Food Courting

Chapter 8: Buzz Kill

Day twelve of the Coup D'é-Tea

The battlefield of the food court was supposed to be littered with their citizens—customers—clutching cups from their chosen establishment. Within the stores, the trenches behind the counters were supposed to be in constant chaos with soldiers—workers—sprinting between their assigned stations, arming themselves for an attack. Screams of orders ready for pickup were supposed to echo in the air, the voices lined with pleas for mercy. The fight for supremacy was never supposed to be fun.

And it wasn't—right? There was no way that being surrounded by a cacophony of cranky chatter while roasting in residual steam could ever be fun. But for some reason, as Cora rushed back and forth between the blenders and espresso machines, she found herself invigorated by an energy that couldn't be attributed to just caffeine.

As she steamed milk, she peered over the espresso machine and through the Cool Beans line. Across the food court, the blue-backpack-wearing customer in front of Fruitastic hadn't moved much from where she last saw them, and while the parent with baby triplets at Cool Beans had moved further, it wasn't by much. The game—no, the battle—was still too close to call.

Cora glanced towards Fruitastic's blenders and tried to see through the crowd. After a few seconds, Farron's tiny figure shifted into an opening as she handed off drinks to an awaiting customer. Her expression was as murderous as ever, and she didn't even appear to say the customer's name, but once she turned to Cool Beans and met Cora's gaze, she smirked.

The line for Fruitastic leapt forward, but Cora merely returned Farron's smug expression with one of her own. It wouldn't be fun without the challenge.

Again, not that the work was fun. It just wasn't painful, that's all.

As she pulled two shots directly into a cup, already holding a splash of hot milk, Cora dashed for the blenders. She had the blended drink poured and covered by the time the espresso was done, and after a minute to top it off with milk and a lid of its own, she had another order ready to be served.

"Order for Katie!" Cora called out, already making eye contact with the customer halfway through her sentence.

Before Cora even finished wishing Katie a nice day, another customer stepped in.

"Excuse me," they snapped, tapping the bottom of the half-and-half carafe against the handoff counter. "This is completely empty."

From the backroom, Darlene spun towards Cora with a firm stare. Cora tried to smile wide, only to realize she was already doing so. Any wider and her face would probably split in half, held together by a hinge of quality Cool Beans customer service.

"So sorry about that!" Cora exclaimed with more enthusiasm than she expected. "I'll get that for you right now."

As she poured the creamer into the dispenser, Cora heard a scoff from the customer. It took her a moment to notice she had been bouncing and swaying in place. A beat later, she realized it was to the rhythm of Fruitastic's jingle echoing throughout the food court. She had to hand it to their marketing team, they knew how to make a catchy battle cry.

After returning the carafe to the customer with a sheepish grin and another apology, to which the customer replied with another scoff, Cora jumped back into her routine. Across the way, the blue backpack had moved up a surprising amount in the last minute, a fact Farron also noticed judging by her smug grin at Cora. In response, Cora narrowed her eyes, but she accepted the challenge with a smile of her own.

It might have been a battle against the orange, but Cora supposed she could have a little fun with it too.

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