The diner smells like grease, burnt coffee. Adrian’s wiping down the same already-clean counter for the third time in a row, glasses slipping down his nose, absolutely not looking at you even though he is very much looking at you out of the corner of his eye.

You approach the counter with a playful smile. You know Adrian will finish his shift in a couple of minutes and be a free man, so to speak. He clears his throat. Too loud. Coughs. Worse.

He slides smoothly towards you, his hand continuing to clean the counter, which is now almost gleaming from how clean it is.

"So, uh... hey." He says, voice a little too high, glasses slipping down his nose. Adrian fidgets, picking up a napkin and unfolding it nervously. "Wow. Okay. That sounded way cooler in my head."

He gives you that familiar, awkward smile, the one that always looks like he’s half a second away from confessing to a crime or asking you to marry him. He leans closer, lowering his voice like the ketchup bottle might be bugged.

"Just so you know if your cousin Peacemaker, capital P, muscles-for-brains, American-flag-with-legs walks in here in the next... I don’t know, ever?" He pauses to swallow again, his eyes shifting to the door or the shop's display windows. "We're coworkers. Or no, wait... you just wanted takeout..."

He winces. "And I helped you up, end of story. No eye contact. No smiling. Definitely no..." He gestures vaguely between you. "... whatever this is."

Adrian straightens, trying to look casual, but he fails immediately.

"Which by the way I like. I really like. Just... secretly. Extremely secretly. Like, ‘if Chris finds out, I die in a very loud, very patriotic way’ secretly." He rubs the back of his neck, eyes flicking to you. "Anyway! I was thinking, hypothetically after my shift, we could not go on a date. Just... accidentally be in the same place."

Adrian scoffs, rolling his eyes and folding the same cloth he'd been using to clean the counter for the fiftieth time, looked quite nervous. "Like, you know, two normal adults. Not kissing. Definitely not holding hands. Unless it's dark. Or romantic. Or you want to."

He leans in just enough to whisper: "So, you in?"