Philip Collyer vs the Cola Thief Read online

  Then he heard Lisa declare, her voice shrill with hostility, "You don't get to drink our coffee! You go away, or I'm going to get every person in this building to open all the attachments in their spam folders. I mean it!"

  Phil wasn't quite sure whether to be moved or mortified, but her threat obviously worked, because no one showed up in his doorway.

  He deleted another fifty e-mails that day and then slunk off to his sister's for the evening, certain Kester didn't have her address.

  Lauren let him skulk in her living room and eat cookies. She even offered him one of her banana-and-pickle sandwiches and put on Star Trek so they could both ogle Chris Pine. She didn't push him to explain, though he knew that wouldn't last.

  The next day, he got an unexpected summons from HR.

  "I know who took my drinks, and I'm not filing an official complaint," he said as soon as he crossed the threshold. "You don't need to follow up on it."

  He got a beady-eyed stare and a finger pointed at the chair. "Do sit down, Mr. Collyer."

  Phil sank into the chair, trying to bite back his defensive reaction. He hated everything about this room, from the dusty slats of the blinds to the motivational posters framed behind the desk.

  "Mr. Collyer, I must remind you that you are expected to inform us of any long-term medical conditions. If you wish for your insurance to cover—"

  "What?" Phil said, genuinely baffled. "I don't have any medical conditions."

  He got teeth bared in an approximation of sympathy. "While lifestyle-induced conditions may be embarrassing, denying the truth—"

  "I'm not ill!" Phil protested. "I have no idea what you're talking about!"

  For the first time ever, he saw signs of discomfort. "I have been reliably informed… . Perhaps there has been some misunderstanding… ."

  "About what?" Phil demanded.

  By the time he'd gotten an answer and convinced HR he was in perfect health, Phil was furious. Everything made a skewed kind of sense now, and it enraged him even more than the original theft. He stormed through the office, dimly aware of everyone's eyes turning toward him as he took the stairs to the basement with his fists clenched.

  The minions both started up as he slammed in, but he strode past them without hesitation to plant his hands on Kester's desk and roar, "I am not diabetic!"

  Kester's initial look of shock faded, and his mouth twisted stubbornly. "I saw your prescription."

  "It wasn't mine!" Phil bellowed. He hadn't raised his voice in years and was surprised by how liberating it felt. "It was my sister's!"

  Kester's mouth fell open. For a moment, he said nothing. Then he cleared his throat and said weakly, "Oh."

  "I can't decide which is worse: that you tried to control my health without even asking, or that you thought I was stupid enough to drink something that would kill me!"

  "Phil—"

  "Go to hell," Phil snapped and meant it. He turned and shoved his way back out of the basement, past Kester's aghast minions and the crowd around the doorway—Lisa and Tim and Sharleen and even HR, all staring at him as if he'd grown a second head.

  HE spent a second evening on Lauren's couch, even though she smacked him around the head and called him a whiny diva.

  Phil ignored her. He'd been flattered that Kester was attracted to him, but he'd thought he liked him too, despite his boring life. He'd thought Kester respected him.

  "It's just a fucking drink, Philip," Lauren told him. "Get over it and give me back my baby monitor."

  Everyone seemed to be avoiding him at work, possibly because he snarled whenever someone gave him a pitying look. This was why it was a bad idea to sleep with co-workers, even if you were a sad loser who never met anyone else.

  Kester didn't come by, not even to steal coffee, though one of the minions sidled in with a mug and had some sort of silent eyebrow-twitching exchange with Lisa.

  "If you keep scowling like that, you'll scare the baby," Lauren told him, "and then she'll grow up thinking all gay people are mean and grumpy. You're damaging her social conscience."

  "Do you want this crib assembled or not?" Phil snapped back. "He lied, and I thought he was—" He choked on that. I thought he was the one. I thought I was starting to love him.

  "Philip," Lauren said quietly, and there was a note in her voice that made him feel like the younger sibling. "It sounds like he meant well. Sometimes you have to look at the intentions, not the outcome."

  ON Saturday morning, he was surprised by a ring at the door. He glanced out the window warily, but it was only some delivery guy.

  Phil opened the door and just stared. The guy was holding three twenty-four packs of cola. He rolled his eyes at Phil. "Grocery delivery."

  "I didn't order anything," Phil said.

  "Yeah, we figured as much." The guy shook his head. "You've got someone weird in your life, man. Me, I just send the girlfriend flowers when we've had a fight."

  "Er…."

  "Let me in, will you? These things are heavy and I've got a hell of a lot more in the truck."

  Bemused, Phil showed him to the kitchen and then went to help him with the next load. By the time they were done, the kitchen table was stacked high. At a guess, Phil reckoned there must be at least two hundred cans there.

  "Sign here," the guy said and shook his head again. "Seriously, what the hell is wrong with flowers?"

  "Flowers are nice," Phil said blankly and followed him out to the porch. Once the truck had backed away, he looked up and down the street, pinching himself slightly.

  It only took him a moment to spot Kester, hanging back on the other side of the road. Phil lifted his hand and saw Kester's tentative smile as he started to walk toward him.

  "I'm sorry," Kester said as soon as he was close enough. "Don't hate me. I couldn't stand it."

  "I don't hate you," Phil said and realized it was true. The apology was just as absurd as the original crime, and it soothed the raw edges off his pride. This was Kester, after all, and he always threw himself at a cause. He'd made a mistake, but at least his heart had been in the right place. He was brave and passionate and a little crazy, and those were all things Phil loved about the man.

  Kester looked sheepish and miserable, his hands shoved in his pockets. "Is there any chance? For you and me?"

  "Yes," Phil said because he couldn't bear to actually see that misery. "Yes." And he moved forward without thinking and wrapped his arms around Kester as tightly as he could.

  Kester looked up, hope flaring in his eyes. "Really?"

  "Really," Phil promised and then added, because he couldn't quite hold it back, "I'll need someone to help me drink all those cans, if nothing else."

  "Cola's bad for you," Kester said instantly.

  "That's all right," Phil promised. "I'll steal yours."

  Other Books by Amy Rae Durreson

  Novels and Novellas

  Fantasy and Science Fiction

  Reawakening

  Resistance

  Recovery

  The Lodestar of Ys

  Emyr’s Smile

  The Court of Lightning

  In Heaven and Earth

  Lord Heliodor’s Retirement

  Ghost stories

  A Frost of Cares

  Spindrift

  Something Wicked This Way Comes

  Short stories

  Contemporary

  Philip Collyer vs. The Cola Thief

  Humming a Different Tune

  Fantasy and Steampunk

  The Clockwork Nightingale’s Song

  Historical

  Aunt Adeline’s Bequest

  Seasonal

  Gaudete

  The Ghost of Mistletoe Lock

  The Holly Groweth Green

  About the Author

  Amy Rae Durreson is a quiet Brit with a degree in early English literature, which she blames for her somewhat medieval approach to spelling, and at various times has been fluent in Latin, Old English, Ancient Greek, and Old Icelandic, thou
gh these days she mostly uses this knowledge to bore her students. Amy started her first novel a quarter of a century ago and has been scribbling away ever since. Despite these long years of experience, she has yet to master the arcane art of the semicolon. She was a winner in the 2017 Rainbow Awards.

  Blog: amyraenbow.wordpress.com

  Twitter: @amy_raenbow