The Lunar Chronicles Oneshots (OPEN FOR REQUESTS)

Continental Cheese

Since Cinder was subjected to working at her stepmother's café, she had long since decided that she'd at least try and make it interesting.

Three years ago, she started her side mechanical business. Through means of Peony's and Iko's social media and word of mouth, it had been born. If a customer asked for a cheese croissant, they had a small device- a phone or tablet- that needed basic fixing. A cheese soufflé meant a larger problem involving a phone or tablet. One cheese bagel meant a basic laptop problem, and half a dozen meant a complicated one, and so on. Everything involved cheese because Adri thought it was too unhealthy to serve in her café, and Cinder thought it was delicious.

Somehow, despite all of the orders Cinder continued to type in as cheese-related, Adri still hadn't noticed that this was not just an extremely large group of people constantly insisting that there were cheese-related items on the menu and was in fact her stepdaughter running an undercover mechanic business. Honestly, Cinder was convinced that she was turning a blind eye to it due to the amount of money they got from these "delusional cheese fanatics".

Unfortunately, all the funds that Cinder rightfully owned from the secret mechanics inside the innocent glass doors of Continental Coffee went to Adri- it would be too suspicious otherwise. But it was the thrill of doing something that actually interested her that attracted Cinder in the first place.

"Continental Coffee," Cinder mused to herself as she rested forward. It was a quiet hour for the café, and as the cashier, she didn't have much to do at the moment. Had Adri been working, she was sure that some ostentatious task would have been given to her purely since she wasn't occupied at the moment, but Adri was never working.

"I wondered about the name too," a sudden male voice said, and Cinder practically jumped out of her skin.

She adjusted her apron as she straightened up, looking up to meet the customer's eyes. She frowned, certain she recognized him from somewhere... yes, he was definitely familiar. From where, she didn't know.

"Adri named it for the fact that apparently everyone in the continent should eat overpriced health-guru ridiculousness that she manages to sell off by poorly disguising it as coffee and muffins." She rested her hands on the register, unable to ignore the way his eyes trailed her metal hand. "Car accident" was her only explanation, but the boy nodded as if this made total sense.

"I... I'm here for a Linh Cinder?"

Cinder raised an eyebrow, still not typing an order into the register. "I'm afraid we don't sell any Linh Cinders here, sir. You'll have to go across the street for that." It said something that he hadn't yet noticed her name tag, labeling her as the Linh Cinder he was looking for.

The boy laughed, and at the sight of any form of smile rather than the awkward expression he had been wearing previously, Cinder's recognition clicked.

"Y-your highness," she said, starting to clumsily bow. The boy- Prince Kaito- held up a hand, stopping her.

"Sorry," he said, eyes darting around the almost empty room nervously. "I'm trying to keep on the down-low. As much as I can, I mean." He raised a hand upward in a motion to run it through his hair, then seemed to remember that he was wearing a hoodie with the hood up and let his hand rest on the counter in between them instead.

"Right." Cinder nodded, barely refraining herself from mentioning that she doubted someone like Prince Kaito could ever blend in.

"Oh, and please call me Kai." He flashed her a practiced smile, one that Cinder had seen on magazine covers and as the background of Peony's or Iko's devices all too often.

"Sure," she said, having no intention whatsoever of calling him that. She returned her attention to the register, hands hovering above it expectantly. "What'll you be having today?"