Stranger (The Aevyanthis Chronicles, Book One)

Chapter One

The jingling of bells sounded through the Morning Swell as the front door swung open, and Emm allowed herself a long, internal groan.

"Good morning!" she called, glancing back at the couple standing in the doorway. "Feel free to take a seat, someone will be over soon."

It was warmer than usual for a mid autumn morning. The sun was bright and clear, and the breeze whispered through the flowering bushes that dotted the Overlook. The waves crashed against the rocks below, spraying the air with a fine, salty mist. Whisking through the café's aisles with a stack of plates in her arms, Emm could almost feel the mist on her face. Almost.

Abandoning the dishes in the kitchen's sink, she grimaced as the dozen of order slips caught her eye. Yellow post-it notes handwritten in frantic, almost unreadable cursive, they mocked her from the counter top above the coffee machine. Some had been there for over thirty minutes.

"Excuse me," a man in a blue blazer hailed her from the fourth booth, his voice rising above the chatter. "I ordered a soy latte. This isn't soy."

"Sorry, I'll make you a new one," Emm called back.

Blue Blazer muttered something, before glancing at his watch and shaking his head. "Jesus, you'd think you'd have better service out of the city. I just want my money back, okay? I'm going to be late for work."

She withheld a sigh, instead replying through gritted teeth, "That's okay, give me a second."

In the corner of her eye, Rose had been nervously punching in an order at the register. Sorry, she mouthed.

Emm threw her a smile as she took over, hoping it looked more sympathetic than tired. The man waited with arms folded, tapping one of his tanned leather shoes as she rang up the refund.

"And tell your manager to hire more help for Christ's sake," he added as he left.

"I'll do that," she lied, hoping he hadn't seen the MANAGER badge pinned to her lapel. "Sorry again."

She continued filling out the orders, wiping her forehead with the back of her arm as the coffee machine whirred to life. It spluttered and hissed and filled the Morning Swell with the sweet smell of coffee, making the pain behind her eyes worsen. Another jingle. Another groan.

Lining the walls, amongst the macramé décor and the potted plants designed to give the café its airy, bohemian feel, photos of Grey Rock's beach watched over the booths her days revolved around. They hung like ageless memories trapped within their timber frames. Some of them she had taken herself, when she had time to waste and days to kill; on those lazy, shiny days, she had walked from one end of the cape to the other, snapping anything and everything with her trusty Nikon. Her heart ached at the thought. It was on one of those days that she had seen the 'HELP WANTED' sign in the front window of the Morning Swell.

The café was the closest building to the Overlook, the jagged, grey cliff that Grey Rock was known for. It was a sleepy, forgotten place, with a beach that had more rocks than sand, speckled occasionally by the odd palm tree. From atop the cliff, you could see the flat, leisurely paths that tourists and the retired walk along each morning. But that morning, it seemed that half the town had decided to make Emm's life miserable.

When she finally had time to clear the fourth booth, she noticed the non-soy coffee had been completely drunk.

"What a dick," she muttered.

By the window, a mothers walking group had taken up booths six and seven. Rose had nicknamed them the Lululemons, a fitting name judging by their brightly colored active wear. Their toddlers were squealing, excited to be free from the Bugaboo prams that shamelessly crowded the walkway. Their sticky hands smeared food along the tabletops and down the walls of the café while the women gossiped and paid them no attention. They gave Emm a filthy look as she tried to squeeze passed the prams, but she pretended she hadn't noticed.