The Coffee Machine | Teen Ink

The Coffee Machine

March 4, 2020
By nickcicala, Greenwood Lake, New York
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nickcicala, Greenwood Lake, New York
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Author's note:

In this piece I came up with two very likeable characters that make the story so much more interesting.

Wesley grew up in the suburbs of a small town in Michigan, he had lived here in this privilege wonderland his whole entire life. Wesley is a lanky five foot ten boy with dark brown hair and his face consisted of freckles everywhere. He had his right ear pierced and as everyone at school said, his only personality trait was how he only wears a pair of beat up maroon converse from 2002. His sixteenth birthday had just passed and his basic everyday routine was back in play. Wake up, go to school, take the bus home, do school work, and finally, go to sleep. He has been aching to experience something new for once in his life, something exciting that doesn’t just consist of him sitting on his couch watching Grey's Anatomy for the fifth time within a span of two days. Everyday at school Wesley daydreams in the middle of social studies class about how amazing it would be to travel to the future. His best friend Miranda often discusses this with him too; everyday after school while they get their weekly iced lattes from the Bouton Coffee Company downtown they rant about how they grew up in the wrong era. Miranda is shaped like her mom's vintage hourglass mug from the antique shop in town which she loves to bring up every now and then. She also has bright green eyes and wears bandanas on her head every chance she gets. She's a hippie and her car always smells like burnt wood and honey glazed candles, she also has a cat named fruit loop. Speaking of Bouton Coffee, Wesley and Miranda were on their way there right now. 

“Three Forty Three PM, year 2005”, Wesley shrugs in the passenger seat of Miranda’s car as he reads the time off her dashboard. 

“Did you see the new episode of Grey’s last night?” Miranda exclaims in a monotone tone. 

“Yup. It wasn’t as good as the last” Wesley says bluntly. 

“I’m so bored of this life we are living right now, it's like we are living on repeat doing the same things over and over and-” Wesley gets cut off after Miranda screams. Her car swerves off the road on a backstreet surrounded by woods. 

“That did not just happen!” Miranda yells. 

“I cannot stand these stupid potholes all over these roads, like at least do a little maintance or something” Miranda complains as she gets out of her car. Wesley opens the passenger door while shaking and catches up to Miranda analyzing the ground. 

“This is exactly why I am scared to get my license” Wesley exclaims. 

‘Yep!!! It was a dumb pothole, it literally just ripped off part of my tire, my mom is going to actually kill me.” Miranda says in a worried tone. Suddenly, a loud inhuman noise exerts out from deep in the woods. Wesley and Miranda instantly grab onto each other and stay put behind her car. 

“Yeah I know this is scary and all but we literally always complain about our lives, lets go check it out.” Wesley says excitedly. Miranda surprisingly didn’t fight back and followed Wesley into the direction that they heard the noise. It was around mid fall so the leaves were falling off the trees and there was a cool breeze causing the two of them to shiver a bit.

“At least this is pretty, the leaves are raining on us.” Miranda says softly. The two of them laugh as they make jokes here and there about what the noise could have possibly been when all of a sudden they hear the same noise again but it sounds five hundred feet closer. Wesley and Miranda inch closer to the sound and start to hear a vibration coming from under the piles and piles of leaves right beneath them. All of a sudden a giant breeze comes, blowing the leaves away. When the two of them look down, there sits something that is still partially covered by what's left on the ground. Miranda just doesn’t care and pulls it out from where it is laying.

“Is this a coffee machine, this looks like a keurig from the year eighteen hundred, who was here? My grandma?” Miranda says in the most sarcastic way. 

“That is not a coffee machine Miranda.” Wesley says in a serious tone. Wesley picks it up and examines it closely. It seems like some sort of contraption that hasn't been touched in a decade. It was probably about thirty pounds and had a lever on it along with a few buttons. 

“Let's place it on the ground and see what it does.” Miranda says while grabbing it from Wesley and putting it on the surface below them. Miranda then grabs the lever and plays around with it until it all of a sudden unlocks vertically and extends like a handle on a piece of luggage. Suddenly a small red button lights up on the contraption and makes a small ding noise. 

“Should we……” Wesley starts talking.

“Press it.” Miranda interrupts. Wesley inches closer and softly presses the red button in. Nothing happens for a moment when all of a sudden what looks like a wave of turquoise escapes from the lever that was sticking out from the “coffee machine” as Miranda would call it. Suddenly there is a bright flash of light sending Miranda and Wesley to the ground covering their eyes. What seems like a minute goes by until Wesley and Miranda finally stand up and gain their vision back. 

