I blink across the counter at him, trying to wait out my annoyance. But then, before I can plaster over the crack, I press up on my tiptoes, exaggeratedly looking over his shoulder (one of two excellent shoulders, not that I should care) to the street beyond, the dark green awning of a fancy shave shop flapping gently in the spring breeze.

“Did you come here in a time machine?” I ask sweetly. I lower back down to my heels, meet his eyes so I can catch the expression I’ll see there.

Blank, flat. No anger or amusement. The most sans serif person.

“A time machine,” he repeats.

“Yes, a time machine. Because no one has said ‘shopgirl’ since—” Parchment wares, is all I can think, annoyingly. So I finish with an exceedingly disappointing, “A long time ago.”

I think my shoulders sag. I am truly terrible at confrontation, though this man, with his blank handsome face, seems unusually capable of making me at least want to try getting better.

He clears his throat. He has fair skin, an aesthetic match for the ruddy tone in the dark blond of his hair, and part of me hopes he flushes in shame or embarrassment, some physical reaction that would remind me of what I’d seen in him all those months ago. Something that would remind me he’s not a man-sized thundercloud, come to monsoon on the rainy disposition I already felt taking hold before he walked in here.

But his complexion stays even.

I could’ve been wrong that day, thinking he was lost or sad. It could be that he’s just a smug, stick-up-his-ass drone. Thinking of him this way—I wish it made me feel better about what I did, but it doesn’t, not really. It was so . . .

It was so presumptuous. So unprofessional.

But I’m all out of patience now, no matter the error I made, especially since he doesn’t even know about it. I may not be good with confrontation, but I am exceedingly, expertly good at avoiding it. I can paste on a smile and finish this shift for Cecelia and get him out of here, back to whatever doorman-guarded high-rise he lives in with his fancy wife who never has ketchup stains on her clothing. A shopgirl, for God’s sake.

“Anyway,” I say, clenching my teeth in what I hope is an approximation of a smile. “May I help you with something?”

I think, in the pause he leaves there. Flat, flat, flat.

“Maybe,” he says, and for the first time he removes his hands from his pockets.