This is Lamar:

      Lamar is a twenty-something that works at the ferry bar serving coffee and day-old muffins to irritable and ungrateful costumers.

      He likes his Martin acoustic guitar (named Susanna), indie-bands, and writing music. He dreams of becoming a professional music artist some day.

      Lamar dislikes the yuppies, trophy wives, fan-freaks (especially those of the female-tween variety), tourists, and musky hippies that make up the majority of his clientele. In simpler terms, he hates everything about his minimum wage, soul-crushing job.

      Well, he doesn’t hate everything about it. He does enjoy creating various coffee/mocha/latte concoctions and writing mini-songs in his head about his day. He also finds himself looking forward to the time of day when he rings up one particularly mousy costumer’s chocolate croissant and Coca-Cola….

      This is Carter:

      Carter is a freshman at San Francisco State University that likes dipping his chocolate filled croissants in his Coca-Cola and enjoys natural history museums along with books by Joe Kane and Sherman Alexie.

      Carter dislikes commuting (especially by ferry), Twilight fan-girls, and rainy days.

      … Sadly, he is currently stuck on the ferry, sitting next to an individual that would fit the “fan-girl” description more than adequately, while it looks like the heavens are having some sort of pissing contest outside.

      Little do Lamar or Carter know, their paths are about to become a tad tangled together.

      “Oh my god, like, I TOTALLY love the rain. Did you know vampires like the rain too? Actually, it’s just like, they like hella cloudy days and stuff? It like, keeps them from sparkling because the sun makes them, y’know, like, sparkle…?” The fan-girl next to Carter has been gushing about her love of the fictional, pasty, patriarchic male lead of the Twilight series and Stephanie Meyer’s genius for at least the last twenty minutes.

      Carter has been tuning her out for at least nineteen of those minutes.

      Resting his head against the thick, plastic ferry window, he watches the rain run down in little streams, their paths constantly changing. He also notices how rough the waves are getting, and how much the boat is actually swaying. Maybe it’ll just tip over, I’ll drown, and I’ll be put out of my misery. … Or at least she’d drown. … Yeah, I like that option better… He thinks to himself breaks off a piece of croissant to dip into his coke. Fumbling to reach for it, he blinks when it’s not in his grasp. Turning, he visibly twitches in irritation when he sees the girl besides him has it in her hands, taking a sip.

      “Like, do you mind? I LOOOVE soda. I’d really miss soda if I was a vampire. Do you think vampires can have sodas if they like, mix blood with it? I heard a gross joke once about like, a tampon and tea and a vampire? It was like, really gross,” she rambles without taking a breath. She doesn’t even bothering to wait for Carter’s negative reply as she takes a long, slurping sip, wincing at the taste. “Ewww, it tastes like chocolate! That’s gross! Like, why do you do that? Like, dip your food in coke? Like, do you do that with everything you eat?” She takes another, ear ringing slurp. “You don’t talk much, are you like, really mute or something?”

      Jesus Christ, does she breathe? Carter stares at the girl incredulously for several long, speechless moments, before he simply sighs, not even knowing how someone could be so rude. Whatever, she can have the damn coke. Someone this crazy has got to be diseased. He futilely hopes if he ignores her, she’ll stop talking to him. He also begins to wonders as he catches a glimpse of his book in front of him exactly how hard would he have to hit someone with it to knock them unconscious…

       Lamar watches the scene from the coffee bar with pity and amusement. Poor kid, the girl’s taken a fancy to him. Or she just likes listening to herself. Probably both. He chuckles as he shakes his head, continuing to clean mugs. Today’s been a slow day due to the stormy weather, so any entertainment is welcome in his book. Still, he feels bad for the squirrelly guy sitting by the window. No one deserves to be subjected to both motion sickness and having to sit next to some girl who seems to be stuck in some sort of perpetual tween-light.

      Carter continues his best to ignore the insufferably talkative girl besides him, having yet to hear her breathe as her words begin to blur into a stream similar to the “wah-wah-wah” of the adults in Peanuts cartoons. Grabbing his book, he prays for some sort of mental escape at least as he opens its pages. He barely reads half a word before he feels a tap at his shoulder.

      “…Hellllllo~? I asked if you’re, like, cousins with RPatz?” The girl besides him asks, also surprisingly pausing for the first time since she’s opened her mouth.

      “….. Um… who…?” he asks after a few moments, realizing that her pause isn’t for a breath of fresh air, but actually is in fact to give him a little time to respond—but she gives him only that just barely.

