If Isaac Newton had lived in the twenty-first century, he'd have discovered a totally different Law. Fuck gravity and inertia, he'd have declared. Here's the ineluctable rule that truly describes our universe:

There is exactly one hottie in every Starbucks.

I used to love Starbucks, which is why I've visited at least one on every continent. I've discovered that this rule holds hard and fast. It works day and night, 365 days a year; it includes the customers and the employees. It's true whether there are two people inside, or whether there are two hundred.

It's like when a really hot man appears at their door, the previous one clocks out and heads home.

Starbucks is the only company I know that has this law. Lots of chain establishments draw in hot men by the dozens -- Whole Foods, Gold's Gym, Hunting World. Other chains are vast plantations of mundanity. Nobody within half a mile of Quiznos has ever come close to the hottie hurdle. I think that's why their employees are so depressed, aside from the fact they toast Sonoma Turkey Sammies for a living.

Nope, it's just Starbucks that has exactly one hot man in every franchise.

I was a regular for a year or two, spending a few hundred a month and thinking I had a chance with the hottie. I'd scope out the situation while I was waiting in line. I'd find the hottie, then ask myself what Jennifer Aniston would do. Sometimes I'd sit nearby and offer to share my newspaper. Sometimes I'd "accidentally" drop a napkin at his feet. Once in a while I'd pretend to search the ground around him for open electrical outlets while secretly admiring the breadth of his thighs.

I clearly remember the day I gave up. I was right behind the hottie in line, and I ordered the exact same thing he did so we'd have something to talk about. "Why, I would ALSO like a half-skim-soy quarter-caf free-range caramel macchiato, please!" I said excitedly. We waited at the counter, and when the first drink was ready I made a fake grab for it. "Oh, gosh!" I said, pretending to remember. "Looks like we have a lot in common!"

"Except for the 'gay' thing," he replied.

That was it. I gave up. Said sayonara to my long-term goal. I accepted the fact that the insane hottie-to-regular-folks ratio made that $12 coffee break absolutely futile. The hottie would go over to get sugar and there'd be eight other singles elbowing me out of the way. "Skim milk?" offers one. "I don't see an ounce fat on you." "I'll bet you don't need sugar," gushes another. "You look naturally sweet."

Last Saturday, though, the rain was coming down in buckets, and my pride lost out to my flattening hair. I raced eight hundred other soggy New Yorkers into line, ordered my usual, and scurried over to the last empty table. My hair was starting to spring back to life when I spotted the requisite hottie standing at the counter.

Staring directly at me.

No, I said to myself. It's not possible.

I looked back. His eyes never left me.

Well, I thought, maybe it's God's little joke. He waited until I gave up, then he gave me what I wanted. Little pink butterflies fluttered in my chest. Staring. It was like we were the only people in the store.

I blushed. I giggled. I slurped the whipped cream off my frappuccino and let the whipped cream drip from my mustache.

I held my breath as he made his move. It's like time stood still as he approached, his scruffy brown hair announcing the sensitivity of an artist but his broad shoulders promising the force of a brute.

He leaned in close enough for me to smell espresso on his lips. "Hey," he said in Barry White's voice, "you wanna get outta here?"

"S-s-sure," I stuttered, sending an unspoken "Thank you, God!" to the invisible forces above. And then I grabbed my drink and headed toward the door while he and his girlfriend sat down.