Triptych

Trenti

One day, on my Tumblr, my readers were invited to ask me anything they wanted about the worlds and head-canons I hold for my own books. Shiftingpath asked me what the story would be if Kalp, Gwen, and Basil had met under different circumstances, such as the favourite fanficiton trope, the "Coffee Shop AU" (where in one or more of the characters work in and/or meet in a coffee shop).

I began to describe the story, and somehow accidentally wrote it instead.

Oops?

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Kalp is uncertain, but his employer says that the dark blue of his work apron makes the green striation markings around his eyes and mouth attract attention. Says that it makes them "jump out". The manager says this as if it is a pleasant, desired thing, so Kalp pets the apron where it lays across his chest and practices his smile.

Today is Kalp's first shift working the preparation station alone, and though he would like to practice with the foaming wand several more times, he feels confident that his grasp of English and understanding of the complicated caffeinated beverages is sufficient for the task. It is only that his finger-pads slip against the smooth metal of the prep-canister, which makes his claws shriek against the steel in a way that halts all polite conversation in the café.

Human youths turn to stare at him when he does that. It is not that Kalp is not used to the staring – his kind are not so populous that every human on the planet has seen one like him in the flesh, and so he is very used to ignoring the staring – it is that he loathes to be the center of attention because of a mistake.

To tell truths, he loathes to be the center of attention at all. The option to indulge in his preference to act in a role that is supportive, to hide among the foliage of society, as it were, has vanished. His people are tall compared to the humans, and their bodies are vibrantly coloured. Good for the world from which he came, but very poor for urban camouflage here.

Kalp spends perhaps too much of his time in the university library, in a corner that is quiet and dim, and smells wonderfully of old paper and dancing dust motes. If he closes his eyes, he can pretend that he is in the fiction repository with his intendeds. Maru would be leaning against his arm as he read from the book, reading along over his fingers, and Trus would be sprawled across both their laps. Their scents would be mingled, warm and comfortable, and the beat of their hearts would thrum against his bones, making his own stutter and skip until they were in harmony, a dance of tempo that matched and merged.

Kalp swallows hard and twists his hands in his apron to remind him of where he is. And who is not here with him. Who he will never see again.

The human female that works the cash register is late for her shift. As the manager departs, she enters from the storage entry, tying on her apron as she goes, while simultaneously attempting to tame he queue of her short, curling fur. She is quiet and kind, and her fur is a colour caught between the red sun of his homeworld, the orange sky, and the brown earth that surrounded his mothers' vegetable patch. It looks like osaps and garden, and her eyes are the blue of his father's skin. Her name is Gwen, and she, like him, is far from home.

Although, unlike Kalp, she is a student at Bristol University, and he merely works on campus.

"Ready?" Gwen asks, turning the key that opens the money drawer and powering up the calculating machine.

"As I will ever be," Kalp answers, plucking the phrase from his memory of a television program he watched the evening before in his dormitory common room.

Gwen offers him a white, dazzling smile which makes his stomach warm, pats her fringe down over the scar on her forehead that she thinks he does not know about, and the manager unlocks the front door.