The Fifth Season

CHAPTER SEVEN: A BURNING SENSATION

SNOH

        "It's pretty busy today, huh?" I jumped at the realization that Soleil was behind me attempting to get through the passageway that I was blocking with my slumped body. I wiped a couple of beads of sweat that had begun to form at the crown of my head; who knew after only a few hours of working, I would essentially run out of steam?

           It was odd. I was usually filled with loads of energy ready to be expunged while I was out and about during my day. But it seems the last few days, my energy level has decreased to the point where I was nearly falling asleep with every task I was doing.

            It also didn't help that I had been visiting the riverbank every day since that tsunami scare in hopes of finding Koia, but she was nowhere to be found; I was hoping to try again today to see if she was alright, but with the way my energy was depleting as we were speaking, I'm not sure if that was a sure plan or not.

             I cleared my throat embarrassingly, rubbing my consistently burning arm in an attempt to the soothe the constant ache it was experiencing. "Yeah, it is... I guess the menu items are pretty popular." I replied as I stepped aside to let her through.

             At this point I had no idea what was going on with my body, not even my mother's antidotes and medicines were doing much for me despite her countless efforts; I was basically on my own to figure things out myself.

             This is why I was going to take a trip to Crescent Moon Athenaeum—otherwise known as the official library of Wysteria; it had an expansive collection of works from all over Othea that possibly could help me with discovering all these weird occurrences. Saam was the one who suggested it to me when we were chatting the other day, but then my energy started depleting and it became more of an afterthought.

             Maybe I had caught whatever Iah had earlier? The flu of some sort.

              I watched as Soleil went into some cabinets to pull some more ingredients for the tree bar and plopped them onto an empty tray so she could take it all with her. I took a deep breath and collected myself so I could garner whatever leftover energy I could find to finish out my shift; I didn't want to leave early and have the other workers pick up my slack so I just had to suck it up for a few more hours.

            "Hey... are you alright, Snoh?" I opened my eyes and looked down at Soleil who had stopped just shy in front of me with her tray of items. Her moss-green eyes seemed to be especially concerned for me the way they were slanted and focused on me with intent.

             My lips curved into a small smile, "I am. I'm just a bit tired is all." I sighed deeply.

             Soleil gave me a sympathetic smile and lugged the tray up against her chest tightly, "You work hard Snoh, you deserve to give yourself a break! Especially with all these returning customers coming in... you'd be giving us some downtime if you did take some time off for yourself." She stated. I watched as her lavender hair slightly pulsated with the draft wind coming in from the back door; Soleil always liked to leave her hair out and I thought her large coily hair definitely suited her small frame pretty well.

             I gave her an odd look, "Am I being a nuisance?" I questioned her with the furrow of my brow.

              I liked to think I worked pretty well at The Corner Leaf. I never slacked, I pulled my weight, I did my best with customer service, and I always helped out my fellow colleagues when they needed me to without complaint; what if everyone secretly hated me here and I never knew it? Was I being annoying?