words, some sentences, some little drawings with speech bubbles. They piled up as she placed them on the side, like a Jenga tower.
‘Sorry, I’ll bring a notebook tomorrow.’
Emanuel shrugged. ‘I don’t know if it’s funnier that in a place that gives you free caffeine, you’re stealing paper, or that you think I care. Write all you like, darling. Just be nice to me in the book.’ He winked and disappeared out to collect wayward cups, and Imogen had the sneaking suspicion, not for the first time, that Emanuel was her London fairy godfather.
*****
The Tale of the Lemony Muffins
‘So … explain these muffins to me.’
It shows you how long I’ve been working as a barista now, that this doesn’t even seem like a strange question.
‘Well,’ I reply cheerily, ‘this is our muffin selection, this one has this, this and this in it. This one has nuts. My personal favourite is this.’
‘What about the lemon muffin?’ The customer points to said muffin.
‘What about it?’
‘Explain it, what’s in it?’
‘Er, lemon.’
I start to suspect this is, in fact, a customer service training exercise, and she’s an undercover market researcher. Except she’s a policewoman. That level of undercover market research may be a little too committed.
‘Yes, but how lemony is it? Is it very lemony?’
What, like you want a percentage? It is 75% lemony, with 15% sugar and 10% ZING.
‘Erm, well, yes, for a LEMON MUFFIN, it’s definitely the more lemony choice amongst our pastry options.’
‘Hmm, I’m not sure if I want a lemon muffin that’s very lemony. What about the peach muffin, what does that taste like?’
There is no way to reply that the peach muffin tastes like peach without sounding sarcastic.
‘It … tastes … like … a sweet nectarine-like fruit that’s been blended in with the muffin mixture.’
Okay, that sounds even more sarcastic.
‘So there’s actually pieces of peach in the peach muffin? Does that mean there are pieces of lemon in the lemon muffin? Or is it just lemon-flavoured?’
This is where I start clawing at my own face asking for some kind deity to please make it stop.
You’re the police. Shouldn’t you be off fighting crime instead of worrying about exactly how much a muffin tastes like the thing it’s named after?
She thankfully takes the damn lemon muffin, after all, and my colleague comes up to me after.
‘Hey, I wanted to ask you a question. You know orange juice … does it taste like oranges? How orange-tasting is it on a scale of one to ten? Because I don’t think I want my orange-tasting juice turned all the way up to eleven.’
On this day, I make a vow, to never eat a lemon muffin again.
Declan came in again the next week, and after messaging him online about her little blogging adventure, Imogen was eager to see what he thought. She hoped he knew she’d been inspired by him. She hoped he didn’t think she’d copied him. Which really, she sort of had. Crap.
‘Which feeble excuse are we using this time? Cup holders or straws?’ Emanuel rolled his eyes as Declan burst in. Declan’s mouth became a thin line.
‘Neither,’ Declan shook his head. ‘I’m here to see my dear friends who are always so pleased to see me. Obviously.’ He winked at Imogen. ‘How you doing, Trouble?’
Imogen opened her mouth to reply, but Emanuel got there first.
‘There’s something terribly wrong. It’s like she’s happy or something. I don’t know what to do about it.’ Emanuel grinned and swanned off to talk to the little old lady in the corner about the variety of cups they sold. Imogen knew this, because the little old lady came by every Friday morning at 10.45 a.m. and had done ever since she’d started working there. Still hadn’t bought a damn cup, though.
‘Oh, I don’t know.’ Declan grinned at her, and she felt a fluttering in her stomach as his eyes met hers. ‘I think she’s a little twisted, our Imogen.’
Imogen bit her lip, trying not to blush, but looked around to see a mostly empty store. She leaned forward on the bar and whispered, ‘What did you think?’
‘Does it matter what I think?’ He leaned back, hands in pockets, a wide smile on his face.
‘Well, sorta, seeing as you’re the one who inspired this whole thing. I didn’t mean to steal your idea, or anything, I just –’
Declan stepped forward, placing a hand on hers on the counter. ‘Hey, love, you’ve done better things with that concept than I ever could. Plus, I turned them into pitiable sad characters in society. You’ve got some rage on you. Funny girl.’
Imogen made a face. ‘Too ragey?’
‘No, but I’ll be sure not to piss you off from now on.’ That Cheshire cat grin again. ‘I’m obviously not the only one who thinks you’ve got talent, either.’
She noticed his fingers stroking hers on the table, and tried not to look down, her heart thumping.
‘What? Who? No one else knows it’s me, right? It needs to stay anonymous. I could get in some serious shit if anyone else knew.’ She pulled her hand away to hold it to her stomach, slightly panicked. ‘I thought I put lots of safety things in place. Did someone mention something?’
Declan raised his eyebrows and tilted his head, a small, surprised smile on his face. ‘Imogen, have you even read the comments on the blog?’
‘No … I just hit “publish” and then ignored it, like releasing a balloon full of crap. Except that it floated … I’m shitty at metaphors. What about the comments?’ Imogen asked. ‘Lots of people telling me that if I hate my job so much I should just go get another one?’
Declan shrugged. ‘A couple, but no, it’s mainly people really connecting with you. A couple of other baristas, bar people, waitresses. You should read them. It looks like you’ve hit on something that people really recognise. I think you’ve got something special on your hands here. How many hits have you got?’
‘Hits?’
Declan
