Food Courting

Chapter 3: Art of Seduction

Unsurprisingly, the rest of the first half of Cora's shift was painfully slow. The entire time, she was forced to watch customers flock to Fruitastic while only occasional patrons stopped by Cool Beans. Worse, whenever someone was intelligent enough to know they wanted the soothing aroma of coffee instead of pulverized frozen fruit, Cora had to listen to Darlene's comments over Kevin's subpar workmanship.

"No, they want an iced latte, not a hot latte with ice," Darlene muttered over Kevin's shoulder, then smiled at the awaiting customer. "Sorry, it's his first day."

It was actually his third month, but Cora kept her mouth shut as she slowly reached for a medium-sized plastic cup, ready to start their order ahead of time. There was a good chance Darlene wanted Kevin to make the drink too, but there was only so much secondhand embarrassment Cora could take.

If only Darlene had let Cora continue training Kevin herself, back when he first started. Unfortunately, they had only spent a few days covering the basics of espresso-based drinks before Darlene commandeered Cora's meticulous training regimen, citing Cora's lack of qualifications. Sure, Cora held the same job title as Kevin, but at least she wouldn't scold him for pressing the computer's giant red "latte" button at the top instead of the tiny gray "iced latte" button at the bottom.

"A hot latte is fine," the customer said. "As long as it's a mocha. All I need is coffee and chocolate."

With that, Cora inched towards the mocha syrup, hoping her movement wouldn't draw Darlene's attention.

"He could use the practice anyway," Darlene said. "Cordelia, don't you have your lunch break?"

Cora froze and plastered a sweet smile on her face before facing her manager. "Oh, right! I can just...make this drink really quickly."

Darlene's smile was wider and faker than Cora's, and that was saying something. "You've done enough. Besides, Kevin needs to practice."

Kevin hunched slightly at his name, but his thick-framed glasses and black-nail-polished fingers remained glued to the computer screen. Cora felt some guilt for leaving him to fend for himself, but it wasn't like she had any power over their manager. What was she going to do? Tell Darlene to go to lunch instead?

"I'll...be back in thirty then," Cora said, leaving the cup directly under the chocolate syrup pump before heading to the backroom.

"And clock out!" Darlene's voice followed her before the door could close between them.

Once the door clicked behind her, Cora dropped her smile, but she still clocked out as instructed. No amount of frustration with Darlene could make Cora knowingly break the rules. As soon as her hours were logged, Cora threw off her hat and apron before grabbing her lunch containers from the employee mini fridge—struggling to maneuver around Darlene's entire lunch bag—before rushing out the back door. She had thirty minutes, so she couldn't waste a second.

Thankfully, there were several open tables, and Cora took the closest one just out of sight of the Cool Beans storefront. The last thing Cora needed was Darlene watching her eat. Her table ended up having a small patch of dried soft drink on one edge, but Cora had more than enough space for her two tiny containers.

One was filled with rice porridge she made a couple days prior, and the lumpy, off-white dish was colored with green specks of chives, a brown splash of soy sauce, and red drops of chili oil. In the other was an assortment of wilted greens from the discount section of the grocery store the day before, topped with a dollop of tuna salad. Well, canned tuna with the essence of mayonnaise scraped from the jar. Mayo wouldn't go on sale for another five days, and the sandwich shop workers were keeping a close eye on her whenever she just so happened to wander by their condiment table.