Page 35 of September
“I can do it,” she offered way too quickly. “I need to see the confirmation. It’s a rule thing,” she lied, trying to cover up just how excited she was at the mere thought of having a reason to text Juliet.
“Okay. Yeah, makes sense,” Molly replied. “Tonight?”
“Tonight?” Gwen asked back.
“Your place? To hang out with Carly for a few?” Molly then closed her eyes for a second and added, “And I realize how that sounds now. I’m not hitting on you.” She laughed a little. “It really is just about seeing Carly. You know what? I’m being silly. I can wait until Jules gets back from her trip. Just forget about it.”
“I didn’t think you were hitting on me,” she said, lying a little because itdidkind of seem like Molly might have been trying to spend some time withherand was using the dog to do it.
“Good, because I promise, I wasn’t. I like someone else; someone from work, who has no idea. If she did, things could get awkward, but I can’t stop liking her, no matter how much I’ve tried.”
“Oh,” Gwen said. “No problem. I’ll text Juliet and ask if it’s okay.”
“Don’t bother. I’m being weird. I’ll see Carly when Jules gets back. You just take good care of her until then.”
“Are you sure?”
“Definitely.” Molly smiled widely. “Thanks. I’ll see you around?”
When Gwen nodded, Molly walked off, and Gwen was left standing there on the street, wondering if Juliet had any idea that her work friend liked her as more than just a work friend.
CHAPTER 11
“And it’s two pumps for the small,” she said. “If it’s an iced drink, though, we add one extra to account for the melting ice diluting the flavor.”
“And an extra shot of espresso?” the roaster asked.
“Not for the small, but for the medium and large, yes,” Juliet replied.
He nodded, seeming to be taking her seriously.
“Once you have the espresso going, you’ll start to steam the milk. Listen for the sound to change. This machine will do all the work for you, but you don’t want to burn the milk. When you put it under the steam wand, it’ll be a little higher in pitch. The milk is done when it gets lower.”
“What about for customers who want it extra hot?”
“Start with fresh milk for them and don’t use that milk for another drink. If they know just how hot they want it, wait until the milk reaches that temperature, but if they don’t tell you, do the usual time and leave it in for another five to ten seconds. That’s good enough for most, and the ones who are extra particular usually know how hot they want it anyway, so you can just get it there with the thermometer without having to guess. Always pour enough milk into the container for the one drink, though, so that you don’t waste any milk in those cases. We have lines on the inside of these.” Juliet held up a clean stainless-steel container and pointed to the lines on the inside that had letters S, M, and L that corresponded to the drink sizes. “You’re probably not using these often because when you’re busy, you just fill up the container to handle as many drinks as possible, but you’ll have customers requesting certain milks and extra hot, so it’s good to know that they’re in there.”
“Cool. Yeah, thanks,” the guy said and looked off at two other roasters who were learning the cash register.
They were doing rotations around the store today. This store was a relatively small one and would start with eight employees since it was only going to be open from six in the morning until two in the afternoon on weekdays and four on Saturdays. The manager was doing a walk around the outside of the building, which would be part of his job twice a day, to ensure there wasn’t trash gathered in the parking lot and no one was violating any of the no-parking or reserved-parking spots. Three employees were in the small back kitchen space, learning about the food items and how to clock in and out and complete their end-of-day paperwork. One person had already called in sick and likely wouldn’t be remaining on if she couldn’t even make it through their few days of training.
Juliet’s job today was to give everyone an overview of how things worked in the store and to give them chances to practice and be graded on that practice. They were rotating around each of the roles, and she was keeping an eye on how each of them performed. The guy in front of her now, learning to make the drinks, had been paying attention to everything she had said all day and was doing well because of it. One of the guys at the register was currently picking at his nail while his colleague attempted to ring up fake drinks that Juliet had pretended to order so that she could see how she did. The store manager was fine, but he had also come from another store and had received additional training upfront, so he knew his stuff. The threeemployees in the back were all right, but nothing to write home about.
She suspected that the store would only open with six employees and maybe even only five, and the manager would need to hire three new ones right away. It was common that they lost people through the training process, but the company didn’t like to overhire in preparation for that because they hated the idea of having someone work for only a few days and then lose their jobs just because they didn’t need them. In their founder’s mind, these people were giving up other job opportunities to work at Southern, so they shouldn’t be considered extra, and no one in the group should worry about getting cut because they’d hired too many people. So, instead, they hired just enough, and, in many cases, everyone made it through training. In some cases, though, they lost one or two, but they could hire new folks within just a few days, and they could typically start right away.
Earlier, she had grabbed herself some lunch at the taco place next door since she’d been craving something different and the tacos were cheap, and she had ended up picking up a whole box of them because of that and had given them to the staff. After lunch, they’d rotated again, and she had talked to the manager about her observations of the two she didn’t think would make it onto the actual schedule. He had agreed to keep an eye on them and to take a look at the notes on the people they hadn’t hired to see if any of them might be available at short notice.
At five, with the day finally done, all the hourly employees had left, but Juliet had remained behind to speak to the manager for another hour or so about a few of the end-of-the-day procedures that he’d never had to do before. At that point, she’d been on for over twelve hours and was more than exhausted, but she grabbed dinner on the way back to the hotel. As much as she wanted to fall flat on the bed and sleep until morning,she worked up enough energy to eat her dinner and opened the pet camera app to check in on Carly. When she saw Carly lying on the sofa, with her head on her paws, looking lonely and sad, she closed the video and went to dial Gwen’s number. Instead of dreading having to make a phone call, though, which was the norm for most people her age and younger, Juliet found herself energized and even a little excited at the prospect of talking to Gwen.
“She looks sad,” she said.
“Huh?”
“Carly. She looks sad. I just checked in on her.”
“Oh. She does?” Gwen asked.
“Yes. She’s just lying there with her head all the way down and staring out the window.”
