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S O R A
She would be the first to admit that maybe, just maybe, she wasn’t always the best of her friends at decision-making. Too hasty, too impulsive. But Sora would also be the first to admit that her decision to start working at Aqua’s patisserie—the perhaps less-than-imaginatively dubbed Main Street Confectionery (though the name did perfectly suit Aqua’s no-nonsense personality)—for a summer job before classes started up again was probably the best decision Sora had made in a while.
Starting, she thought as she raised the mixing spoon to her mouth, with the taste testing.
“Aqua’s gonna kill you if she catches you licking the spoon again,” Kairi warned without even looking up from the accounting books, still in the daily chore of auditing the previous day’s totals. With it having been a holiday, the shop had been absolutely packed, and the numbers were taking longer to process than usual as a result. “Plus, it’s dangerous to eat raw batter. Again. For the millionth time.”
“And for the millionth time,” Sora pointed the spoon in her direction, and winced a little at the drops of red velvet cake batter flung onto the countertop. Sora had just cleaned up the murder scene she had made from her work on cupcakes for tomorrow, and seemingly already in the process of undoing her own work. “I’ll be totally fine. Nothing’s happened yet, right? I run more of a risk of dying from Aqua catching me.”
“Salmonellosis,” Riku pulled out a flashcard from his deck lying on one of the free tables in the customer area. “A symptomatic infection caused by bacteria of the salmonella genus. Species include salmonella bongori and salmonella enterica, either of which can induce typhoid fever if bacteria manage to reach the lymphatic system. Symptoms most commonly presented are—”
“Fine! Okay, okay,” Sora groaned as she tossed the spoon back into the mixing bowl and took both over to the sink. “You both have been way too eager to gang up on me lately with Riku’s med school prep. Two against one is unfair.”
“We’re not ‘ganging up’ on you,” He shot her a sympathetic shrug. “We just don’t want you to die or anything. Isn’t that what being friends is about? Keeping each other from dying?”
“Keeping each other from dying sure didn’t seem to be on the agenda when you two were racing your bikes down Mount Gagazet last summer,” Kairi grumbled.
“We were wearing helmets!”
Kairi only rolled her eyes in response.
“You know,” Sora said as she ran the faucet and watched the water swirl a shimmering burgundy as the mix washed away, “Caffeine addiction is pretty dangerous too, isn’t it? I could just,” She playfully flicked water in Kairi’s direction. “Tell Aqua to cut off Riku’s and yours supply. No more cappuccinos, or frappuccinos, or any ‘ccinos of any kind.”
“No,” Riku gasped as he looked over with abject horror.
Kairi squinted. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“I would,” Sora teased. “Maybe I wouldn’t have to do a mid-shift run for beans all the time anymore.”
But Kairi’s squint did not let up. “Cutting off Riku alone would halve the shop’s numbers for gross. Never mind net.”
“I don’t buy that much coffee.”
“Yes you do,” Both Sora and Kairi chimed in without even turning towards him.
Riku sheepishly turned back to his flashcards.
“Anyways,” Sora dragged out the word like bread dough as she got back to work on the sink, “Aqua and I would make do when we stop totally enabling you guys—Kairi, don’t give me that look! It is enabling!—and,” Her next words were cut off at the sound of the door opening and the bell jingling.
Kairi looked thankful for the distraction as she put on her ‘customer service face’, as Sora called it, and peeked over the countertop and endless rows of numbers as her polite smile widened into a real one at the sight of a familiar face coming up with a cart. They both cheered.
“Riku, your dad’s here,” Kairi joked.
“Not my real dad,” Riku replied, still mired in his notes, but Terra was undeterred from smoothly reaching over the table and ruffling Riku's hair without breaking his stride.
“Might as well be,” Terra chuckled. “It’s been, what, nine-and-a-half years or so since the circuit court said I could adopt you?”
“Ten,” Riku took a moment to look up, and his feigned disdain at his messed-up hair faded in lieu of a bashful happiness at the reminder, quickly hidden by burying his face in his flashcards once more. “As of two weeks from now.”
