Moving On ¦ Maggie x Nina

Chapter 1: Making a Move

'Nina, love, I know you are busy and the place is packed but I think we might have a little emergency on our hands. I can probably figure it out but-'

'Just spit it out already.'

A timid smile appears on Maggie's face. There's nothing she'd rather do than help Nina out with her coffee shop. "Give Me Coffee Or Give Me Death" has become like a second home to her, as has Nina, but she must admit it is a lot busier than her record shop. The number of yearly customers Maggie receives doesn't even come close to one day of coffee-crazed customers for Nina. It's a humbling experience but no more humbling than growing overwhelmed during rush hour. 'It appears we are out of oat milk.'

Nina sighs and Maggie awkwardly smiles at the customer in front of her.

'There's no such thing as being out of oat milk. I've got an extra stash in the back.' For a second, she thinks that's it but then Nina wipes her hands on her apron and grabs Maggie's arm. 'C'mon, I'll show you.'

Butterflies whirl around in her stomach as Nina's hand sits around her wrist. It nearly feels as if they are holding hands although that shouldn't make her blush this hard. After all, they danced like they were straight out of an Austen novel before and surely that means more than mere hand-holding? Not that Maggie's giddy feelings are reciprocated. Well, they are but not quite yet. Nina has too much going on right now to pay any attention to trivial things such as their skin touching or the way Maggie cannot hide her longing gaze whenever her friend does so much as breathe.

Not until they reach a tiny fridge in a dimly lit room in the back does Nina let go of her arm. Maggie is glad when a carton of oat milk is shoved into her hands. If she doesn't have something keeping her arms busy, she might go insane. The room they're in is small and it makes Nina's presence so much clearer. She smells so lovely and-stop being weird, Maggie tells herself.

'Don't tell anyone about this fridge. They forget to keep track of inventory sometimes and if they knew I had a secret stash back here, I couldn't pretend to run to the store when really, I'm taking a break.'

'You know you are allowed to take a break, right? You are the owner of this place.'

Nina scoffs. 'If I slack, they'll slack. You see how busy this place is, it's too much sometimes.'

'But you are enough.'

'Of course, I am. I never said the problem was me.' Nina pokes her arm and throws her a quick wink. 'You're really something, you know that?'

Maggie feels her cheeks heat up. 'Oh, I could say the same about you. I would never have thought to keep extra storage over here.'

'You'll learn.' A glint in her eyes reveals that she doesn't plan on pushing Maggie away just yet. If anything, she appreciates the extra help as much as she does her friendship. 'Running out of oat milk in the West End is a death sentence. You'll have an army of queer hipsters after you if you do.'

'It can hardly be much worse than an army of demons, can it?'

'Don't give them a chance to prove you wrong.'

-

'Psst. Maggie. Quickly, come here,' Nina whispers even though there's hardly anyone around to hear her.

Maggie's just returned from her cosy little shop where she mostly sat around until it was time to close. She only had one customer to tend to today who admitted they had the wrong store but ended up buying a mini-LP anyway. Maybe they were pitying her but Maggie couldn't help but feel happy at the thought of potentially having brought someone joy through music.