Lonely Shade of Blue

SEVEN: Milk and muffins

Three updates in one week????  Who is she?

Anyway, enjoy!

.::.

SEVEN

'Milk and Muffins'

The week started out pleasantly, with bright blue skies and warm sunshine.

Carmen had been up since the break of dawn on Monday morning, ready to start the week ahead of her. She was excited to meet their new hires, excited for a better work schedule that didn't have her up and about before the sun even made its appearance. She was supposed to do some minor training today for her baker who would then start tomorrow. The new member of her wait staff was going to start later today, and she'd left Stephanie in charge of that.

She was still, honestly, a little tired and a day in bed probably wouldn't hurt, but she figured that she really could just take the rest of the day after training her new baker. So she had pushed herself out of bed and out of her house just before five in the morning that day.

As was expected, the morning was busy and it was past eight when she managed to even breathe for more than five seconds. Sometime during the morning, she'd heard her phone beep, but she'd ignored it, in favor of keeping cinnamon buns and croissants rolling out of her kitchen and into the racks.

Now, as she leaned against her counter, finally able to have at least ten minutes before she had to start with the lunch menu, she fished her phone out of her pocket and slid her thumb across her screen to unlock it.

It was Ariel, and he had sent a 'Good morning, neighbor,' message, accompanying it with a smiling emoji. It had been sent almost an hour ago.

She shook her head and grinned, her fingers flying across the keyboard to type up a response. 'Hi, good morning,'' she responded, mentally berating herself for the idiotic grin that's spread across her face. She wasn't supposed to act like this, but she couldn't help it.

She watched the three dots on the screen, signalling that he was already typing his reply. Then her phone dinged, and his message popped across her screen.

'Are you feeling okay?' he sent, and then the ellipsis appeared again, so she waited. Then: 'I'm outside,' he said simply, but her breath hitched and she walked over to the pass and peered over to see if he really was there.

She heard his voice first, as he chatted with Beth — she could barely hear them from here, and couldn't tell what they were talking about, but she could see his dimpled cheek and his sparkling eyes, and in her solitary, she smiled, too.

She really should go out and greet him but she wanted to take a moment to just observe him from here. She would be extremely intransigent to insist that he didn't have an effect on her, because he did. It was too great to ignore or deny. Despite trying to fight her feelings, she knew that it was there, and she could only keep him at bay for so long.

And that was, if she really wanted to keep him at bay.

But these are questions for another day, and she heaved a sigh, before she walked out of the kitchen and greeted him with a smile.

.::.

Ariel had woken up fairly early, though his work did not require him to be there till eleven. He knew when he'd taken a quick glance at Carmen's house that she'd already left (it was dead silent, and if he knew Carmen, her house would already be bustling with life and music if she was there). He knew she wanted to work, and she had told him during the string of their exchanged messages last night that she was going to welcome her new baker and then take the rest of the day off.