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The crisp early morning air nips at Mark’s skin through the red, knitted cardigan he hastily pulled on before leaving his apartment. A light pink tint spreads from the tips of his ears down to his cheeks. He regrets not grabbing a scarf, but it’s too late now, his destination approaching.
Blood Moon Cafe.
Mark is a notorious cafe-hopper, known to visit every new cafe he stumbles across. It started as a simple, fun hobby sparked by his love for quiet spaces to sip drinks while reading novels. He made a routine of photographing his drink of the day alongside the current book he was reading to social media along with a detailed review of his cafe experience. Unexpectedly, his posts gained a lot of attention and his follower count sky-rocketed, leading to a blogging company reaching out to him with a job offer and a generous sign-on bonus.
That’s how he unintentionally landed the perfect job for his interests. Running a blog where he posts descriptions of the cafes he visits, recommendations for his personal favorite spots to visit, snapshots of menu items he orders and small annotations of whatever book he is reading at the time.The Blood Moon Cafe is his all-time favorite cafe by far.
Mark’s favoritism for this particular cafe is biased, ranked as his favorite spot because of the “beautiful view” it offers, as he stated in his blog post covering the small cafe. Little do his readers know, the mentioned ‘beautiful view’ has nothing to do with the cafe’s interior design nor the view outside. Instead, it refers to the cute barista who captivated Mark’s attention at first sight and hasn't left his mind yet.
Jeno. That’s what the cute barista’s name tag said. The name lives rent-free in Mark’s mind, inserting itself into the books he reads when romance is the genre.
Mark is thrilled when he finally reaches the cafe building, tucked away in the less-populated part of the city, surrounded by vacant buildings with ‘For Lease’ signs in the windows. There’s hardly any foot traffic in the area, but the cafe’s long-standing existence goes to show that the business manages to bring in a sustainable amount of customers despite the barren location.
The soft chime of a bell sounds above the door when Mark enters. His eyes are glued to the off-white pages of the current book he’s reading; a fantasy romance novel. He’s three quarters of the way through the paperback novel, invested in the detailed storyline. His goal is to finish the remainder of the book before the day’s end. With the current time being 3am, that leaves twenty-one hours to accomplish the goal.
While he is aware that reading while walking is risky, Mark is unable to pull his nose out from the book’s pages. The consequences of his actions come when Mark runs into something solid, dropping the book in his hands and reaching his arms out to steady himself. His face burns red, matching his cardigan, when he realizes the solid thing he ran into is a person. And not just any person — the center of all his most recent daydreams and the only barista working the graveyard shift — Jeno.
“I am so sorry, I should have been watching where I was going. Here, I’ll clean up the mess,” Mark sincerely apologizes, looking down to the ground where shattered shards of a mug the barista had been carrying lay spread out, seeping into the pages of his fallen book. He crouches down to retrieve his book, freezing when he gets a better look at the liquid spilled out from the mug.
Naturally, his original assumption would have been that the drink was black coffee, but now as he views the liquid up close, he’s certain it is not coffee. The liquid is a little too thick and a little too dark red to be considered coffee-esque. It takes him a few seconds to register the sight in front of him.
Blood. The ‘mug of coffee’ was undeniably a mug of blood.
Mark slowly looks up from the spill, glancing first at Jeno whose eyes are wide with worry and then towards the only other customer in the cafe at this hour. The customer glares back at him with glowing red eyes, anger evident in their expression. Human eyes don’t glow abnormally red, last time he checked.
Uh oh.
Mark doesn’t know the appropriate reaction to this situation, though making a run for the door and never looking back seems like a great option. He slowly rises to his feet, hands clutching at his now-stained novel with a white-knuckled grip.
“He’s seen too much,” the angered customer hisses out through gritted teeth.
Mark’s eyes go wide and he takes a step back.
“I’ll handle it. Please, just sit patiently until I re-make your order,” Jeno responds in a tone bordering on fear.
Jeno has a nice voice. Mark could listen to it all day without growing tired, however, the words ‘I’ll handle it’ are the last thing he wants to hear after witnessing something he was not meant to see.
“I won’t say anything, I swear! I’ll go straight home and never come back, please.” Jeno seems to be getting closer, making Mark take continued steps backward until he runs into the edge of a table. He stumbles, nearly falling over before Jeno grabs his arm to catch him, pulling Mark in.
“Look at me,” Jeno demands.
The last thing Mark wants to do is upset him — lest the next mug of blood served ends up being his blood — so he looks at the (highly intimidating) barista.
‘Look at me. Look at me. Look at me.’
Mark hears the same words being repeated over and over again in his head, Jeno’s voice clearly defined as if he were speaking directly into Mark’s ear. But Jeno’s lips aren’t moving. And yet, Mark can hear his voice clear as day.
‘Look at me. Don’t take your eyes off of me.’