      “RPatz! You know, like, Robert Pattinson? Like, you know, the like, beautiful specimen of man that is like barely worthy of playing Edward Cullen. Like, he is SO Edward Cullen! He’s pale like you, and you like, both have the same auburny hair and he kinda has a scruffy beard right now for like another movie like you have right now and high cheek bones and like, dark eyes and everything. Are you like, British? I think I heard like, and English accent when you talked! OH my god where are you from?! Oh my god, you’re like, FROM England, aren’t you?! OH GOD, you’re like, not just RELATED to Robert Pattinson, holy CRAP you must be him! OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD—“

      Jumping at her sudden squeals of excitement, Carter backs up against the window, now actually seriously considering putting his theories about using his book as a weapon into practice. “Oh. That guy. U-Um… no… I… I’m not quite sure how you came to that conclusion without any actual evidence, but… uhm,” his words are stammered, his chuckle staggered, “Huh-how do I put this? …. Do I look like I’m brooding, a chain-smoker, or… well, I guess according to you I DO look British…”

      The fan-girl resumes her incessant, bone-shattering squeals once more, causing Carter to jump enough to hit his head against the window. “OH. MY. GOD. That is EXACTLY something RPatz would say if he was like, out in PUBLIC—See, he is SUCH a good actor he can like, sound hella AMERICAN if he wants—LIKE HE DID FOR EDWARD CULLEN OH MY GOD.”

      Oh my god, this is the crazy shit you hear about on Dateline. She’s going to murder me or something THIS. CAN’T BE HEALTHY, Carter thinks to himself as he presses his back with more force against the ferry building wall. He is now not only painfully aware of the obsessive girl more or less has him cornered, but also of the rocking motion of the boat. Neither helps his growing anxiety as he subconsciously attempts to will himself to disappear.

      Lamar nearly drops a filter filled with old coffee grounds at the sound of a feminine screech. Eyebrow quirked, he looks over his shoulder to see that it’s emanating, unsurprisingly, from Madame Fan-girl. He laughs to himself while he tosses the grounds into the trash, catching a glimpse of the terrified boy’s expression. Crap, he looks like a mouse cornered by a cat… As funny as this is to watch, it’d be mean to let this go on much longer. The poor guy actually looks terrified! Can’t blame him, I’d be terrified too… He washes his hands and dries them. He tosses the towel onto the counter before he casually fills up a glass with coke. Holding the glass steady in his hands, he makes his steady way towards the table where the usually mousy boy is praying for an escape from the fan-banshee.

      The girl continues to squeal, reaching over to actually try to pet Carter. Not knowing what else to do, really, Carter tries to push her hands away with disgust. He doesn’t even notice the coffee-bar guy set the soda-glass down on the table. Jumping at the sound of the glass clinking onto the table, the girl suddenly stops her screeching long enough to give the coffee-bar guy a frigid glare.

      “’Scuse me, miss?” Lamar asks, his tone quiet as he leans forward towards her, resting his hand on her shoulder. “I didn’t know how to tell you this… but… Well, see that kid with the greasy black hair, leather jacket and the Green Day shirt over there? The shirt that's got all the nasty holes in it…?”

      Craning her neck to look past Lamar the coffee-guy, she sees him on the other side of the ferry, slightly banging his head as he listens to MP3 player. “…. Yeah…?” Her tone is cautious as she warily glares back towards Lamar while she scoots closer to Carter. “What about him? He’s like, not cute or anything and you are like, interrupting my time with Rob here so can you just like, get to the point--?” she continues to ramble on while reaching for the soda, which Lamar artfully slides just out of her reach.

      “I just wanted to say that you seemed like you know good literature, and he was talking about some book series called Twilight or something,” he grins when he sees that he has her attention, and that Carter’s expression has shifted from the fearful to the plan confused.

      “….. Uh-huh…?” the girl continues with devout attention, her smile smug as she giggles some. “So, like, what did he say about the best book series ever, huh?!”

      Lamar licks his lips, trying his hardest to keep his composure or, at the very least, not to laugh. “Ohhhhhh nothin’ much, really. He just mentioned something about it being a sloppily-written, plot-less waist of production efforts written by some conformist whore that has more or less destroyed the vampire genre.”

      The girl’s eyes widen before her expression becomes cold and deadly. Narrowing her eyes into a glare, she shifts her weight to look past Lamar to the individual in question. “…. If you, like, excuse me,” her words are grainy through her gritted teeth as she pushes past Lamar and ignores Carter. Even with a supposed celebrity in her mists, a fan-girl must never let someone have a different opinion about something she deems as absolutely brilliant as her obsessions.

