BXBX NOVEL Chapter 843 - 843 Performance Review
Sometimes I wish there was a button I could smash, a lever I could break loose that’ll just shut down any and all sentient thought from forming in my head… ’cause all they’ve been doing for the past forty-eight hours was screaming at me for answers I don’t have.
For a diligent detective lady, Irene sure had the tendency for coming up with mysteries rather than actually solving them… and all the times I tried poking and probing her for some clues, she’d answer right back with even more ambiguity.
<<You’ll find out when you come over.>> remained her undaunting shield against my onslaught of questions.
Much like Amanda, this woman seemingly loves her surprises. I’m starting to feel all women do at this point.
Well, according to the tick-tock of the clock hanging high on the rustic brown of the cafe walls, there were only twelve more hours left until the entire world on this side of the hemisphere collectively starts polluting the sky with the celebratory stench of sulfur.
Just needed to hold out for just a bit longer. For the time being, though… I suppose the orders piling high aren’t gonna complete themselves. The end of the year really brings out the coffee-lover in folks, it seems.
Missing both my favorite patrons due to different yet equally unfortunate circumstances, the morning shift dragged on as it usually does even during the hectic peak hours when my nose would be numbed down by the constant wafting scent of brewing beans.
When the horde eventually thinned out to a more manageable two or three tables occupied, I went back to my little resting corner behind the counter, where I could brood and ponder needless, taxing mysteries for however long my brain thought I could handle it.
.....
“Hey, psst!”
I heard a weary grown resound inside of my head, and begrudgingly, I looked left – spotting a beaming smile poking out of the doorway of the backroom, wide, inquiring eyes peering back at me.
“Not busy are you?”
I gave the perimeter a double-look through, checked if the register’s closed, the condiments replenished, and let the shrug of my shoulders give the answer.
The smile widened, and out emerged the rest of Hayley with two narrow boxes weighing down on her palms.
The shock I got clocking in just this morning, sun barely shining, only to find the usual hulking Nick hunched over at his desk had been replaced by a manic pixie girl wobbling on a footstool putting up the last of the streamers to commemorate today’s special occasion.
Apparently, Nick took leave for today; some important family thing he had to attend… and seeing as how she was here as opposed to joining him, I’m guessing it wasn’t really all that important… to her at least.
“Need an executive decision,” she heaved, slamming both boxes down atop my nice, empty counter; toppling bottles, rattling silverware. “Got two types of custom-made napkins specifically designed by me that I ordered. I was thinking of sprucing things up for the new year, you know?”
I peeked over the top of the boxes, seeing in one, the green of nature, branches, leaves, and all, manifested in a piece of two-ply, while the other box contained the deep red of evening woven in its thin layers.
“Something like this seems way above my pay grade, to be honest,” I muttered.
“True,” She agreed, nodding. “But maybe consider this a… initiation of sorts, hm? For something more later down the line, who knows? Now – ” she delved her hands into boxes, plucking out one of each for my sole assessment. ” – this or this? If you’re a customer, what would you personally want to see in a napkin?”
Personally, she says? Well then, if I really had to choose…
“Green?” I offered, giving another half-hearted shrug.
“Green?” She looked kinda surprised by my choice. “Hm, ‘kay… favorite color or something?”
“Something like that.”
“Huh…” Hayley still looked surprised. “Well, okie-dokie, then. Guess I know what Nick’s ordering in bulk next.”
With a haphazard toss, both napkins flopped into the opposite box from each other. I watch her seal them close, feeling a lot more uncertain about my decision than she was.
“Are you really gonna go with things based solely on my say-so?”
“Business is only as good as the employees that work in them,” Hayley said, smiling proudly at me. “You, you’re a diamond – and your words are worth their weight in them.
That’s… that’s some nice words to hear actually. Good boss. 10/10.
“Nick will probably whine a bit though. He doesn’t like green.”
That… isn’t as nice.
“And I gotta say…” she threw me some fast quizzical blinks. “I was seriously thinking you’d pick the other one instead.”
I snorted in response. “Don’t know why you even expected me to but sure, I’ll bite… why did you think that?”