“Hey, Terra!” Sora lifted up the hinged end of the countertop so the cart could be wheeled through. And in the afternoon sunlight lit up by sparkling rivers of flour and confectioner’s sugar in the air, she spied a stack of boxes and sacks that Terra got to work on unloading. “Is that the muscovado sugar? Aqua’s been dying to know when the next shipment would be in.”
“Along with some other things she put on the list,” Terra searched around, and said, “Where is Aqua, anyway?”
“Taking inventory,” She began to lower the countertop once more without looking, distracted. “After yesterday—Oh!”
The countertop hit something with a dull thump, and Sora pulled it back up as fast as she could upon hearing a muffled “Ow,” in a voice she didn’t recognize.
“Crap! Crap, sorry,” her hand flew towards her mouth in an unconscious gesture as the apology flew out just as fast, and Sora saw what, or who, she had hit: A likely coworker of Terra, given the matching uniform, rubbing the spot on his head where the countertop had collided. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you there!”
“It’s fine, it wasn’t bad,” The young man lifted his hand away, and Sora finally got a good look at him, and…
Oh.
Crap, indeed.
The first thought that went through Sora’s mind, once all the little gears in her brain that had stopped at the sight of him started turning again, was Wow. The second thought was, He’s really cute. And hot. And cute. And the third, was And I just smacked him with a countertop.
Yep. ‘Crap’ sounded about right for something like that. Or maybe a shade more intense, considering his perfectly tousled hair was the same color as honey. And gold. And those amazing pumpkin snickerdoodles they made every fall that Sora would definitely catch salmonella from one of these days. The more Sora thought about it, the more it felt like ‘crap’ didn’t really suffice at all.
This warranted a ‘damn it’.
Sora knew she was staring at him in front of everyone, and she knew she should probably stop. The problem was that, in the last five seconds, she seemed to have forgotten how to stop staring.
“Yep, I thought you two would get along,” Terra laughed from somewhere to their side, but Sora barely registered it. “Sora, meet Ventus. He usually goes by Ven. Ven, meet Sora. Ask her to show you how to set up recurring shipments like I taught you in training, I’m going to go help Aqua with inventory.”
Ventus? Ven? Ven. Wow. Ven.
Wow.
“H-Hi, wow,” She stammered, and shook her head. Had she forgotten how to talk, too? His name wasn’t ‘Wow’, though it sure could work as a synonym for it. His hair swirled up kind of like a cinnamon bun.
Heh. Cinnamon, synonym. That rhymed. But she was getting distracted again.
“Sorry,” Sora tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and noticed how his eyes—This really did warrant a ‘damn it’, his eyes were a gorgeous blue—followed it before going right back to her again. Ven looked as though he were in a bit of a stupor himself. Had she really hit his head that hard? Damn it.
“I—no, it’s okay,” He tried, and shook his head as well. Sora watched as his hair swished before he held his hand out. “Better than okay. You’re Sora? I’m Ventus. Call me Ven—wait, you already knew that.”
He cursed himself under his breath as Sora breathed out a laugh and shook his hand. He was good at handshakes, she realized.
“That’s okay, let’s both try again,” She suggested. “I’m Sora. It’s great to meet you. Terra said something about recurring shipments?”
“I’m Ven. It’s great to meet you too,” He tried again, with a grin that seemed both bashful and relieved. “And, um, yeah. I-I’m a new hire.”
Sora realized that the confectionery was much quieter than normal, and glanced around. Terra was long gone, but Kairi and Riku were still there. And when they saw her looking, they both turned back to what they were doing with matching expressions of amusement.
“What?” She asked.
“Nothing,” Kairi replied a little too soon, “Nothing at all. So, Riku: If Terra’s basically your dad, does that make Aqua your mom?”
V E N T U S
Usually Ventus was the sort of guy who could find anything at least a little bit entertaining—When classwork became droll and his (admittedly kind of lacking) attention span waned, he tried to think of it like a game. When the miles started dragging on his psyche in cross-country meets, he tried to think of that like a game as well. When it came time to choose a thesis for his upcoming senior year, he fought tooth and nail to convince his thesis advisor, Professor Gula, that his concepts for altered national park trails were solely for preventing soil erosion threatening native flora because of inefficient design leading to desire paths by attendees.
