Corner Store Coffee Shop (sometimes villains stop by)-made by an orphan_account

chapter 11

For once in his life, he thought that he finally had a normal customer. Which was both a nice thought and kind of made him on edge. The chances of a villain coming in while a normal customer was there was abnormally high for a run of the mill coffee shop, but Tommy was Tommy so of course that's what life gave Tommy. It wasn't all that bad though.

He looked to be average except for a scar that ran across his eye, but that could've meant anything, people can have scars without being villains. Scars that big was kind of suspicious, but he didn't want to assume. The downsides to normal customers were, first of all, he had to pretend to be excited to see them, and on top of that the fact he could get caught having villains at the shop. He plastered on a fake smile, "What would you like to have today?"

When the guy stopped in front of Tommy who was sitting behind the cash register, he put on a big smile, it was kind of weird seeing so many different smiles. The Blade he had only seen a quirk of his mouth that resembled a smile, the Angel had a warm one and Siren had one that just showed he was happy. This one though, it changed the whole room. If there were other people in the room it probably would have made them happy, too. The guy had wings, Tommy didn't realize because who purposely looks out for wings in every person when avians are so rare. He was also kind of numb to wings after the Angel, although he was the only person besides his parents that he saw with wings, the Angel's wings were big enough that it made any other pairs of wings look small. Even without seeing the Angel's wings, this guy's wings would probably still be pretty small. They resembled the shape of cartoon angel wings, or a duck, he guessed. There weren't angel hybrids so they had to be connected to an actual bird.

The guy looked at the menu which was definitely new, maybe villains were just stupid and unobservant since this guy was the only person that he had actually noticed the menu right away. It also said that he didn't drink much, even if it was his first time at the shop, most shops have a lot of the same standard drinks. "Water? Do you guys have water here?" Tommy didn't even bother hiding his emotions this time, he squinted at the guy in confusion. This guy really went to a coffee shop and looked at the menu only to order a water.

"Well yeah," Tommy said, "But why would you go to a coffee shop to order a water?" Tommy knew the old saying of 'the customer is always right', but Tommy liked to respectfully disagree with that sentiment because in this case they are wrong. If it were someone else they probably would have been annoyed at that, even Siren questioned Tommy when they first met, but instead, the guy burst out laughing.

"Fine, then what would you recommend?"

"I don't know, literally anything else?" Tommy pointed at the menu, "You saw the menu, there are options ."

The guy leaned down to look at the menu and hummed in contemplation, Tommy didn't know why though, he wasn't that tall that he would need to. He straightened up again, a smile still on his face, "I guess I'll get a macchiato."

"Name?" Now that finally affected the guy's positive demeanor, he still had a smile on his face, but it was smaller and he looked confused. He looked around the shop, looking for other people he could've missed that were in the shop. When he concluded that there was no one else there, Tommy noticed a slight tilt of his head and a slight clench in his jaw.

The guy pointed a thumb behind him, his speech was hesitant like he was unsure of himself, "There's no one else here...?" He fixed his beanie, there was nothing wrong with it, so Tommy assumed that it was a habit that he did a lot. Tommy shrugged, "My name's Quackity."

Silence. "You're kidding." It should have been a question, but there was a small part in him that hoped he was actually kidding. Quackity wasn't technically classified as a villain, but he was close enough for Tommy to groan out loud knowing that he didn't have to pretend to be happy to see him. Either there was something going on or this was a much worse neighborhood than he thought the place was. Quackity wasn't a villain but he was definitely not on the legal side of things. He was known to the public as someone who just sold drugs, nothing too big especially since it's one of the easier ways to earn money when you're on the worse side of things, but even more so, he was an information broker. He was a happy go-lucky guy that people were very willing to be open to and even if he didn't get information the easy way, he heard everything and everyone had a price and that included Quackity. He never really did anything himself, but if he ever did get into some fights he could hold his own.

"No, I'm actually not!" And he knew that Tommy was ready to attack him right then and there because he looked like he was there just to cause trouble when he had the chance. He couldn't attack a customer for no reason, so Tommy did the best he could to radiate his annoyance as much as he physically could. He was clearly someone who laughed a lot, he definitely didn't actually mean any harm but he definitely knew how to push boundaries to get the reactions he wanted, "Can I have my coffee now?"

"Yeah, whatever," Tommy muttered. He was only half sure that he actually knew how to make a macchiato. Making coffee was his job, but he didn't ever really actually have to make much coffee for a while until the villains and Quackity started coming to the shop. He learned how to make all the items when he first got the job, and he definitely needed the practice after never making anything.

"Are you having this to go or are you staying here?"

"I'll stay a bit, I made plans with someone." And Tommy hoped it was not a drug deal or an information broking job. Letting villains stay in the shop was one thing, it was another to be compliant when crimes were being committed in front of him because he could much more easily get in trouble for it.

As he finished pouring the last drop of coffee, he heard the door open and what he saw was something he knew would give him a headache. Siren he could deal with. Quackity he could deal with too even if he had just met him. But both Siren and Quackity, he definitely couldn't handle them both at once.

Siren sent a wave at Tommy before sitting down across from Quackity. It was kind of sad, not actually sad, but nonetheless, that he knew that Siren wanted his usual tea even without him saying anything about it directly to Tommy. Tommy sighed before getting out a platter to set Quackity's finished coffee on and made Siren's tea.

"So how's it been Quackity?" It was the weirdest thing; seeing Siren and Quackity talk, they seemed like completely different sides of the world. Though he could see why they were close, they were by far the most open people on the other side of law he's met. The Dream Team were a close second when it came to how open they were about being close and they weren't shy on their emotions either, but they weren't open to Tommy, they were open to each other.

Where the Angel's body language was completely closed off save for his facial expressions, Quackity was completely open with his body language, Tommy didn't doubt that Quackity hid things too, it was just much less than most others did. Every time there was even a slight change in temperature, almost unnoticeable, his wings would ruffle up slightly before settling down again. When he got excited or hyped up, his wings would show it too. While his body language was open in general, the wings were where his emotions were.

It was an interesting thing, the fact that these two people were friends, it reminded him that villains had friends, too. No doubt a lot of them were friends even without their villain personas, the fact they were villains was just a coincidence.

Even with Quackity there, someone outside the SBI, someone he no doubt was close with, and they definitely were close, for some reason, Siren would keep getting Tommy's attention and opinion on the conversation. Asking 'what do you think's' and waiting for Tommy to answer. Even though Tommy didn't think Siren was considered a friend, clearly Siren considered him one. Maybe he should consider Siren one, too, or maybe Siren was just really comfortable with people.

It was hard to tell sometimes, what people felt.