      Carter’s frame melts away from the wall with relief. Lamar waits until the girl is out of earshot before pushing the coke back onto the table. “…. I suggest you take the coke and follow me before she comes back.” Carter jerks at the sound of Lamar’s voice—not because it was particularly jarring by any means (anything that wasn’t that girl’s voice could have been mistaken for angels’ voices), but because he had almost forgotten that the man was still standing there. Glancing over towards the girl who is now wailing towards the unsuspecting guy-wearing-the-Green-Day-shirt, Carter sheepishly nods as he grabs his book bag and soda. Sliding out of his seat, he obligingly follows after Lamar to the coffee bar.

      “Just sit down on the floor, kiddo!” Lamar flashes a large, kind smile as he motions for Carter to drink his soda. Feeling his cheeks flush, Carter smirks as he slides down to the floor, sitting with a quiet thud as he contently slurps at his soda.

      Lamar glances around for any costumers before he leans back to sit on the floor as well, wincing as his back cracks. Leaning his head back against the cabinet, he taps his fingers against his leg, his dark eyes shifting over towards Carter with a curious glint. “What’s your name, man?”

      Stopping mid slurp when he notices that Lamar is now sitting next to him, he feels his ears grow hotter as he murmurs around the straw. “Carter Howard. …. But, uh, I guess nobodycallsanybodybytheirfirstandlastnamessoit’djustbeCarter,” he rambles out quickly, before putting his focus back in slurping his drink.

      Wonder why he’s so nervous? Lamar thinks to himself while he nods, letting a beat and a particularly loud slurp from Carter’s straw pass between them. “My name’s Lamar—“

      “I know!” Carter quips back quickly and excitedly, before his face flushes again. Clearing his throat, he hesitantly reaches over to tap on Lamar’s name badge, before snapping his hand back, returning to his soda, which is now just ice.

      “…. Okay, so I just had a blonde moment. Sorry about that…” Lamar laughs as he glances down at his badge, his dark skin thankfully hiding his blush. “You know what, Carter? She might have been a chatty sonofabitch, but I would have at least gotten her number.”

      Carter’s eyes widen at Lamar’s suggestion, and he nearly chokes on a piece of ice. “…. Okay, I might not know you at all but from what I can tell you seem pretty sane…”

      Chuckling still, he pats Carter’s shoulder, shaking his head as he explains. “Hear me out here! You could have taken her out to dinner or something, aaaaaand, I dunno, maybe she’d be into that freaky vampire stuff!”

      Carter staring incredulously at Lamar, he chomps on his ice a few times, before swallowing it, nearly snorting it out of his nose as he begins to snicker. “Um… I... I think you got the wrong idea about me--”

      “Oh, don’t say it’s not you’re thing—most young guys want to try that at least once!” Lamar insists, rolling his eyes teasingly before he holds out his hand to take Carter’s cup from him.

      “No, I mean—,“ Carter starts, before he thinks for a moment as he waves his hand to show Lamar that he is fine with just the ice. His blush grows deeper as he speaks. “Um... Lemme… uh… put it this way. You ever heard the joke with people in Hollywood? Or I guess just about people in general—about if a guy is just gay or British?”

      “Yeah, I think so. Why?”

      “…. Well, um… l-let’s just say Mary-Sue-Crazy over there? Um… she had a fifty-fifty chance of guessing the right answer between those two, and, uh… she… pickedthewrongone.” Carter feels his heart thumping in his chest as he tilts his head back to catch another piece of ice to chew. Jesus, why am I getting the jitters? This is a ferry to San Francisco, for christsakes!

      Pursing his lips, Lamar pulls a knee to his chest while he nods. He doesn’t miss a beat as he shrugs and grins, his eyes shifting over towards Carter before he bounces his eyebrows. “…. So… you’d only be interested in crazed vampire kinks from an annoying fanboy?”

      Surprised at Lamar’s easy reaction, he smirks as he nods, doing his best not to laugh. “Um, I guess…” his words are simple as he feels himself begin to relax, gnawing at his lower lip.

      “If that’s why you’re so tense, doooooon’t worry. I’m an open minded kinda guy! No judgin’ here! … Well, except for that bitch I saved you from. I’ll judge kids like that all day.” Lamar watches fondly as Carter laughs with a snort, glad to see the poor-kid finally looking less miserable.

      “Um… thanks. For, you know, giving me an out. … And bringing me a new coke. She drank my other one...,” Carter’s voice is quiet and shy as he keeps his gaze on his cup, his fingers fiddling with bending the straw every which way.

