Waffles
Title: Waffles
Chapter: 1/1
Author: kiroyo
Genre: Fluff
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: I own this page of lies.
Rating: G
Pairing: Kai x Reita
Synopsis: He was due to close shop soon, it not for a customer that just had to come in at the right time.
Comments: Another café fic ._.
The bell chimed and on auto-pilot Reita greeted, "Hi, welcome!" He amazed himself for being able to sound so enthusiastic at this hour - it was 10.30pm - and he was due to close shop soon. Well, "soon" would have been somewhere near 2 minutes in the future if not for a bastard of a customer...
He readied himself to face a neat housewife, an average school kid or a burly drunkard even, anyone who was nowhere close to a fatigued salary man. A fatigued salary man with dimples at that. Reita blinked.
"Hi I said waffles with a scoop of vanilla?"
Reita blinked again, this time feeling bashful for faltering and not paying attention. How could he be distracted by dimples!? They were merely holes in the face. A genetic hiccup! Damn dimples! Damn dimple that was so adorable on the man in front of him. Reita mentally slapped himself again.
"Ah yes, take a seat please." he gestured to the seating area since all the customers left 15 minutes ago. The salary man smiled in gratitude, revealing that dimple again, causing a facial muscle of Reita's to twitch, and slowly maneuvered himself to a seat by the wall. He placed his briefcase on the chair next to him, leaned his head against the column and sighed.
Reita shrugged his shoulders. He figured that the gentleman must have had a long and rough day at work, then he rounded and headed into the kitchen. After pulling out the designated tray for waffles and shutting the last one in the oven to warm up, Reita found himself recalling bits of details about the customer. There were vague grey eye bags beneath his eyes, and his eyes lighted up like a dim sparkle when he smiled. He had thick coarse fingers which Reita noticed when he placed his hands on the counter while placing his order just now. There were also slight creases at the corners of his eyes and at the sides of his mouth which hinted wrinkles, but given his seemingly youthful appearance, seemed more likely to be smile lines. Would that mean the customer is generally an optimistic cheerful person? Reita wondered how he was like in the day, on his off-days, on Sundays probably? He would probably be the type who enjoys morning walks in the park on a stone pathway with the sun basking down on them.
Hey wait - them?
The knob on the oven returned to '0', giving off a sudden ting. Reita jumped and his cloud of thoughts poofed. He shook his head. He was NOT just thinking a lot about the customer! Ridiculous. Placing the waffle on a plate, he returned to the spot behind the glass display case and plopped a large round scoop of vanilla ice-cream on the pastry before dazzling the top with chocolate sauce. Reita grinned at his creation and stepped out onto the dining floor, to where the sole customer was. He gently placed the porcelain plate on the table and turned to leave. That was what he was about to do until he noticed the customer did not waver. Reita backtracked and leaned backwards. He realised that the man was still in the same position where he was before he entered the kitchen, except that this time his eyes were closed. The customer was sound asleep.
Though the shop was silent, Reita tiptoed to the chair opposite him. He slowly and carefully pulled out the chair and sat down on it quietly. He brought up his elbows and set it against the table, cupping his chin as he mellowed his breathing and watched the customer in front of him who was strangely immensely intriguing.
Reita had observed customers before. That was something anyone working and have free time on their hands would do. He would notice the different ways people talk and eat. The way they cut up their food, the proportion of which they shove into their mouths, the rate at which the food on their plates disappear. He observed random people at random moments but never one to this extent.
He estimated the man's age to be around his, late twenties, early thirties. He squinted his eyes as he scrutinised where the man's eyelashes met his cheeks. He tilted his head when he spotted a blemish, eyes wandering elsewhere to locate any more. Lastly Reita stared at the spot where the dimple appeared: the corner of his lips on the left cheek. He felt slightly awed that when the man wasn't smiling, the dent in his face wouldn't make an appearance. If he didn't smile, there was no trace or any hint of that feature at all.
Reita frowned. He liked that dimple. Despite seeing it only once, Reita decided that that was the man's best feature. To be more accurate, he liked that smile which brought the dimple alongside with it.
He had been staring at the spot on the customer's face so long that he startled when it shifted as the man yawned. He rubbed his eyes and blinked sleepily, a look of confusion crossing his face for a second as he stared at the shopkeeper in front of him. "Ah I ordered ice-cream waffles! Sorry I fell asleep! Were you gonna close soon? Sorry for holding you back!" the customer hurriedly blurted out a string of apologies, smiling abashedly at the same time.
Reita felt himself entering that same daze again. But he hurriedly snapped out of it. "Nope it's alright. Though I'm not sure about your dessert though..."
Both of them simultaneously glanced down at the plate on the table. An untouched brown square was drowning on a half blob of white mess. "Oh man," the customer groaned, "I was looking forward to this the whole day!"
Reita chuckled. He gripped the edge of the plate and brought it closer to his side of the table. “It’s okay. That was the last piece of waffle though. Perhaps you’d like to come back tomorrow for another?”
That line escaped Reita’s lips before he knew it. He bashed himself up inside. That was not an indirect pick-up line! He told himself. Or was it…? He wondered as the man in front of him smiled, revealing the dimple that caught his eye and a line of pearly white teeth.
“Really? That would be great!”
Much to the blonde shopkeeper’s delight, the salary man really did turn up the following night, the night after, and the subsequent nights after that. They’d sit at the same spot and chat, mindlessly, randomly, about anything on their minds over a plate of vanilla ice-cream waffles.
A couple of weeks later, in the middle of a half-eaten waffle, the dimpled customer said “You know Reita, I’d still come even if your parting words to me for the night is ‘bye’ and not ‘There will be waffles again tomorrow.’”
Reita choked on his water and set down his cup with a thud. He felt a sudden heat rush up his cheeks. Wasn’t the air-conditioner cool enough? He should go adjust it now, he thought. However, just as he was about to push back his chair and make his way towards the control on the wall behind the counter, a large warm hand covered his own on the table. It wasn’t a firm grip; it was merely the other’s hand gently placed above his. But this mere contact alone rooted Reita to the ground, and he turned around, his eyes trailing from the gnarled hand to the face barely a meter away from him.
“It’s true that I like waffles, a lot. But I think I like the person who makes it more.”
The loose hold on his hand turned into a firm grasp as calloused fingers closed around his own knobbly ones.
“I think you like waffles too. But I also think that you like the person who eats them at 10.30pm a lot more right?”
A gentle squeeze on his hand caused Reita to jolt and meet the pair of large brown eyes shining with a curious glint. A gentle smile graced the lips of the man holding his hand, with the hint of that dimple barely visible under the florescent light and Reita found himself smiling and nodding his head, his other hand moving from his side to envelop the hand between his.
A/N: I've had this 90% completed for weeks already, but I've been sucha lazy ass.