Hatchetfield.

Strawberry cake

"Lunch at Beanies? Again?" Melissa grumbled, crossing her arms. "Why do you always choose this place, Paul?"

"It's important to support local businesses, it's a nice cafe! Why go and give our hard earned money to some big corporate chain?" He rolled his eyes like the idea was silly. "It's close, it's cheap, the coffee is way better than at starbucks," he exclaimed as he pushed open the door.

"And there's nothing for me to eat here," she added on to the end of his list. "Besides, I'd hardly call our money 'hard earned,'" she shoved her hands into the pockets of her pinafore, trudging along beside him.

"Yeah but you only like, like, two or three foods. You don't like half the places." She was only upset to be coming here because she was hungry. He knew she'd calm down after she picked something to eat, so she did not damper his mood.

"And you don't like the other half," Melissa sighed, shrugging. "That's why we can never go out for lunch."

Sometimes it was a compromise they had to make, although Paul had admittedly been calling the shots lately. There was just something he liked about being at Beanies, the feel of being a local he supposed. He liked it when the barista at the counter looked at him, smiled when he came in. If he stayed away too long perhaps she wouldn't smile at him like she did anymore.

Yeah, he liked the girl across the counter. Even if the coffee wasn't terribly cheap he didn't mind if she happened to be on shift.

He really liked her smile. It gave off confidence, and not the sort of everyday confidence or customer service grin either, a distinctly unique smile. It felt to Paul like she didn't fit in, and she smiled despite it, almost in rebellion to it. He wished he had her level of confidence, so that perhaps one day he could smile back at her and she could recognise what they had in common.

It was stupid, but he liked to listen to her talk to the other customers, she seemed to know her way around a conversation without the need for a hospitality script, he knew that wasn't something everyone would like, but he certainly did. Making a visit to Beanies was almost like sitting down to watch an episode of his favourite show, enamoured with the way she handled herself.

There was no one at the counter yet, but Paul had noted the particular Barista he liked was working last Saturday afternoon because he had heard her bantering about how the weekend hadn't started for her until her shift was over.

Melissa was still grumbling to herself, a hand hovering over the glass display case, trying to settle on a pastry to eat.

"You can just get fruit. They sell peaches," he advised her, wanting her to pick before the Barista came to take their orders so he didn't look stupid.

"I'm not paying four dollars for a peach, Paul. There's peaches in the fruit bowl, who goes out for lunch to eat fruit?" she told him in disbelief. "What're you getting?"

He had maybe been pushing his luck with dragging her out to Beanies at lunch the past couple weekends, but before he could answer her, in walked the barista, wiping her hands down on her towel as she came to the counter. "Good afternoon, what can I do for ya?"

"Uh hi! Good afternoon!" Paul made sure to greet her the same way, he hadn't been practicing or anything, that would be weird, but he had hyped himself up before coming to get him to take it slow and cool, to give her proper replies. "Can I just get a black coffee and uh, what would you recommend to eat?" He asked, even though he wanted the blueberry slice. He hoped she would say blueberry slice.

"Uh, the house made sausage rolls are nice," damn it. "We've just gotten them out of the oven so they're still nice and warm," she suggested, grabbing a pitcher. "And anything for you, miss?"