'tis the damn season • matt sturniolo

CHAPTER 3

"Okay, maybe if I just don't move for the time being, they won't notice that I'm here!" Cecilia leans back in her seat and slides down.

"So, about that!" Celina laughs uncomfortably. "Me and Gia kinda passed them as we walked in.. like they looked at us and everything so they know we're here."

"If you bitches had just showed up 5 minutes earlier." Lisa glares at the two girls. Gianna turns to face her. "Blame belellish, not us."

"Trust me, I am." Cecilia zones out on the half drunken coffee on the table in front of her, trying to distract herself from the fact that her literal ex boyfriend that she hasn't seen in a year and a half is in the same small room as her.

The amount of times she thought of him today has her thinking, what if that was her mind warning her for this?

"I actually haven't ordered yet and I don't know how long they're gonna be here for, should I just go?" Celina asks the table. "You can, I'm not going anywhere." Cecilia answers.

Lisa says slowly, "Cece.. you're kind of the only one who's ordered so we all need to get up."

"You are not leaving me alone at this table right now." She looks around and sees all her friends eyeing her, knowing they're about to do exactly that.

"Also, you have to get up because I'm on the inside of the booth." Gianna has a regretful look on her face.

"The one day you get the inside of the booth this happens. I'll just go with you guys because I don't want to be alone at the table."

Lie. She wants to see if Matt will say hi to her.

"It'll be okay! Just pretend you don't see them. Look like, super distracted in our conversation and if you almost make eye contact, pretend someone's calling you and take it outside. Easy!" Gianna devises a plan as they all stand up to make their way to order their drinks.

Cecilia hesitantly scoots out towards the end of the booth and stands up, her eyes focused on her shoes as she walks with her friends to the counter. She can feel eyes on her almost immediately, and she knows exactly who it is. She knows what his stare feels like. But she doesn't dare turn around, instead conversing with her friends about random stuff as Gianna orders.

She keeps her back facing towards the 3 brothers, but she knows they're there. She notices Lisa looking past her head though, her eyebrows raising slightly. Then, her hand reaches up to give a small wave.

f*ck.

Cecilia hears footsteps coming towards them, and her eyes shut, trying to prepare herself to look at them. Preparing herself to talk to her ex boyfriend and as a result, her ex best friends.

It's not like she wanted to stop being friends with Nick and Chris, they were some of her closest friends in the world. But with them moving away, and her ex boyfriend being their brother, drifting from them was inevitable.

"Hey guys!" A too enthusiastic voice breaks through her thoughts, knowing that voice belonged to Chris. Gianna walks back from ordering just as he speaks, her eyes widening the tiniest bit.

Her eyes land on Chris, giving him a small but genuine smile. Okay, maybe this isn't so bad. It's just old friends reuniting. Her eyes go to Nick next, everyone having already said "hi", or "how are you guys?" but Cecilia hasn't said a word.

She realizes she hasn't even looked in Matt's direction yet, so she does.

When she looks at Matt, she finds his eyes already fixated on her, and something tells her they've been there for awhile. She doesn't know what to expect, but it certainly wasn't a f*cking staring contest because neither looked away for what felt like an hour, but was really only 8 seconds.

"Hey Cece."

Oh!! Okay!!

She removes her eyes from his and looks around his whole face. Not much changed, although his hair is a little bit longer. She takes a deep breath before answering.

"Hi Matt."

The air in the room is thick, everyone kind of standing around awkwardly and not knowing what to say. Making matters worse, Matt just can't take his f*cking eyes off of her. She's contemplating using that pretend phone call trick that Gianna told her to use, but she actually gets a phone call instead.

She looks down at her phone and sees it's her brother, James, and rolls her eyes before telling everyone she'll be right back.

"Who was that?" Lisa asks as Cecilia returns.

"James." She responds with an eye roll. Nick's eyes light up at the mention of her little brother. "JAMES!! How's he doing I haven't seen him in ages!!"

"Well.." She starts. "Dumbass decided to throw a party while our parents are out of town since he's a senior now. Someone apparently broke my moms favorite vase at the party so he asked me to come over."

"Oh, you're leaving?" Cecilia turns to see Matt's eyebrows drawn together in confusion. "Not yet, I told him I'd be over in a few hours."

Matt's face relaxes. "Oh, okay." A ghost of a smile appears on his face.

and so it begins.
the next chapter will be the last chapter of the coffee shop i swear.
also this is not proofread so shhhh

<3-ash

'tis the damn season • matt sturniolo - 003 (2024)

References