      “I saw that! Jesus, people can be so rude.. … But then again, she thought you were some sorta celebrity, so she’s probably missing a few seeds in her gourd anyway,” tapping Carter’s cup, Lamar raises a curious eyebrow as he tries to get the boy’s attention. “If you don’t mind me asking, why do you dip your croissants in your coke?”

      Carter blinks at his question, glancing at him cautiously before answer, his own eyes baffled. “H-How did you…?”

      A small, self conscious smirk settles at Lamar’s lips, “Well, you’re here every morning, and you order the same thing, and you sit in the same seat. I… guess I kinda noticed…. ... … That sounded a lot creepier than I meant it to be.”

      “It actually didn’t, uhm, sound that creepy…” Carter laughs, adjusting his jacket hoodie to try and conceal his blush. “… Do… you notice everybody like that…?” His face grows hotter, feeling almost like the beginning of a sunburn. Oh jesus, now I’m sounding creepier than Mrs. I-Want-To-Be-Edward-Cullens.

      “Honestly? Not really, no,” Lamar says after quick hesitation. “Everybody else sorta blurs into one big picture that preeeetty much consists of nothing but coffee orders. You’re, I dunno, interesting to watch. Now, are you gonna answer my question or not?” He teases, nudging Carter’s shoulder with his own.

      Glancing down to his cup, Carter pushes around the last ice cube as he shrugs, gnawing at his lower lip as a flattered smirk ghosts at his lips. “It’s not really an interesting answer…. I just… y’know, got a sweet tooth or something. Like, it just tastes good, I guess? I never really thought about it…”

      Lamar nods as he grins, reaching over and pushing Carter’s hoodie away from his head. “Sounds like an interesting enough question for me! And why you wearin’ a hoodie, huh? It’s not raining in here!” Not surprisingly, the moment that he says this, the ship sways in the choppy waters, the rain beginning to pounder harder all around the boat with water splashing onto the decks. “… Although it might be if this rain keeps up. Shit, it sounds like it’s gonna bust a window!”

      Carter braces himself against the cabinet when the boat sways. He does not really hear much of what Lamar is saying in regards to the weather as his own thoughts begin to wander. I wonder... I mean, crap, I’m probably wrong. I’ll proooobably just make an idiot of myself if I ask… But… he seems nice and… he has a really, reeeeeeally nice smile…

      “Mind if I ask you a question…?” Carter asks, throwing a side glance over towards Lamar.

      “Shoot!” Lamar says, all ears and alert.

      The sound of the rain pinging against the windows is matched by the thudding of Carter’s heart in his ears. “Are you…. Um… g-gay or British…?” He can feel his stomach twist when Lamar begins to laugh again, his eyes beaming and his smile gleaming.

      “Well, considering that I don’t have a British accent, and the fact that I think you’re kinda cute? Well, that makes me pretty gay.” Despite his good-humor, Lamar’s own face becomes a deep red. His fingers also begin to tap nervously against his leg as he wets his lips. “Um, and I guess the fact that I didn’t hit up Vampira-groupie-girl over there was a pretty good indicator too. Maybe?”

      Hardly able to believe what he’s hearing, Carter looks over towards Lamar with wide eyes, searching to see if he’s joking. When he sees that he is in fact serious, he laughs as well in relief. Shit, this has GOT to be one of the least suckiest ferry rides I’ve been on… He thinks to himself as he glances up towards the ceiling, before frowning when he catches the time on the register clock. Shit, we’re gonna be there soon… Well, that is if we don’t frickin’ capsize first… He fiddles with his now empty coke cup and its obliterated, crushed straw again, before he suddenly realizing that he didn’t pay for it.

      “Um… I.. well… the ferry’s gonna be docking soon… And, well… um… H-How much, uh.. do I owe you… f-for the co—“ he starts as he faces Lamar, before he reels back at the coffee-bartender’s lips pressed against his in a sweet, espresso flavored kiss. Once he realizes that he isn’t hallucinating, he relaxes into it, his eyes fluttering shut as he rests his hand against the other man’s cheek.

      Lamar draws back slightly, smirking against Carter’s lips as he murmurs softly against them, “Just this… And maybe your phone number…”

      Carter grins from ear to ear as he keenly slips his fingers into Lamar’s short curly hair, resting his hands at the back of his neck. I would have sat next to some crazy bitch on a ferry months ago if I knew something like this would have happened! Biting his lower lip, he does his best to keep from laughing and murdering the mood as he leans in to give Lamar another kiss. Figure’s the fairy would meet a guy on the ferry.

illustration by Hayley Hart