Darius the Great Deserves Better - Adib Khorram Page 0,43

his musk as I did (at least I hoped it was him and not me), dodged around Alexis, who was carrying a gaiwan service to a table in the corner, and made it to the shelves.

Rose City Teas had never been so packed. But it was an unusually warm Saturday, and we were launching our new Nitro Earl Grey, served float-style over vanilla ice cream from this artisanal ice creamery down the block.

I wiped the sweat off my forehead with the crook of my arm and started unboxing, using a little retractable box knife to slice the tape and flatten the empty boxes.

Each box of sixteen tins had four smaller cardboard boxes inside, with four tins each.

I didn’t understand the point and purpose of double-boxing.

“Do you have any English Breakfast?” a voice asked behind me.

“Oh.” I stuck the knife back in my pocket and turned around to face a woman about Mom’s age, with her purse slung over her shoulder and her arms crossed. “We don’t have any traditional English Breakfast. But we have an Assam that’s similar, and—”

“Can you check in the back?”

I blinked.

We didn’t have any English Breakfast in the back, because we didn’t actually make any English Breakfast.

Mr. Edwards once told me that English Breakfast was “terribly pedestrian.”

I never knew exactly what he meant by that, until now.

“Sorry. I mean we don’t make it at all. But I can help you find something similar. We’ve got lots of great options.”

I pulled down a couple different Assams and one Keemun.

“These are all single-estate black teas. These two are from India, and this one is from China.”

I had the woman smell each tea (just the dry leaves) while I described the flavor profiles.

I felt kind of like Mr. Edwards, using words like malty and smoky and umami as we talked. The woman’s eyes lit up when she smelled the Second Flush Assam.

“This smells great!” she said.

“Want to try a cup? I can steep you one.”

“All right.”

I led her to the tea bar and got a cup steeping. As the leaves unfurled, she told me about how she and her wife had just moved to Portland and were looking for a new tea store.

I was telling her about some of our other teas when Mr. Edwards hollered at me.

“Darius, aren’t you supposed to be stocking?” Mr. Edwards asked. His sleeves were rolled up, revealing the winding vine tattoo on his left forearm, and his cheeks were flushed.

“Sorry, I was—”

“I need more nitro. Like now.”

“Sorry.” I turned back to the lady, my ears burning. “Sorry. Enjoy your tea.”

“I will. Thanks.”

I tried not to blush.

I loved it when I could help someone find the perfect tea.

I squeezed past Kerry toward the stock room, where we kept the wooden palette of nitrogen tanks. They were about three feet tall, with no handles: awkward, but not that heavy. I weaved it back out to the tea bar, where Mr. Edwards had me set it down.

“Thanks.” He knelt under the bar and disconnected the empty tank. “Here. You know where the empties go?”

“Yeah.”

But before I could grab it, there was a tinkling crash of porcelain from one of the corner tables.

Mr. Edwards made this sound that was part sigh, part laugh.

“Can you . . .”

“Yeah.”

I had been back and forth from the store to the stock room so many times, I was surprised I hadn’t worn a groove into the floor. I grabbed the broom and dustpan off the wall and snagged a couple towels off the shelf.

“I can clean that up for you,” I said to the pair of older men, who had managed to knock two gaiwans off their table. Shards of white porcelain and long green leaves of oolong lay in a forlorn puddle of wasted tea on the floor.

One of the men nodded at me but didn’t make eye contact. I swept up as best I could and knelt down to get it all into the dustpan, but as I did, I heard something.

A terrible something.

A ripping sound.

I scooped up the last few pieces of gaiwan and sopped up as much as I could with the towels, but there was so much.

“I’ll be back with a mop. Sorry.”

“Could we get some more of your Da Hong Pao?”

“Um. Sure.”

I tugged my shirt down behind me with one hand and hurried into the back.

Something terrible had happened to my pants.

I hid behind the door and felt my pockets to find the problem.

The edge of the box knife I’d been using was still sticking