HEART FOR HIRE ✓

Twelve

I'm in a sour mood for the rest of the day, slamming doors, jeering at nothing randomly and sometimes hitting my head.
To be exact, I don't know why I'm mad. This was supposed to be a good day when I go to taste wine and it happened. Zion got us over five 300ml samples along with some food he ordered from a fast food takeaway restaurant.

Then, what in the world is bothering me?

"Gosh, if you bang that door one more time," Alex shouts from the break room, "I promise I won't be nice. I told you that I'm recording a video and that noise is cutting through the audio."

"Sorry," I yell back and then in a soft voice add, "silly silly Natalia."

"What's got into you?" I jump from Jeanette's voice that comes from behind me. "Don't give me bullshit and say nothing is wrong. Start talking."

"I don't know," I sigh.

Jeanette lets out a loud chuckle and jumps such that she can sit on the counter I'm currently cleaning.
"Why are you being like this? Didn't mystery man pay you like he promised?"

"He paid me," I grumble out

"Then, did something happen at the factory?"

"So much happened at the factory."

"So, it has to do with the factory? Tell me, what is bothering you."

"I said I don't know what's bothering me," I snap. "Can't I be like this without anyone poking into my business? What do you want me to tell you when I also don't know what to say?"

"Woah woah," she raises her hands. "I was just asking and you don't need to be snappy about it, alright? Just do your work and make sure you don't make noise for Alex, alright?"

"Of course boss," I spit out the last word.

Jeanette throws a final look at me and walks away to the break room, probably to talk about me to Alex.
Talking about the younger man, he hasn't been doing much of his work because he has to make a perfect video. Sometimes, I feel like snapping at him but he is nineteen and between him and I, Jeanette would pick him any time.

Groaning, I continue cleaning after which I make popcorn, organize the snacks and tickets. All that time, Alex is uploading his video on YouTube and apparently, it undergoes so much processes like checking for copyright violations.
I believe him anyway even though it could have been a lie to slack off because who am I to doubt him? It's not like I've uploaded videos before.

Tonight, I decide to sit at the snacks booth and Alex at the tickets booth. I don't feel like I am in a good condition to communicate to customers who normally want to make small talk when they are buying tickets. Hence the snacks booth because each snack has it's price tag and people don't usually make small talk here.

Jeanette hasn't come out of office and I haven't seen him since the word exchange earlier. Not that I want to apologize, it just would be nice to know that she isn't secretly planning on how to kill me and get away with it.
She has a really bad temper.

"Please keep the change," a customer who just bought salty popcorn and Pepsi says and I look up to thank them. My eyes widen at who the person is. "Riley!"

"Hey Natalia," he grins at me, "I didn't know you worked here. No wonder that Thompson kid asked me to meet him here."

"I'm here every night," I awkwardly smile. I bet he is absolutely stunned by finding out about my work place. He probably didn't expect me to be a theater girl. No wonder, they both don't want me to meet Zion's mother.

"Well, that explains so much. Like his absence every night," he laughs, chewing some of his popcorn. "I'll see you after the movie then. I see you are showing a classic tonight, he likes those."

"Enjoy the movie," I wave him off to attend to the next customer.

Not long after, Zion joins the queue and when it's his turn, he holds out a bottle wrapped up in a paper bag.
"This is for you," he grins. "If you don't like it, we will try something else."

"What's this?" I look at him confused. Since when do we give each other gifts? And why would he be giving me one?

"A sample from the juice you suggested. We spent the whole day mixing different proportions and this one seems palatable enough."

Of course it's about that. Even though I should feel humbled that his team spent the whole day trying out my silly idea, it doesn't feel like that at all. It's not honor, it's my responsibility because I started it.

"When you're done here, you know where to find me," he winks, orders popcorn with butter and water. "I brought some food you might like."

After the tickets are sold out, I leave Alex to the snacks booth and go over to where Zion normally sits - his usual place he claimed.
It's my job to be there and eat with him and no matter how much I don't want to be around him, I have to be.

"She says it so casually," I overhear Zion telling his best friend, "but this is good for me. I haven't had ideas in a long time and this is my time to shine. Don't you think?"

Riley smirks, both of them having not seen me approaching.
"Dude yeah. If she can keep those ideas flowing, don't get rid of her. Besides, she's not that bad."

"Definitely not my type but sufferable."

Their glasses collide in a toast as my heart drops. So, he wants to keep me around because I give him good business ideas?
What in the world happened to 'I would be a hypocrite if I took all the credit for them?'

Without waiting for what they are going to say next, I turn and exit the theater. I don't miss Alex's voice calling me and Jeanette's texts while on the bus.

At this moment, fuck it all.

Natalia's first cuss word. Cheers 🥂