NORTHSIDE BAKERY
A Simon Mohr Very Short Story
by Simon Mohr
All Rights Reserved
Gay Erotic Fiction. Adults Only. If this story is illegal where you live, or if you are a minor, please do not read it. This is fiction. No reference to any person, living or otherwise, or a specific place is intended. Please donate to the Nifty Archive using the donation information listed on this site.
All Rights Reserved
It was fair, and he knew it. Pierce anticipated getting fired. This late arrival would be his third time late to work at Northside Bakery. His old alarm might have worked, but he hadn't heard it.
His Honda tire was flat; he hadn't checked the piece of crap out last night before he went to bed. Oh, he knew the rules about work attendance at Northside Bakery. Mr. Settelmeyer posted the rules and verbally reminded his employees about them as often as he took a breath.
Older, cranky, and balding weren't just terms to describe Mr. S.--they defined him.
He parked the motorcycle, chained it to the rack, and went inside the bakery. A few customers were already there stuffing their faces with donuts or, excuse me, croissants. Some croissants had a chocolate filling, some not. The customers all looked like they needed the slurped wakeup juice, the coffee from hell, worth half what they paid for it. Somehow the lineup behind the counter didn't seem right, and the manager, Karen, was fluttering around as she'd never been in the store.
" . . . and they took him out about an hour ago, eyes closed, ventricular tachycardia, pale, why I've never seen anyone as sick as that in my entire life, I swear . . ." Pierce blinked. What in hell was going on? Karen, the manager, saw him standing there.
"Oh, Pierce, I'm so glad you're here. I need you to manage for me until I get back. I'm going to get some flowers for the boss from Jim's florist down the street. Keep an eye on Linda. She needs to be more careful getting her orders right this morning. She might be flustered; I don't know."
Pierce recognized that fate, possibly karma, something, had stepped in on his behalf today. He wasn't glad Mr. S. was sick, but given the total picture to consider, grace took unexpected form at times. He decided that karma hadn't entirely favored him, however.
In the ideal blissful resolution of his problems, he would have been sent by the manager himself to perve once again on his crush, a guy named Bruce, who worked at the florist shop. He had never spoken to Bruce but dreamed about him some nights. Bruce was a junior at the University of Portland, just a few blocks away.
Jim's was the florist of choice in the Northwest side of Portland. If one of any status required flowers, then sooner or later, the bell on Jim's shop door would ding, and money, sometimes a lot of it, would exchange hands for flowers.
Jim's Florist Shop carried gorgeous flowers in every color, every fragrance, fresh, without a wrinkle or a water stain in the lot. Jim knew his flowers like surgeons knew their anatomy and had the advantage of being polite and accommodating compared to surgeons, especially the orthopedic types.
Pierce despised orthopedic surgeons.
There was an ortho clinic across the street from Northside Bakery, and the docs and nurses and whomever else traipsed over a lot for goodies all fucking day long. The orthopedic surgeons acted like their orders had priority over whatever got in their way and they thought their answers to any question on any subject were superior to anyone else. Pierce re-arranged the pre-packaged sandwiches in the open cooler by the bottled juices for sale.
He thought again. Yep, he generally despised orthopedic surgeons. He liked his urologist and family doc, OK. He'd had a procedure to fix an extra something on one testicle, and the urologist was professional and kind. He would have recommended that doc for sainthood, but he moved his practice somewhere unknown.
Pierce went into the back room and kicked a box of paper hand towels viciously. He always treated people with respect and got frustrated when others did not. He hoped the paper towels wouldn't take offense.
It might have been about then an idea, a young sprout of a picture with potential to grow, entered the conscious part of his brain. It stopped him in his tracks. Cold. Then his mind began the internal conversation.
"Nah, that couldn't be true. It's not me. I never asked . . .."
"Why not try it out?"
"I wouldn't know what to say."
"You won't win it if you're not in it."
"This isn't exactly a lottery."
"True, but."
"Stop standing there."
The last voice wasn't his internal conversation.
The manager had arrived back and stood in the doorway, one foot pressed against the door jam, arms crossed. "Jim's shop isn't open yet."
That was all kinds of unusual, Pierce thought, but not his business. Making the manager happy was his business.
"Any trouble while I was gone?"
"No, uh, none. No customer complaints."
"There was one complaining out there in front of the counter when I got back just now. It looks like an ortho doc slept in his scrub suit and got up on the wrong side of bed this morning."
"Would you mind carrying on, Pierce? My babysitter called, and daughter #1 has red spots all over. I've got to run. Be sure and appoint someone to close. If it is you, change the sign to 'closed,' douse the lights, and lock up, front and back; you know the routine. Be sure to switch over to the answering service."
"Sure thing, Karen. Hope your girl is OK."
"Karen out. Call me if you need me, and it better be life and breath, buddy."
