Coffee's For Closers (And Also Romantics)

Chapter 2: Toni

"That'll be $7.45," Toni said to the middle aged man standing in front of the counter, her tone bored and dripping with exhaustion. He handed her a ten dollar bill, which she put in the register and pulled out a few bills and coins to replace it. "And here's your change." She handed the money to the man, and he took it and walked away to find a table, without so much as a thank you.

Cashiers are people too, you know. She sighed, wishing she could call the man out for his rudeness, but it was a stunt like that that had gotten her fired from her last job.

She rubbed her eyes before walking into the kitchen to get the order of coffee and a croissant that had just been made. The coffee shop's kitchen was very ordinary, with all the normal kitchen stuff, and it smelled strongly of coffee beans, which was a plus. That was probably the best thing about this job- the coffee.

Toni loved coffee. The taste, the smell, everything. It was her favorite drink, and smell, in the whole world. That was the reason why she had been drawn to work at the coffee shop.

She grabbed the tray off the counter, careful to hold it steady and upright so the coffee wouldn't fall over and spill.

She came back to the front room and took the tray over to the older woman who had made the order. The woman didn't even look up from her newspaper as Toni set the plate, and then the coffee, down on the table. She walked away without trying to get the old woman's attention. She was nearing the end of an insanely long shift, and she didn't really feel like talking to anyone at the moment.

She cleared a table and took the dirty dishes to the kitchen to be washed, and then went back to clean it off, because whoever had been eating there had left a ton of crumbs on the tabletop and the seat.

Toni heard a boom of thunder from outside just as she was leaning over the table to start wiping it down with a wet rag. The coffee shop's walls were actually huge windows on all sides, save for the one with the counter and kitchen, obviously. She glanced up from the mess of crumbs and saw it was starting to rain.

She hadn't even noticed the sky darkening until now, as the sudden drizzle quickly evolved into a harsh downpour, the raindrops smacking the roof of the little building and sliding down the windows. The view outside was completely blurred by the rain within a matter of seconds.

She sighed again. There was no way she was walking all the way home in that. She glanced at her watch and saw that her shift ended in half an hour, but she'd be stuck here for much longer if the rain didn't slow.

She finished cleaning the table and went back behind the register. She noticed the customers at their tables were all fidgeting and muttering about the storm- none of them had been planning on staying long enough to wait out the rain either.

Toni stared down at the counter, drumming her nails against the marble, tuning into the sound of the vicious storm. If coffee was her favorite smell, then rain was her favorite sound. Had she been chilling at home, rather than being stuck at work, she would have considered the storm a bout of luck.

The melodic tapping of the raindrops was suddenly interrupted by the little bell above the front door chiming, and the sound of the door being quickly pushed open and then shoved closed again. Toni glanced up, across the room, to the door.

Standing there was a teenage girl, about the same age as herself, that Toni had never seen before. She couldn't help but notice that the girl was kind of gorgeous, even though she was sopping wet and dripping onto the hardwood floor that Toni had mopped herself only a couple hours ago.

After a couple seconds Toni realized she was staring, but she wasn't the only one. Almost everyone in the shop had turned to see the soaked red headed girl who had barged inside to get out of the rain, loudly disturbing the calm vibe of the room.