All Starbucks baristas

The barista takes my hand and leads me to a storage room in the back, a coquettish smile spreads across her face.

She slams the door behind her. "You know what I'm going to do next?"

She takes a piece of paper out of her forest-green apron. She pulls a pen out slowly with her unoccupied hand.

"What's your name, young man?"

"John."

"...like this?" The barista ends her feverish scribbling and turns the paper to me.

"Jawn"

I frown at the sight of my misspelled name.

"Oh sorry, is this how you spell it?"

Once more she shows me an incorrect rendering of my name.

"Jahn"

"You incorrigible woman..."

"I am no woman."

She takes off her flesh mask, revealing a writing pile of tentacles.

"GAZE UPON MY TRUE FORM"

Using her own squid ink, she attempts to write my name one last time.

"dʒαn"

I scream. Her correct use of the international phonetic alphabet brings me to the top of my mountain of bliss.

Like Sisyphus rolling his boulder up the mountain, I hope she brings me to that torrid peak tomorrow.