The Rebel & The Cafe Girl

Prologue

I've always had a thing for personality tests.

Whenever I see them on the internet, I feel obliged to take one, just to see how accurate they really are. A few months back, just before my parents passed away, I took one that would reveal my four letter personality thing. I'm an ENFJ. It stands for Extrovertion, Intuition, Feeling, Judgement. It can also be known as "The Protagonist". Yeah, some people think I'm sad for doing these types of things. I don't care. 

Whenever I get to know a person, I always show them these personality tests, and get them to answer the questions while I tick the correct boxes. Then, I'll tell them what they are. Then I save a screenshot of them so that I myself can remember. I have an entire folder. Call me a freak, I don't care. It's just stuff that I like knowing. I genuinely don't know why. Personalities are just important to me.

Take my brother Joel, for example. While I'm an ENFJ, he's a ESTJ, also known as "The Executive". Now, let me just give you a brief description of an ESTJ, and then of an ENFJ, and you'll see the difference between us. 

ESTJ: ESTJs are representatives of tradition and order, utilizing their understanding of what is right, wrong and socially acceptable to bring families and communities together. Embracing the values of honesty, dedication and dignity, people with the ESTJ personality type are valued for their clear advice and guidance, and they happily lead the way on difficult paths. Taking pride in bringing people together, ESTJs often take on roles as community organizers, working hard to bring everyone together in celebration of cherished local events, or in defense of the traditional values that hold families and communities together.

ENFJ: ENFJs are natural-born leaders, full of passion and charisma. Forming around two percent of the population, they are oftentimes our politicians, our coaches and our teachers, reaching out and inspiring others to achieve and to do good in the world. With a natural confidence that begets influence, ENFJs take a great deal of pride and joy in guiding others to work together to improve themselves and their community.

So there we go. Going into deeper depth is a lot more interesting, but I'm not going to start with all that as I know that not everybody is interested in all that. Those brief descriptions were just a part of the whole in-depth report of those personalities, from the website that I use. Yeah, yeah, I get it, you're probably yawning right now. Well stop. Personalities, and who we are, is really important. That's what makes every person different. My best friend, Leah, is an ESFJ (similar to me in quite a few ways, but different in others) and yet we get along extremely well. Most of the time. ESFJ, also known as "The Consul". It fits her perfectly. 

She's extremely bubbly, friendly and always chatting. She loves being sociable and going to parties and such. She's energetic most of the time, but after being around people, even more so. She doesn't like hurting people's feelings but she also likes to be more logical in most situations. She's judging, like me, but she's assertive, while I'm turbulent.

See how many different varieties there are? Personalities are fascinating, but I won't go into any more detail. If I do, the story won't go on.

I'm Natalie Mercer. I'm 16 years old, and instead of going to school like most other 16 year olds, I work at my brother's cafe. Yeah, I'm known by a lot of people as The Cafe Girl. It doesn't bother me, though. I am a cafe girl. And I'm proud of it. Just because I'm not going to school doesn't mean I'm not getting an education. I do online courses and I have a tutor that I go to every Monday evening, Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning. I'm still learning. But being in the school environment wasn't something that I wanted. I'd rather work. But learning things on the side is better than nothing. I have to do that till I'm 18, according to Joel. That's when he can't control me anymore. I can't wait for that moment.

As much as I love Joel, he's a bit controlling and he always disapproves of me, my thoughts, and pretty much everything about me. It's irritating and, above all, somewhat hurtful. My parents used to be really supportive of me and my decisions. They'd give me advice, but they wouldn't tell me how to live my life...

My parents died in a car accident two years ago. I was 14 years old. It was my birthday, and they were driving me to pizza hut. I remember the moment clearly. They were chatting away, and we were laughing. Then suddenly, I looked ahead and saw a car swerve off the right side of the road and straight onto our side. I screamed, but it was too late. The car rammed into us at full speed. The car went toppling sideways, and I remember mine and my mother's screams above everything else. The sound of shattering glass filled my ears as we went over...

I survived. I had a broken leg, and a sprained wrist, and lots of bruises. But I healed after a year and a half. It was then that I decided I wanted to work in a cafe, instead of going to school. So Joel agreed, as long as I had a tutor on the side. The online courses was mainly my idea, but now that's mandatory as well.

I can't help but wonder why I was the lucky one. Why did I survive, but not them? I didn't usually voice this question to others. It wasn't as though I wished it had been me and not them, because I didn't. I just wished that they had survived too. They didn't deserve to die in that moment. They deserved to live a long life, watch as Joel and I grew up and had families of our own. But they didn't get to see that, and I knew they wanted to. It broke my heart to know that they were just...gone. 

But honestly, I've tried to move on and be as brave as possible. I don't talk about it with anyone, not Joel, not Leah...nobody. I don't like explaining my feelings to people; it makes me feel vulnerable, and plus, I don't want to risk everyone finding out my deepest, darkest thoughts and secrets. That's why I try to keep them to myself, despite everything. People told me I should go to a therapist, to which I scoffed and told them I was fine.

"The Protagonist", my personality test told me. It would be more accurate if I were called the actress. Nonetheless, that's not important anymore. I'm coping, and that's what matters. 

Working those hours in my brother's cafe, of course, had it's downsides. There were rude customers, angry people, demanding people, snotty people, rich people who clicked their fingers at us whenever they wanted service...believe me, it was extremely infuriating when they did that. But then there were the great things about working in the cafe...one of them being the fact that I was getting paid, and that I had a job. Plus, not all the customers were bad...

Anyway, that's a bit on my background. Me, Natalie Mercer, The Cafe Girl, The Personality Freak...whatever you want to call me. And now that you know me...

This is my story.

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Author's note: Idek man. I tried xD This is only a prologue so obviously it's nothing major. But yeah. I'll start working on the first chapter straight away. Hopefully it'll be better than this.

Oh, and the personality descriptions from this chapter and potentially future ones is from 16personalities. I love their site! It's creepily accurate too, so yeah. Have a great day guys <3