The complaining customer was in a blue scrub suit plastered tightly over the sweetest ass Pierce had ever seen or dreamed about as Pierce came up behind him. The customer was conversing quietly with Linda. "This drink is perfect, but when I tasted it, it wasn't the drink I ordered. I ordered a tall soy Mexican mocha half decaf with whipped cream. If I drink more than that, my hands might shake during surgery, not a good thing, right?"
Linda, frazzled, and more than a little defensive, wasn't in a mood for excellent customer service. "Hey, you said it was good."
"So, let me get this straight. It's OK to sell the customer something other than what they order. Then what if I take my patient's right arm off this morning in the operating room. No matter that he signed up for the removal of his left toe, the joint beyond repair from gout. Get my drift?"
Pierce, still behind the customer, stifled a quick grin, looked over the surgeon's shoulder at Linda, caught her eye with a movement, and shook his head. She got the message and rejoined the team at Northside Bakery.
"I'm sorry. Let me replace it. It's no excuse, but our owner got taken out by ambulance this morning, something about a heart condition . . ."
"Uncle John, oh, God!" The surgeon spilled, dropped the drink, and rushed out the door, calling on his cell.
Pierce finished mopping and clearing the mess from the spill, cleaning up the cup, lid, and coffee spill in a few minutes. The rest of the day was uneventful, without news from or about Mr. (or, for that matter), Doctor Settelmeyer.
Two days later, the Northside Bakery doorbell tinkled, and the ortho doc entered, still in scrubs. This pair was a different pair of scrubs. Pierce knew because coffee had stained the last scrub suit. Pierce had silently mourned missing the removal of those scrubs. He had wondered at the time if the doc's front side was as exciting as his ass but refrained from asking, having been taught better.
"Hey," he called to the man, "It's 'nephew-doc' back for his free tall soy Mexican mocha half decaf whip."
Jeff Settelmeyer, M.D., looked over at the red-haired manager with blue eyes and a 50,000-watt smile over perfect white teeth. Pierce scrutinized the buzz-cut blonde newly minted surgeon with blue eyes and a dimple on Jeff's chin.
"He's stable in the ICU. He had a mild heart attack and should recover. He won't be working for a prolonged time, though. The plans are for rest at home in a couple of weeks."
"Would you care for a breakfast sandwich or a muffin, perhaps even a, um, croissant to go along with your coffee this morning?" Pierce was capable of vamping that sentence. He gave it his all, an effort which would have made Mae West proud. He only left out the word 'honey' after the word 'sandwich.'
Jeff, surprised, looked then, really looked into Pierce's eyes directly and held the glance just a little longer than necessary. Touching his groin briefly, Jeff brought his tongue to one corner of his mouth for a split second. Seeing the answering grin, Jeff glanced down to Pierce's groin, noticed a bulge there he liked, came closer and whispered, "Anything orthopedic there, sweets?"
"I'm sure I cannot imagine what you all mean, honey." Pierce's eyes went up and gracefully out for a moment, channeling Mae. He listened for a response, heard something, didn't quite catch it, came back to reality, and asked, "What did you say, sir?"
"Muffin honey."
In some shadowy world of his own, his heart pounding, face flushed, hormones pumping, Pierce went behind the counter, warmed two chocolate croissants, and got a tall soy Mexican Mocha half decaf whip from the barrister and took them over to Jeff's table.
"Please sit with me. I want you."
Pierce's world got a little hazier. Jeff continued. "Did you know that all blue-eyed men and women have a common ancestor? Some person, thousands or millions of years ago, had a spontaneous mutation, and the result we see as mousy blue or vaguely blue or stunning blue, in your particular case."
"My uncle wants me to manage the store. I told him that I would delegate the task to someone who wanted and needed the job. My choice is you. I intend to work very closely with the manager. You will need to move in with me. In case you were about to ask, "how close?" my condo is three blocks away and big enough for two. I have a king-size mattress, and I don't wear scrubs to bed. People call me 'ecological' in that I wear far fewer clothes at home than most, waste less water, and less laundry detergent pollutes our seas. I get called out infrequently, but when I do, it is usually urgent. In between, I need to discuss manager affairs, get fucked, and eat, followed by repeat behavior. Would you be the manager of my assets, honey?"
Pierce's blue eyes dilated some, "I could do that. But first . . ."
"Yep. My butt first."
"You, sir, are an annoying little tramp."
"Thank you, son."
"That's better. I will punish any repeat behavior."
"Promise?"
"Guarantee it."
"Oooooh. If we get along and grow to care for each other and then like each other and then decide we can't live without each other, you will ask me to marry you and I will say yes."
"You are the guy I choose to sleep with for the rest of my life, my muffin guy. I'll teach you how to make me happy, starting with a tall soy Mexican mocha half decaf whip every morning with or without a chocolate croissant. It would be best if you promised me not to compete for orthopedic patients, however. Part of the deal."
"What did you say, Jeff?"
"Muffin honey."