Page 87 of A Winter Kiss on Rochester Mews
There was very little to feel good about until five minutes to twelve when Mattie came barrelling into the shop to make sure everyone was working at full capacity and saw Happy Ever After’s erstwhile manager walk through the door.
‘Verity! Is it really you or am I having a stress-induced hallucination?’ Mattie cried.
‘Don’t hug me!’ Verity said, inching away from Mattie, who was trying to do just that. ‘This isn’t a hugging situation. The snow turned to slush and we’d promised to spend Christmas with Johnny’s dad in London so, here I am. You don’t need me to serveactualcustomers, though, right? I should probably get on top of the website orders.’
‘Verity Love, it’s Christmas Eve, if you don’t get behind this counter and serveactualcustomers, then I will never speak to you again,’ Tom snapped from where he was dealing with Bertha, who was almost as frazzled as Jezebel. ‘Worse, I’ll sign you up to a find-a-friend service and tons of randoms will get in touch with you, wanting to chat.’
‘You wouldn’t dare,’ Verity breathed.
It was Tom at his narrow-eyed worst. ‘Just try me.’
Considering she was the most responsible grown-up on staff, Verity stomped behind the counter with all the bad grace of a surly teenager and, though they were down a Posy, Mattie could let them get on with it.
She went upstairs to the flat to start bringing down the pig-in-blanket rolls that Meena had been making while Phil had languished on the sofa complaining that the smell of bacon was making him feel sick. Eventually the smell of bacon had revived him and he’d wolfed down five pig-in-blanket rolls that were meant for paying customers.
‘Four more hours,’ Mattie muttered under her breath, as she raced back down the stairs with a laden cooling tray in each hand. ‘Four more hours and then it will be over for three days and you’ll never have to look at another pig-in-blanket roll or a mince pie or a red velvet cake masquerading as a miniature Christmas pudding, for eleven whole months.’
‘Excuse me, but why aren’t you serving cappuccino?’ As Mattie stepped into the tearooms, a woman in a bright-yellow faux-fur coat popped out of nowhere, giving Mattie such a fright that pig-in-blanket rolls went flying in all directions.
‘Oh, damn it all to hell!’ Mattie tipped her head back, blinked her eyes frantically and willed herself not to burst into tears.
‘No use in crying over spilt pig-in-blanket rolls,’ Sophie said sympathetically as she came over to clear up the porcine-and-pastry carnage. ‘By the way, did you know that Chiro has heard that Jezebel’s had a meltdown? One of his sons is standing at the entrance to the mews and telling all our potential customers to turn back if they want a hot drink made with steamed milk.’
‘I can’t,’ Mattie said, sinking down heavily on the nearest chair and disturbing a young couple who were feeding each other cupcakes. ‘I just can’t any more. I’ve nothing left to give.’
‘Oh dear.’ Sophie shepherded Mattie back into the kitchen and delivered in short order a double espresso and a pain au chocolat, which did wonders for Mattie’s energy levels, so that when Sam summoned her back to the shop an hour later, she was nearly fully revived.
‘It’s just Nina’s dying for a wee and also it’s against the law not to let us have a fifteen-minute break after we’ve worked for five hours.’
‘Nearer to four hours, as we opened at nine. But of course, go for it.’
‘Then me and Sophie are going to Burger King to get chicken nuggz,’ Sam insisted. ‘That’s non-negotiable.’
Mattie didn’t dare argue, but took over from Verity who needed to accompany Nina to the lavatory, which meant that she and Tom were the last two members of shop staff standing.
Tom looked a lot less grey than he had done earlier, but he was still very tight of lip as he served customers from behind the counter in a very mechanical way, while Mattie took up position at the Mistletoe Booth.
Instead of explaining about the lack of steamed milk to people who were quite capable of reading a sign, she now had to explain that you could only use the booth on proof of purchase, to people who were equally capable of reading a sign.
No wonder the queue was always so long, the couple currently in there went way over their allotted ninety seconds.
‘I look so chinny,’ the girl kept exclaiming, until Mattie could bear it no longer and pulled back the curtain.
‘Thirty more seconds and I’m cutting you off,’ she told them. ‘It’s a bloody selfie, you’re not shooting the cover ofVogue.’
‘What a bitch!’ the girl muttered as Mattie pulled the curtain closed again.
‘One minute,’ she announced to the people still waiting. ‘You have one minute in the booth. Sixty seconds and that’s it.’
There was a general, discontented mumbling, which Mattie silenced with her best bitch face.
‘I don’t think that’s reasonable,’ Tom called out from behind the counter. ‘A minute isn’t long enough.’
‘A minute is plenty of time and I don’t remember asking for your opinion,’ Mattie called back.
‘Fine. Good. Glad we’ve cleared that up.’ Tom glared at Mattie over the top of his current customer’s head and she glared back, and how long did it take people to have a wee, get chicken nuggets and no doubt snog each other’s faces off?
By the time Nina and Verity were back from the loo, Sophie and Sam had returned with their chicken nuggets spoils and Cuthbert had popped in to say Cynthia had asked him to go to Boots to get some Rennies and a shower cap, Tom and Mattie were nose to nose in the middle of the shop.