Mark couldn’t look away if he wanted to — not in his usual ‘I have the biggest crush on this man, I can’t take my eyes off of him’ way — his eyes are literally glued to Jeno’s gaze, unblinking. He tries to close his eyes, but his eyelids won’t budge. He tries to turn his head, but it’s as if he’s frozen, unable to feel anything besides the firm grip of Jeno’s hand on his arm and the burn of the barista’s intense gaze.
“You didn’t see anything,” Jeno says, without breaking eye contact. “Tonight’s visit never happened.”
Mark feels a heaviness begin to take over his body. His bones feel like they’re made of lead, an invisible weight dragging him down. The sensation makes him feel like he’ll fall over at any second, but Jeno’s hold on his arm remains firm, the only thing keeping him centered in the midst of this storm he has stumbled into.
“You didn’t see anything,” Jeno repeats himself. “Tonight’s visit never happened.”
“I didn’t see anything.” Mark’s mouth moves on its own, his voice sounding odd and almost robotic to his ears as he repeats the barista’s words without thought. “Tonight’s visit never happened.”
“What did you see,” Jeno asks.
Mark’s eyes feel heavy despite him not being able to recall feeling tired. His eyelids beg to weigh themselves down so that they can slip shut, but he can’t seem to close them. His vision goes blurry, making it difficult to tell if he really just witnessed Jeno’s eyes go from a warm brown to a glowing red, or if he just imagined it.
“What did you see?”
“Nothing.”
Once again, Mark doesn’t even get the opportunity to think about the question being asked, his mouth opening to respond without command.
“You didn’t see anything.”
“I didn’t see anything.”
Mark really can’t see anything. The current state of his vision reminds him of when his glasses lenses are blurred and smudged by fingerprints that he was to wipe away with alcohol to make them clear again. He can’t do that with his eyes though.
“Were you at the Blood Moon Cafe tonight?”
“No.”
“You didn’t visit?”
“No.”
Mark’s head begins to throb with the threat of a headache. He can’t think, unable to string together a single coherent thought.
“You were not at the Blood Moon Cafe tonight.”
“I was not at the Blood Moon Cafe tonight,” Mark parrots back, his voice silent to his ears. He feels his lips move to form the words, but he can’t hear anything other than Jeno’s chilling voice.
“ Sleep. ”
The heavy feeling in his bones triples in intensity. That single spoken word hits him like a ton of bricks, shoving him off the edge of consciousness. Mark feels himself fall out of his body, heavy and weightless at the same time as he sinks down further and further, drowning in a glowing red sea behind closed eyelids.
Mark feels like shit.
He wakes up experiencing what feels like the world’s worst hangover. His head is pounding and his eyes burn with dryness.He doesn’t remember drinking… he rarely drinks past the limit of ‘mildly tipsy,’ and doesn’t understand why he is hungover if he didn’t consume any alcohol.
He groans to himself, massaging at his temples. It’s dark outside, telling him that he slept the day away which is… not very like him at all. Though, Mark finds it understandable for himself to sleep all day if this is how he’s feeling.
An iced coffee accompanied by the remaining pages of the current book he’s reading sounds heavenly. He knows just the place for night time coffee and reading sessions.
Blood Moon Cafe.
The soft chime of a bell sounds above the door when Mark enters.
The scent of fresh coffee grounds wafts through the air, the aroma so strong it makes Mark feel like he just walked directly into a mug of coffee. There’s only one other customer present when Mark enters, the stranger sipping from a mug while staring out the window.
Mark approaches the counter to place his order, forgetting how to form words when the barista greets him.
“Long time no see! What can I get for you today?”
Mark loves the sound of Jeno’s voice, chilling, yet soothing. It’s almost… hypnotic, in a way.
“Always nice to see you again, Jeno,” Mark tries (and fails) not to sound too awestruck when he greets the oh so beautiful barista. “Just a medium iced coffee, please.”
The barista gives him a warm smile that contradicts the chill of his voice. Jeno rings up the order, gesturing for Mark to take a seat once the transaction is complete.
“Make yourself comfortable, I’ll have that iced coffee out to you shortly.”
Mark settles down into a booth seat, reaching into his tote bag to retrieve his book. His expression twists in confusion, alarm in his eyes as he takes in the sight of red-stained pages. Mark is always extra careful with his books, he doesn’t understand how this could have happened.
Mark tries to think long and hard about what kind of activities he could have gotten into that would leave him with red-stained novel pages and a massive hangover feeling. Trying to recall those memories seems to make his headache worse, so he gives up.
Mark slips the stained book back into his tote before gratefully accepting the iced coffee that is handed to him.
“One iced coffee, here you go. Let me know if there is anything else I can get you.”
“Will do, Thank you.” Mark sips the coffee and lets out a pleased hum. It tastes delicious, probably because Jeno made it. Mark tries so hard to not be biased, but he can’t help it.
Good coffee, noise mindfulness, and a cute barista managing the cafe during the night. The full package. Mark loves everything about the cafe, from the excellent staff to the considerate customers. Mark feels like a fly drawn to a web, unable to resist the cafe’s clutches.
He loves the Blood Moon Cafe.