“What-” Miranda says.

“The-” Wesley says.

“Where in god's name are we?” Miranda questions. The two of them grab onto each other and slowly do a three sixty turn to see what is surrounding them. The scenery around them was no longer trees or leaves or grass; there were glass structures everywhere, the ground looked like it was made up of neon green plastic. There were no animals in sight, no feeling of a breeze anymore, the sky was bright blue, almost too blue. 

“Miranda where are we?” Wesley asks rhetorically. The two of them inch their way out of what seems like a forest of glass. They are left standing on a street where they thought they came from, but Miranda's car was no longer in sight. There sat a pod, it was a small white sphere like machine that levitated about a foot off the ground. Miranda looked at their surroundings and examined the street, although it was bright green and the consistency was not like a regular road, she could still see a faint mark of where the pothole that originally damaged her car used to be. 

‘Where is my car!!!!! Someone took my car!” Miranda yells.

“That's what you are concerned about right now?! Your 1999 Subaru?” Wesley questions her.

“From what I can see it seems like we are in another universe right now so I think your little old car is the least of our worries at the moment.” Wesley exclaims. 

“I need a coffee.” Miranda says while sighing. Wesley and Miranda then get closer to this pod that is floating off the ground and don’t know what else to do so they just get in. It was very snug and there were two soft seats inside of it facing one another. When they both sat down the door slid shut. A robotic like voice started speaking to them.

“Welcome Miranda and……  Wesley” the voice stated.

“Um this is so weird what is going on.” Wesley says. All of a sudden a hologram looking touch screen lights up between the two of them. There's a search bar asking for their destination. So as Miranda would do the first thing she types in is, “Bouton Coffee Company”. She then presses okay, the pod lights up from the outside and quickly starts traveling down the road. 

“Okay but like honestly this is so cool Wesley, we always talked about how bored we were and now something interesting is actually happening to us for once, no one will believe us if we ever talk about this.” Miranda says.

“I mean you’re right, what's the worst that can happen, we get stuck in the future?” Wesley says while nervously laughing. Suddenly a clock illuminates onto the wall of the pod, it reads, four thirty PM year 2230. Miranda and Wesley's jaws drop.

“We traveled over two hundred years into the future, Wesley.” Miranda says.

“This is absolutely insane.” Wesley whispers. Suddenly the robotic voice interrupts them again,

“Miranda, Wesley, you have now arrived at Bouton Coffee Company.” Wesley and Miranda step out of the pod, but Bouton Coffee Company is nowhere to be seen. It just looks like a house. 

“Girl if they don’t have Bouton Coffee in the year 2230 then I want out, the aliens can have fun with their acid juice or whatever they are drinking around here.” Miranda exclaims.

“No Miranda relax, lets go check it out.” Wesley says. The two of them walk up the steps leading to the “house”, they open the door revealing what looks like an extremely futuristic cafe. 

“Ok wait this is kinda cool.” Miranda exclaims. The two of them laugh and sit down, a regular waiter walks over but once they take a closer look they realize that the waiter is a full on robot that just looks exactly like a human.

“How are we supposed to trust anyone around here, what if these people eating aren't even human?” Miranda questions. 

“All we gotta do is just not interact with them just in case and we are fine, let's mind our business like we always do in computer class, ignore them just like we ignore Miss Welber.” Wesley says while laughing. Five minutes go by and the waiter brings Wesley and Miranda their drinks, the usual lattes that they always ordered. The two of them continue to just talk and laugh and enjoy the time they have in this unusual place while they can even if it does feel like a dream. Suddenly Wesley and Miranda hear a bell ring, the doors to the cafe open. Two people walk in slowly, they have their hoods on which they then take off. The two adults are glowing, they walk in talking to each other while giggling. The boy stands almost six feet tall, he has one earring in his right ear, freckles scattered all over his face, dark brown hair and maroon converse. The girl stands a bit shorter than the boy, her scent radiates honey and firewood, she has the brightest green eyes and wears a light red bandana over her hair, she's shaped like an hourglass. Wesley and Miranda slowly turn back towards each other in awe and shock. 

“Could we please have two iced lattes.” The mysterious couple asks the waiter.

“Coming right up.” He says.



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