”You absolutely have to try this coffee shop,” Sulli insisted, taking Krystal by the arm. It was Krystal’s second day attending classes and she’d met a girl she’d seen on the first day. She’d immediately been pulled into a crowd of people after she’d confessed to feeling tired from her first lectures. They’d gone shopping at a nearby boutique, and now they were all heading for coffee. 

She smiled her shy smile at the tall, beautiful girl. “It must be popular.” 

“Yes. Pretty much every alumni and student has been going to it to reawaken their brain for the past fifteen years. The owner of the chain used to attend our university so we have to be loyal,” she said with mock seriousness, her glittering eyes revealing her humor. 

Krystal was glad to be dragged along by her. She wasn’t very good at making friends since people were turned off by her cold appearance, but Sulli didn’t seem to be intimidated at all. She had a vast circle of friends and seemed determined to add Krystal to the collection. 

They entered the shop and she passed Krystal the list of orders they’d made earlier. “You’re new, so this is your job. Also, you’ll get to see the other reason why this place is so popular.” 

Krystal just shook her head good naturedly and headed to the counter. A tired looking boy stood beneath the menu board, a tight smile on his lips. But wow, he was handsome despite his obvious weariness. There was something quite pretty about him too with those long eyelashes. People were only supposed to have lashes like that in romance novels. 

She coughed and blushed. Not that she read romance novels. 

“Hi,” she said quietly. “I would like to place an order...” 

The worker practically grimaced. “Go ahead with your order, M’am.” 

Krystal inched toward the counter, then quickly straightened her spine, taking bolder steps. The worker should do a better job of looking pleasant rather than trying to intimidate customers, it was not Krystal’s fault that he worked there. 

She placed the order sheet on the counter, trying to be firm like her father. “The detailed list is here. Our party is sitting over there. I’ll point out which orders belong to which person once you deliver them to the table.” 

With that, she her heel and walked away.

Sulli took one look at Krystal’s face and burst out laughing. “Cute, right?” 

Krystal pressed a hand to her forehead. “If you like that sort of person, then sure.” 

SuBin, another girl in the group giggled. “Don’t worry, we’ve all made a fool out of ourselves in front of him once or twice. It’s hard not to stare at his face. Then you get nervous, then you get mad you got nervous. It all goes away after a bit, I mean, who in their right mind would date a coffee shop worker? But he’s fun to look at.” 

Krstyal nodded in agreement. He really was nice to look at, but she never gave herself over to actual relationships. She wanted to figure out what she wanted for herself first before thinking about someone else. She’d just now started college and would one day have a career. A boy would just ruin all that. They wanted to control everything and women had to just sit and take it. Well, she wouldn’t be that kind of girl. 

“M’am,” that husky voice that she already knew belonged to the cafe worker said near her shoulder. 

Krystal jumped, knocking into what turned out to be the serving tray and ended up spilling drinks on the cafe worker and the pristine floor of the establishment. She gaped in shock. 

The worker’s shoulders slumped and a hard furrow appeared between dark brows before he just closed his eyes for a brief second. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come up behind you like that. I’ll clean this up, go remake the orders, and be right back. Sorry for the inconvenience.” 

Krystal wanted to help, since she was the one who’d over reacted, but it was his job to do, so she just sank back down in her chair, cheeks pinking. The other girls from university were all silently chuckling at her embarrassment. She wished she could just sink into the floor.

Amber wished she could just sink into the floor and teleport to any place but this one. She was tired, her body ached, and now a bunch of girls were giggling around a mess they could at least pretend to want to help clean up. 

She gathered towels from the back room, then went back to the group of girls, trying not to let out an audible groan as she sank to her knees to clean. Her dirtied uniform would come out of her paycheck if she wasn’t able to get the tea and coffee stains out and she simply couldn’t afford that. Rent and electric couldn’t wait, but she also couldn’t lose her job for not wearing the right uniform and the boss was always screaming about how those stupid little coffee logos on the white button ups didn’t come for free. 

She felt a tension headache trying to start so just focused on her task. She cleaned the floor as thoroughly as she could, staring at all those expensive shoes all the while. Each one probably cost more than the rent she paid on the place for her and her mom each month. She was literally surrounded by thousands of dollars as she mopped up beverage from the floor. 

“How lucky some people are,” she murmured.