"Are you crazy?" A deep, yet angry voice shouts from the dark gray car that is literally five inches away from my body. He opens his car door and glared at me like I took his chocolate cake, ate it, and wiped the leftover crumbs all over his face. My eyes scan his face and realize how he isn't bad-looking at all. I also have to say that this is the worst time to think about how handsome he is.
Now, that you think about it. I actually did pretty well in my SATs back in high school.
"Did the SATs forget to test you on the fact that you have to look left and right before crossing a road?" I snap out of my thoughts from the car owner's voice. I really didn't mean to say that, I swear. I mentally slap myself three times for presenting my thoughts and SATs at the worst time possible.
"No." After mentioning my genius of an answer, maybe I really was crazy. I planned to apologize and end this whole thing, but I couldn't form any words to come out of my mouth at that moment except for "no".
I should've ran straight to the taxi instead of getting into this situation. But, no.
He utters a few curse words under his breath. "Is she even serious right now?" he asks himself, but indirectly to me, in disbelief. "Can you just get off the lane?" he exclaims exasperatedly.
When his words told me to get off the lane, my eyes almost fell out of their sockets at the huge traffic forming from the small scene that I made. My feet felt glued onto the concrete surface restricting me from moving. And my soul almost left my body when I felt a hand circle around my wrist pulling me to the taxi that started all of this. I pick up my head as my eyes come into contact with a pair of friendly gray eyes. I have no idea who he is, but he mouths the words "I'm sorry" to me. I stare at him in confusion as his figure saunters back to the passenger side of the car that almost hit me.
"Dude, let's go!" Mr. Gray Eyes shouts, pulling the driver back into the car because he was too busy shooting daggers at me with his eyes. Apparently he was in the car the whole time watching the whole show play out, and guided me to the taxi when I didn't move. The car drove away, and my mind still can't register what just happened.
A loud noise causes me to flinch in my place. I turn to see that it was the taxi I should've gone straight into five minutes ago.
* * *
My mom had two dreams: 1) meet a guy who would love me unconditionally and 2) open a cupcake shop.
After 27 years, I finally granted one of her wishes. And no, I didn't meet the guy of my dreams. Instead, I endured five years of stress learning about the basic building blocks of business management, graduated with a degree that made my mom cry from tears of happiness, and opened up a little, but proud, place for my mom's dreams to come true.
The chimes ring as I sashay into the cozy, small building that I have been stepping into for the past six months. The smell of butter and chocolate illuminated the room from every corner, and my lips break into a huge smile at the two people in front of me. "Morning, Emma!"
"Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Evans!" I smile at the husband and wife who have been diligently working at this place for the past six months. Finding the right people for our cupcake shop is a little difficult, but my mom and I were glad to find these people. They are not only the coolest people ever even at that age, but they are great in managing the business here when my mom and I get too busy. They're also like my second parents. I walk towards the counter and sit on one of the chairs.
"Coffee or tea?" Mrs. Evans pushes an empty coffee cup and tea cup in front of me. I pick up both cups in my hands and push the coffee cup in front of Mrs. Evans.
"With ice cubes and two teaspoons of sugar and creamer, please?" I asked her in a sweet voice as I softly batted my eyelashes. I like my choices to be concise because I have preferences as a lover of food and drinks. Also, I really don't know why, but hot coffee just throws me off sometimes. It's not that I hate hot coffee, I just like having my tongue burnt-free.
Mrs. Evans laughs at my unique personal choices when it comes to food consumption, "Sure, Emma."
"Emma, can we ask you a favor really quickly?" Mr. Evans hands me a plate with a freshly baked cookie and grabs a rag to wipe the stray crumbs off the counter.
"Okay, what's up?" I happily munch away on the chocolate-y goodness and waited for Mr. Evans' question.
"James has a dental appointment today, and he wants both of us to be there with him. We're sorry for the short notice, but we couldn't contact your mom so we have no choice but to get permission from you. We'll only be gone for about an hour and a half." Mr. and Mrs. Evans look at me with hopeful eyes.
I pretend to ponder on their favor but smiled at both of them. "Of course you can go with James! The dentist is kind of taunting at the age of five." Anywho, both of them have been loyal to my mom and I, and they also became a family to me so I can't say no to them. Who am I to stop them from being with their son when he really needs them?
For more information, the only reason why they had to ask me to leave is because I've never been put in charge and left alone in the cupcake shop. You can say that I'm a little clumsy with stuff.
For the next hour, we assisted customers and went into cupcake mode. Mr. Evans glances at the clock and says that they had to leave now. They both hug me and gather their things. As they were ready to leave the building, Mrs. Evans calls out to me, "We'll buy you pizza, darling! Thanks a bunch!" I give her two thumbs up and wave goodbye.
My phone rings the moment Mr. and Mrs. Evans left. I rush over to the counter to answer it. "Hello, Code Cupcake?"
"Emma? I really want to talk to you." The infamous voice rings through my ears and my throat closes shut. I can feel my fingers shaking but something in me kept listening to him speak. "I really can't take this guilt anymore. I want to talk things out so that things can be okay between us. We can talk at your cupcake shop since you're already there." When I hear the words "cupcake shop", I press the red phone button and end the call. No, I didn't need to talk to him and an explanation won't just let me forget everything.
* * *
It's been thirty minutes since I was put in charge of the cupcake shop, and I am glad to say that I haven't done anything wrong yet. I sit back on one of the chairs and decide to take a mini break as a reward for myself. I turn on my phone to look up places that my mom and I can go to for dinner later.
I scroll through a variety of fast food restaurants, Chinese restaurants, and barbeque places. Hm, barbeque, it's almost as if I can smell it. Wait, I can smell it. Why can I smell it? I look up from my phone, and my eyes widen at the smoke forming in the kitchen at the back. I didn't want to turn my mom's cupcake shop into a barbeque place, I swear.
I jolt out of my chair and run to the kitchen in full panic mode. I hastily grab the fire extinguisher and fumble with the handle. I tell myself to call down so that I can work it properly. As the smoke continues to surround me, my need for oxygen slowly grows faster and faster. The fire alarm is being fixed at the moment, and the water isn't going off. I am the luckiest ever.
While running to the location of the fire, the fire extinguisher slips off my finger and slams into my right foot. I yelped in pain and picked up right foot while trying to balance on my left. At that moment, a jacket flies over the top of my head and a pair of hands pushes me to the side, causing me to fall down and roll over a couple of feet away. I hear the sound of the fire extinguisher go off and sigh in relief.
I rip the jacket off my head and push up my body to a sitting position. My gaze darts at the person who happens to be a male, and try to adjust my vision to the guy coming towards me. My mind immediately tells me it was him, and he already got the message that I never wanted to talk to him or see him ever. Soon enough, I came into contact with a pair of green eyes. As he comes closer and closer, my first instinct is to kick him in places that shouldn't be kicked. And so I do.