The Regularʳᵒᵇⁱⁿ ᵇᵘᶜᵏˡᵉʸ

5| Everything is entirely Normal

Chapter 5

Everything Is Entirely Normal

Wednesday 3rd of July 1985

Work was like normal the next day for Jaya. Entirely normal apart from one key thing. Scoops Ahoy was empty. Jaya had seen the morning shift leave, they'd waited around much longer than they should have been there for, hoping someone would show up to take over but no one had come to replace them, Steve and- more importantly to Jaya- Robin was nowhere to be seen. Eventually, they gave up waiting and left. It confused Jaya profusely as she silently watch the ice cream parlor opposite the Burger King she was serving at. It had been long enough that she wasn't even the only person to take notice at this point, in fact, a member of security had to close up as best he could when no member of staff had appeared after 30 minutes of the last shift leaving.

Kate had whined about it since she noticed the shop being closed, she kept going on about how "Today was the day I was gonna talk to Steve" and shoot her shot so to speak. Ordinarily, Jaya would have humoured the girl but after yesterday's chat, she wasn't sure how she felt about Kate. She was confused and worried and wasn't sure what to do about the way she was feeling but either way knew that her feelings towards Robin were anything but platonic.

However, today was normal, nothing notable happened at all. Jaya chalked that up to not being able to talk to Robin at all. For some reason she didn't like that and so, once getting home, Jaya found herself by the phone reading out the Buckley Home phone number to herself for a second time.

"Hello? Buckley Residence."

"Hello, Mrs. Buckley. This is Jaya, Robin's friend, is she home from work yet?" 

"We're not sure where Robin is at the moment, but I can have her call you when she gets back."

Jaya pauses, a rush of worry overcoming her, "Yes, that would be good, thank you. Robin has my number." 

"Alright, goodbye, dear."

"Goodbye." Jamie puts down the phone, hanging up before immediately picking it back up again, "Jess? It's Jaya."

"Jaya? Hey, it's good to hear from you. You've got great timing, yknow, I just got home."

Jaya smiles, "Oh yeah? How was your holiday?"

"It was good. I doubt that's the reason you're calling, though- you kept saying how boring it would be before I left."

"Was I right?"

"Maybe..." Meena comes over as Jess is talking gesturing to the phone, "So what's up, why'd you call?"

Jaya puts a finger up at her sister, asking her to wait a moment. Meena sighs crossing her arms over her chest but seems to be fine with waiting, "You wanna meet up tomorrow morning, we could go to the arcade?"

"Yep, library sounds good."

"Parents listening?" Jaya laughs to herself as Jess gives a short 'mhm', "Cool, I'll meet you tomorrow. I need to catch you up on some stuff."

"Okay, see you then." Jaya again puts the phone down, dramatically gesturing to it for Meena who again rolls her eyes as Jaya walks away.