For you and a thousand times over.

2:30 am

after a few days, the painting was already collected by Kio. Niko never met his client, all the agreement was made by Kio which was perfectly fine for him, all he need was to get paid and he got it already. if he's going, to be honest, he is very much disappointed with himself. thoughts go around him like "do you only amount to this?" or "you need to do much better". he already lost himself without even gaining anything, he's getting sick of it, hoping every thought he has will leave him when the sun comes. and there again the cycle of his week continues. after getting hundreds of orders every day, he doesn't even have the energy to analyze his customer's faces. he just gives them a small smile as a welcome and all. well he finds it weird to even interact with people, they will leave any minute or an hour or you wouldn't even notice that they already left. until this one lady came, ringing the bell of their dirty glass door.

he expected the lady to go straight to him, take her order and leave, but he was completely wrong. the lady sat at the last table, taking her notebooks or whatever it is, it's not like he cares right? hours passed by and the Caffe is getting quiet, it's already midnight what does he expect. he needs to close it until its empty, but no the lady is still there. he doesn't want to bother the poor lady just because he wants to close the Caffe and be selfish. half of her face was covered by her hair as she was busy drabbling on his notebook. he spent his 15 minutes gathering all his courage to approach her, he doesn't even know what he's going to tell her. he's too tired and just wants to go home so he did it.

"Uhm" approached quietly enough for the lady to hear him while his entire being is shaking as if his guts are about to explode anytime. why is he getting intimated by a lady that he doesn't even know or maybe that's the point he's getting cowed because of a stranger. "are you alright?" all his senses came back as soon as he heard the lady's voice. he didn't even notice how long he's been standing there while fighting all his discomfort. "ah y-yeah I am" he replied looking away trying to hide his face as if it's helping. "miss, i- Uhm- I know you are completely busy but can I ask how long you're going to stay?" he's rambling and he doesn't even know what he's saying, maybe he came off a little rude? the lady lets out a cute chuckle leaving him all confused. what's so funny? isn't she supposed to be mad or what? "I'm just waiting for you to tell me to get out of he-" and he cut her off "no! it's not like that, I'm willing to wait for you" funny how he's been standing there for so many minutes, he still couldn't look at her gaze. but from his peripheral view, he can say that the lady is smiling. he suddenly had all the guts to look at her.