Fox's Fire

Chapter 1: Bo

Bo hated coffee.

The irony in the sentiment never failed to hit her at the most inopportune moments. Usually it dawned on her as she glared at the coffee grinder, or struggled with the espresso machine, or spilled coffee down the front of her apron. The two former moments were always preferred over the latter.

The latter was, of course, the cause of her daily dose of irony.

A muscle in her cheek jumped as the warm coffee slowly seeped through her apron to dampen her white t-shirt. The customer, a frizzy gray-haired woman with fashionable eyeglasses perched on the flat nose of a bulldoggish face, gapped at her from across the counter. Another muscle twitched, this one above her eyebrow. She calmly placed what remained of the paper coffee cup on the counter.

A detached part of her registered the fact that her hand was turning bright red from where the coffee had landed on her skin. The same detachment made her reach behind her and snatch Cynthia's arm as she passed. "Watch the floor."

The chattering blonde stopped mid-sentence and gasped. She grabbed Bo's hand and yanked Bo away from the counter. "Don't just stand there, Bo! Come over here to the sink, quick! And take that apron off before your boobies melt!"

Cynthia yanked on her arm, and Bo followed her to the nearby sink. Cynthia plunged her reddened hand beneath the torrent of cool water. "There! Keep it under for a full minute, and then we'll put some aloe on it, and wrap it up—"

"Cynthia." Bo reached around her and turned off the faucet. She shook off the extra water before reaching for the paper towel dispenser beside the sink. "I'm fine. Go deal with the customers while I clean up."

"But—"

"We can't let a mob of pen-pushing zombies overrun us." Bo glanced over her shoulder at the line that had grown while their backs were turned. "It's gonna get pretty ugly today if we don't get them all out of here before their shifts start in fifteen minutes."

Cynthia sighed, though a grin took the edge off of the exasperated sound. "Yeah, because they're all already late anyway, and why can't we just have their regular order already finished because they always get the same thing at the exact same time every day."

"And all baristas have photographic memory of each and every order they make."

Cynthia giggled and turned back to the front counter. Despite the sting of pain beginning to register, Bo had to smile. Bo hated coffee, but Cynthia made working at a coffeeshop more bearable than her last job. They had met when Cynthia had knocked over a display of discounted rice cakes Bo had finished stocking. Cynthia had parked her cart and helped her arrange the bags, chattering on about how she had rushed to buy more coffee beans because she had placed her order wrong. But, Cynthia had assured Bo, she had made sure to have an overabundance of the other three C's: cookies, cakes, and cupcakes. Bo had found herself smiling for the first time in months, and she had saved Cynthia's number between the other two numbers in her phone. After two months of texts and personally delivered sweets during every-other-day "emergency back-up coffee" trips, Bo had found herself donning an apron with the name The Magical Brew gaily printed across her chest, complete with twinkling sparkles and magic wand.

She never had the heart to tell Cynthia she absolutely hated coffee.

Bo flexed her hand and found the stinging pain bearable. While Cynthia began to appease the crowd, Bo slipped into the back of the coffee shop to find the mop. She passed the other part-time employee and gave him a small glare, which he responded to by ducking his head in an obvious sign of guilt. Will liked to bail at the first sign of a crowd, but Cynthia insisted on helping him overcome his social anxiety. Bo thought that scaling down on his twenty smoke breaks every day would help.