A la Carte

Chapter 2

Monday arrived swiftly and Charlotte was not looking forward to it, Monday meant work and Charlotte being a lazy person, naturally, hated hard work, but in order to survive and keep her pride in tact she had to work two jobs. The Bistro was her main job, she worked night shifts during the week and occasionally worked double shifts on weekends, other than that she worked in a popular bookstore close to her apartment, it paid well for the work she had to do, which was basically sort and sell books. The bookstore was just an average bookstore, nothing really special about it except the fact that you normally found a variety of odd books there, its client base was sound and Charlotte had come to know some of the regulars quite well.

"Good morning Hailey." Charlotte said as Hailey walked in through the door of the bookstore, the bell jingling as she did so.

"Morning!" Hailey was a seventeen year old girl, who was a regular at the bookstore before she begged Sandy (the owner) to give her a job there. Hailey Watson was short and petite and had the longest blonde hair Charlotte had ever seen, with crystal blue eyes and high cheekbones; she could definitely be a model. She always wore her glasses though. She called them her "nerd" glasses, although she didn't look anything like a nerd in Charlotte's mind. Hailey told her that her mother had claimed her eyesight had deteriorated because she read too much, while Hailey had paid no attention to her whatsoever, in fact she seemed to like her glasses so much she even had them in different colours, today they were bright blue. She wore skinny jeans, combat boots and a loose grey sweater with a tiger embellished on the front, her blonde hair was up in a messy bun. Charlotte sometimes envied her dress sense and the fact she made it seem so effortless, but the two girls were close friends, despite their different ages, and the both shared something in common: books.

"Morning you two! I brought coffee!" Sandy said as she waltzed into the shop, three coffees in her hand.

"Oh! Thank you!" Hailey cried, reaching for a coffee cup, she sipped it and smiled, "Hazelnut! My favourite." Charlotte chuckled and reached for a coffee herself, like Hailey she savoured the Hazelnut flavoured coffee.

"Right, new stock came in yesterday and I think the donations box is ready to be cleared again, it's practically overflowing with books!" Sandy said, both the girls shared a look and sighed.

An hour and a lot of sneezing later, Hailey and Charlotte had unpacked the donations box and dusted the shelves off, while they were busy marking and pack the stock onto the shelves a customer bustled in through the door, bringing in with her a draft of cool wind.

"Miranda! What a surprise!" Sandy greeted and that was all the two girls heard of the conversation, before Sandy came to tell them she was going out for lunch and she'd bring something back for the both of them. Charlotte was so engrossed with her work that she didn't hear the bell chiming, signaling another customer, neither did she notice that Hailey had come back until she cleared her throat.

"Yeah?" Charlotte said looking up at her from the box she was currently perched on.

"I want to introduce you to someone.'' She said, motioning for Charlotte to follow her. Charlotte sighed stood up and smoothed her creased clothing before following Hailey to the front of the shop.

Whatever Hailey was saying to Charlotte was lost when she first laid her eyes on who Charlotte was introducing her to.

"Charlotte this is my uncle, Derek. Uncle Derek this is my good friend Charlotte." Charlotte gawked at him, it was the same man she had served on Sunday, the same man who called her special , the same man who was still immaculately dressed in a tailored suit and was now smirking at her in a bookstore.

"Nice to see you again, Charlotte." He said politely. Her heart rate spiked when he said her name, he remembered her.

"You've met before?" Hailey asked bewildered. Charlotte was saved from answering by the man himself.