the same old fears | denreze

the awkward café scene

Denji's messed up the order. Again. The customer – a cute blonde girl with highlights in her hair and a frown on her face – is gesturing wildly at Mr. Tanaka, who's wearing his best customer service expression.

Tanaka's disappointed in him, obviously. He won't scold him or kick him out, though. He knows that 'Daiki' needs the job. It's stupidly generous – he's an employer, after all. Nothing like the mafia, or her even.

The benefits aren't as great as when hunting devils. The pay's kinda meagre, but Tanaka lets him take home the leftovers.

It's strange. He didn't know jobs were like this. Could be. Reze'd probably know, she was working at a café back then too, wasn't she? Even if that was a cover.

Tanaka's walked back up to the counter. He sits down, sighs tiredly as the shop door tinkles and the girl storms off.

"I'm sorry," Denji tells him.

"No..." Tanaka murmurs. He looks defeated. "I'm sure if you follow the instructions, you'll figure it out. Eventually." He seems to be reassuring himself.

The instruction book burns a hole in Denji's back pocket – the truth is that he can't read a word of it. But like hell he's telling Mr. Tanaka that.

Tanaka pulls out a cigarette, fiddles with a match. "Perhaps I'll sit with you one day," he says. "Help you out." He exhales smoke.

Denji shakes his head. "I'll just ask Reze."

"Rej?" the guy asks.

Oh crap. He'd forgotten. "I mean, uh, I'll ask Suzui."

Tanaka chuckles dryly. "So you have nicknames for each other already? That's pretty sweet."

Denji nods, keeping his face calm. "Yup."

The older man slides off the stool, gets up. "Alright, I'm off," he says. "Call me if you need anything."

Denji grunts in affirmation.

In a few seconds he is alone in the café. It gets barely a trickle of customers at best – the rusted seats and the old tables are almost always empty. He's pretty sure Tanaka got those from a broken-down school or something. But he doesn't really think his general incompetence is helping pull customers in.

"All right, Pochita," he mutters under his breath. "New goal. Gonna become the best damn coffee making person in the entire world."

Pochita'd probably wag his tail or something. Who knows.

He starts cleaning the counter. The sponge is so dirty – he's not sure if it's making the surface cleaner or making it worse. But hell, he's been told to scrub, so that's what he'll do.

There's a sound —the jingling of the dreamcatcher near the door. It's a creaky old thing that sounds like a laugh and Denji hates it. He lazily raises his head to peruse the customer—it's a guy, boring . The guy's looking around the café, turns and sees Denji and-

"Aki?"

His hair's done up in that stupid top knot. He looks... well. A lot less drawn, more hearty than when Denji'd last seen him.

"Denji!" Aki says. And then he smiles. It's a warm, toothy sort of smile—completely out of place on Aki's face. Denji tenses up automatically as Aki bounds over to the counter.

It is him. There's that Aki sort of brittleness to his face, that gasping familiarity in his half-stooped posture. There's something entirely unAki about the manic gleam in his eyes.