Underwater (BoyxBoy)

Chapter 12 - Coconuts

"You'd need to be like, asleep to be bad at this job," Esmeralda told me. She was a twenty-year-old college student who was training me during my first weekend at Pleasure Pizza.

I nodded, watching the spatula wave around in the air, loosely hanging from her fingertips. She'd described it as 'a peel or some shit, I can't remember. It doesn't matter because nobody ever asks.'

"Actually no, even an unconscious person could do this shit. You'd need to be fully braindead. Like I'm talking brain-dead, some zombie ass motherf-"

"Excuse me," Esmeralda and I turned to the woman who'd apparently been waiting only a few feet from us. Both of her hands were covering the ears of a young girl who stood below her, hugging her mother's leg. She couldn't have been more than three.

"Yes?" Esmeralda asked, raising her eyebrows.

"Can we order?"

Esmeralda tapped my shoulder to send me forward, enjoying the little power she had for the week. I didn't mind, at least she was entertaining.

I easily took care of her order, handing her two slices of pepperoni after she paid. She took her food, cautiously guiding her daughter to the farthest possible seating away from the front counter and vulgar language.

"See?" Esmeralda said, picking at her long, dark green nails. "Easy as fuck. Sometimes I just sit at a table and watch whatever Claire puts on the tv until people come in. She also doesn't care if you're on your phone if there are no customers. Cause what the fuck else is there to do?"

Claire was the woman that hired me, and I was wondering if she didn't care about the language Esmeralda used, or if she was aware and just needed workers that badly.

Someone walked through the propped-open front doors before Esmeralda could start another sentence, and my head turned to see Kieran approaching with a grin.

"Hey, pizza boy." He said to me, after saying a polite hello to my coworker. They seemed to be familiar with one another, probably from working in such close proximity. "How do you like it here so far?"

"It's not bad at all," I said, smiling at his stupid nickname. "I can't complain when there's pizza involved."

"That's the right attitude," Kieran replied, before turning and motioning to the walls of the building. "And you chose this place for the decor, I assume?"

I let out a laugh, figuring that's what anybody who knew me at all would've thought. The walls of the pizza parlor were covered in photos of surfers, or professionally shot images of the local waves. Even the small tv hanging in the right corner of the dining room usually had videos of famous surfers riding massive waves on a loop.

"I'd actually forgotten about that lovely bonus feature before I applied," I answered, glancing towards the tv.

"Well, while we're on the topic..." Kieran lowered his voice a bit, to which Esmeralda only rolled her eyes and walked to the back kitchen. "I have an idea."

"What?" I said cautiously.

I wondered if I'd gone in over my head a bit. Kieran was a daily surfer, maybe he'd want to jump right back into the waves of Cowell's Beach with me, and I'd go back with full force. I couldn't do that.

"Well, I sometimes teach a beginner's surf class on Sundays, depending on whether my boss is up at Half-Moon-Bay or not,"

Does he want me to take a beginner's surfing lesson?!

"And I was wondering if you'd wanna help teach with me tomorrow."

Oh...

"Uh... tomorrow?" I asked, keeping my voice steady. Tomorrow was... well tomorrow. It was soon, and I was not in shape.