Beyond Gloom

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

I stood in front of the cafe seeing humans rushing in and out. I went inside, the door opened with a chime and I was engulfed in an octopus hug.

"Maria, I can't breathe". I said chokingly.

Maria is Daniel's wife. She is a 54 years old kid. She may be old by the age, but her actions are of 5 years old. She has got mesmerizing blue eyes, sun-kissed fair skin, smooth wavy brown hair. She is stunning.

"Oh! Sorry dear, I got little too excited to see you".

"It's been just a day Maria and you act like this, besides you talked to me over the phone the whole afternoon".

"Here you go being a bore, sometimes I wonder who is the elder one here. You are no fun sweet". She said while sticking her tongue out at me.

I rolled my eyes and sighs at her childlike behavior.

"You don't roll your eyes on me missy" and slapped my back lightly.

"OK, ma'am, I surrender". I said with my hands up in surrender.

She smiled proudly; I realized all eyes were on us. The customers were staring at us and for my colleagues, they are used to this. I hate being the centre of attention. With all eyes on me, I go anxious. Maria claps her hands and says loudly; Everyone, please enjoy your meal. The free show is over. Then she turns around to me and says

"Well, miss, you are pretty late today so you better start doing the work". She walked away but not before looking at me with suspicious eyes. I sigh, I have no idea what story she is cooking in her head. I look at the watch reading 11:00 am. I felt her gaze on me. She looked like an angry bird. I ran into the staff room and wore my cap and apron with the cafe name written in beautiful calligraphy. She may be 5'4 but can be quite scary. I greet all my friends and check if everything is fine. Erin is the best coffee maker in the town, no probably in this whole world. He has to fall sick on Monday morning only. Now you can understand why Dan was worried about his absence. I took the notepad and went on with my work. I kept running around from table to table meeting various types of customers. Some customers are friendly, some cranky and don't forget the douche bags. It was lunchtime. I took a deep breath and sat down.Soon enough, Tessa joined me.

"It's more bustling than usual today". She commented.

"Yea girl and Erin have to fall sick today only. His presence makes a difference. He does all the work like woosh". Tessa snickered.

She is a very charming girl. She has espresso hair with chocolaty eyes. She has got all the curves at the right places and beautiful olive skin. She is a perfect example of beauty with brains. Even though she does a part-time job here, she is an A-grade student. Now you must be wondering what is she doing here instead of being in university. The university gave a holiday of a week due to heavy rain.

"It's something new that you came late. You are always the first one to arrive. Was the last night rough?" She asked, wiggling her eyebrows.

"No! Tessa, I spent the night alone and I, just overslept today".

She started laughing, "Your face was priceless" she managed to say in between her laughter.

"Yea yea, you and Maria love to bully me".

"It's not called bullying sweet, it's called love". She said mimicking Maria.

We both cackled, we were interrupted by Dan screaming my name.

'Lilith, come to the office'. Tessa looked at me, I don't know why he called me. I shrugged and went to his office. I knocked at the door.

"Come in", he said from inside.

I entered and saw him covered in a mountain of papers. His 6 ft self-looked petite under all these papers. I wonder how he managed to do that in a few minutes. He was engrossed in those papers like they were rare diamonds and he needed to check if they were real.

"You called Dan".

"You here, yea I need to talk a couple of things with you". He said with a serious face.

And boy all the bad things ran in my head.