young woman muttered, "Gross," and someone snapped a photo. Another gentleman muttered, "Classic."
Then Lars's mother appeared—an older woman with a strong jaw. She had come, it seemed, in support, but when she saw her son standing in a small public crowd with a woman he had hurt and a line of strangers, her face—once warm—hardened.
"What have you done?" she demanded, as if not caring where this was said.
Lars stammered. "Mom, I—"
"You made promises to that girl," she said, eyes flicking to me. "And you told me lies about needing more time and how she didn't understand." Her voice rose until it was a clear bell. "You left your responsibilities to—what? Own selfishness?"
The people around us leaned in. On a small leather bench, a mother across from us put her hand over her child's eyes. "This is intense," she whispered.
"Mom!" Lars said, chest heaving.
His mother turned to him with a look sharper than any blade. "You thought a fancy bag could replace character? You thought borrowed education meant you were exempt from honesty?"
Lars sank to his knees in the middle of the registry hall.
"I'm so sorry," he begged, but the sound had lost its currency. Phones flashed. People whispered. Some clapped softly—less in joy and more in judgment.
Celine collapsed into his arms, crying. The registrar peered over his glasses, uncomfortable. A woman who had been minutes from filing her own marriage papers closed her folder and left, eyes wide.
I felt a curious thing: relief. Not glee, but the cool water of vindication. I had not wanted blood on a public stage. I only wanted to be seen, to be heard. And now—stripped of the cheap artifice—he stood naked in his choices.
A man behind us muttered, "Karma's loud."
Lars's pleas degraded into incoherent fragments. "I didn't know how else—" "I thought I'd be better—" "Please—"
"Don't make it about you," his mother said sharply. "Make it about what you did. Tell them the truth."
He did. In fragments that were ugly and real. The crowd listened. When he tried to blame circumstances, a chorus of voices shouted him down gently, like someone discouraging a child from lying. An older woman who had been listening with sore attention asked, "So why not tell her? Why let her pay for you?"
He had no answer. Only shame, pouring out like a bad wine. Phones recorded every word.
When it ended, Lars—once so polished—was collapsed against the counter, crumpled and tremulous. Celine's shoulders shook. People moved away, folding the incident into their lives like a glance from a sudden storm. Three teenagers asked for a selfie with me. "We stan the revenge story," one said, laughing, and I felt a strange, distant amusement.
Hayes squeezed my hand through the entire thing.
"Are you okay?" he asked afterward, voice soft.
"I'm fine," I said. "I just wanted him to say it. And he did."
"Good," Hayes said. "You deserve someone who says sorry without having to be forced."
We left the registry to the ordinary sounds of summer—child laughter, a vendor hawking cold drinks, the city breathing. In the car, Hayes put the ring on my finger again, like a final seal.
"Ready for lunch?" he asked.
"Always," I said.
Three months later, Lars's reputation had frayed. Celine deleted her photos. The woman from the registry left a comment on a neighborhood forum praising me for being "brave." His mother texted me an apology that read like a letter to a stranger—awkward, ashamed.
As for me, I was discovering small, enduring joys. Hayes would stand in my kitchen stirring soup while I fussed with a spreadsheet. He would call a loan officer and insist on my rights as if he had been trained by life to respect me. He would make a face when I complained about paperwork and then kiss it into submission.
One night, when we hadn't fought but had argued gently about renovation choices, he came over and set two cups of tea on the balcony.
"What's that face for?" I asked.
"I get to annoy you forever," he said, smiling.
I rested my head on his shoulder. The city lights were a scatter of worn gold. I sighed and let myself believe.
It wasn't always fast. There were awkward conversations, mortgage meetings, nerves about family introductions. But I had gone from nine wasted years to a life where someone took my hand without strings.
"Do you ever regret not staying?" Hayes asked once.
I thought of Lars's pale face in that registry hall, of the cost of keeping a promise to someone who wasn't keeping theirs.
"No," I said at last. "Not once."
He turned to me, eyes clear. "Good. Because I'm terrible at wasting time, and excellent at keeping promises."
"Then keep them," I said.
He kissed me, like he had been practicing for years.
Our life together wasn't perfect. We both had edges. But in daily small ways, we learned to be better. We learned to be honest with money, with mistakes, with low cupboards and high hopes.
Once, when a neighbor knocked to ask about plant care, I found Hayes on our small balcony, talking to two little succulents like they were classified assets. He had that focused look on that made me think he was going to map out the next five years.
"You'll do?" I asked.
"Every day," he said. "I promise."
We had the kind of marriage that unfolded like a well-managed portfolio: patience, small investments, steady returns.
And sometimes, on a late summer afternoon, when the air smelled like white tea and the apartment hummed, Hayes would reach over and tuck a small note into my lunchbox.
"I love you," the note would say. Or, "You are home."
I kept them all.
I kept him.
The End
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