“Because Amanda picked the other one,” she said, as if that alone was supposed to make any logical sense at all. “And you know, lovey-dovey couples tend to share a lot of things in common with each other over time, right? Subconsciously and whatnot. It’s just surprising… seeing your choices vary differently. Could spark some conflict somewhere down the line, just saying.”
What kind of caffeine-heavy concoction was she on right now, and where the hell does she keep it so I can dispose of it?
“How many guys have you even dated yourself, Hayley?” I asked.
“Well… I…” she pulled a face. “It’s just common sense, alright? Opposites attract, but there’s a reason opposites are so far apart from each other too. You never know, okay?”
Clearly arguing was just gonna sink me deeper down this hole, and I’m already neck-deep in one particular mystery hole as it is, so I gave the universal sign of good faith and just nodded along all fine and dandy.
“Ooh, speaking of Amanda too…” Hayley crept a little closer, wearing a terrible, no-good smirk on her expression, then with a white flash of light, she held her phone up before my eyes.
“Phones aren’t allowed during service,” I said. “Better keep it away before the boss sees you.”
“Oh, just take a look,” she said, shoving the phone closer. “I mean, wow – you certainly captured her finer details just perfectly, didn’t you?”
I froze in terror. Pure, unadulterated terror. The moment I heard her say those words, I knew my fate was sealed, my horror was real, and I knew what exactly was gonna stare back at me behind those bright AMOLED pixels.
Eldtrich-Amanda smiled her derpy smile at me, one eye gazing left, the other staring into the skies; broccoli trees were drooping in the backdrop, which I regrettably believed would salvage what artistic value remained in the sketch.
In hindsight though, I want nothing more than to burn it and then myself into a fire.
“She uploaded this on her feed?!” I heard my own voice yell, saw a few heads turn; I didn’t care, swiping the phone from Hayley for a closer look and felt my heart dissolve quick within my intestines. “One hundred thousand likes?!”
“Truly the Mona Lisa of our age,” Hayley sniggered. “Also you don’t keep up with your own girlfriend’s feed? Boo.”
“She posts like fifty times a day!” I exclaimed. “I – obviously I’m not gonna look up all the time if – ! Oh, I’m dying. Oh, Christ… why would she put something up like this for the whole world to see?”
“Because she obviously really loves it, duh! Why wouldn’t she want to show it?” Hayley rolled her eyes at me. “It’s like how that saying goes: if you really love something, you post it online.”
That’s not a real saying.
“I have hers. You don’t see me posting hers. Actually, you don’t see me posting every single little thing I – !”
“Opposites, you see?” she said in triumph, as if I’d just vindicated her point in real-time, taking her phone back from my stiffened fingers. “That being said though, what you did for her the other day… from what I heard anyway… I don’t think she’ll ever find a more total opposite than you.”
Quiet and sincere her words left her, and she was beaming at me again – proud as proud can be.
“A love letter? A pseudo-engagement ring? In the town of her childhood, on a romantic plateau known for forever promises?” Hayley gave a quick, vigorous applause. “Always Amanda keeps telling me how perfect you are – and after what you did… yeah, I get it now.”
More flattery, more praises, I’m not sure exactly how to respond to this…
“Um, thanks… I think.”
“You set a high bar, Chester,” she said, smiling coy. “Now you got me here wishing my first date would be as good as you.”
Okay, now that, I really have no clue how to respond to.
“Unfortunately now, we get to the part that’s a bit troubling,” then quicker than quick, her voice turned harsh, her smile sagged down, and looking more akin to a stern boss, she scowled. “After all that – why aren’t you going to be with her tonight?”
I blinked. “Huh?”
“It’s New Year’s Eve,” she said slowly in clarification. “A new you, a new her, a new love… and she’s telling me that you’ll be far too busy tonight? Like, what the…?”
Hayley let out a heavy disbelieving scoff, crossing her arms as if the very notion had struck a nerve in her.
‘It’s… complicated,” I muttered out limply. “There’s someone I need to see.”
“Is it?” She fired back. “Okay, alright – then tell me. What… or who on earth can be more important than the absolute love of your life in the new year’s?”