And not, in fact, solely because Ventus wanted to find a way to work various Mario Kart roads into his thesis. Ivalice National Park’s design being almost identical to the rainbow road for the latest game was merely a coincidence. That’s all.
But this new courier job? Boring. As boring as it could be.
Which was…extremely boring.
Ventus had tried everything; Thinking of more packages delivered as more points. Score multipliers depending on how fast he could manage a delivery. Enjoying the outdoors on his routes. It wasn’t Terra’s fault, of course, even though he had offered him the position at Eraqus’ company in the first place. Terra had tried to keep things interesting from his end as the mentor, and Ventus tried to do his best work as the mentee. Was mentee a word? Eh, either way, he was the protegee-slash-coworker.
And either way, regardless of how boring the work was, bills had a bad habit of needing to be paid. And student loans. And rent.
This whole ‘being a semi-functional young adult’ thing was expensive.
Yet Ventus could not stifle the groan that came out when Terra led him to a stack of more cardboard boxes to be loaded for delivery. He was beginning to hate the color brown.
Terra gave an apologetic shrug in response. “Sorry, kid. It’s what we do. Load these onto the dolly while I go get the rest.”
He did, and when Terra returned with what looked like two fifty-pound sacks of flour hoisted over each shoulder, Ventus asked, “Where are we going today?”
“I think you’ll enjoy it,” Terra shot him a grin before throwing the sacks down onto his own cart. “A bakery. It’s only a couple of streets away, and we don’t have any other orders due until tomorrow, so we can hang around for a while and I can sneak in some extra training opportunities for you.”
He did the math—there weren’t any bakeries on this side of town except for the grocery stores, but those places tended to get their materials sent directly from the suppliers.
So no bakeries, but Ventus did have an idea of where they might be going.
“Aqua’s place?” At Terra’s nod, Ventus continued, “But doesn’t she call it a confectionery?”
After all, Aqua had been quite insistent on that.
“Bakery, confectionery,” He shrugged again, “Tomato, potato. You could even call it a café, since there’s beverages.”
Ventus picked up the last box, that appeared to be smaller, and was surprised by how heavy it was.
“Careful with that one. It’s delicate.”
“What’s in it?”
“Just a little surprise for her bakery. But seriously, be careful with it.”
“Fine,” He felt unsure about just loading it in with the others, deciding instead to simply carry it along with him on the drive, and Terra didn’t protest. “But, uh, didn’t we go by Aqua’s place a month ago when you were showing me the regular clients? Why were you being secretive about us going there today?”
“Okay, maybe that part was just me trying to drum up excitement,” Terra relented as he turned down the street, “But I really do think you’ll have fun on this trip. There’s someone there I want you to meet.”
“Who?”
“Someone who didn’t happen to be on shift last time we went,” At Ventus’ evident lack of satisfaction with that answer, Terra chuckled. “Okay, okay, another hint. You know Riku, right?”
Ventus had known Terra’s adopted son off and on over the years, given that Ventus and Terra were sort of brothers themselves. Not by blood, but also by adoption—Eraqus. Somehow, being related through paperwork (and not genetics) tended to run in their little makeshift family, but it suited everyone involved just fine. Preferred, even.
So yeah, he knew Riku, though it was a little weird to think of him as his legal nephew considering Riku was a year older than him.
“Who?” Ventus cracked up at Terra’s deadpan expression. “Of course I do. So, what, is he working there now or something?”
“Or something,” Terra made another turn and the truck began to slow. “A good friend of his is working there today, and she reminds me of you a lot. I really think you’d like her.”
“Okay, what’s her name?”
“Nope, no more hints from me,” Terra stopped in front of a familiar storefront, and opened his door. He gestured for Ventus to do the same. “Now put down that box for a moment and come help me load up the cart.”
The confectionery hadn’t changed one bit from last time, apart from the chalkboard out front being erased in favor of advertising the latest selection. The dining area was as spic and span as the day the confectionery had opened, with impeccably waxed floors and spotless windows. Given that it was a weekday and people were back at work around this hour, there weren’t many patrons seated aside from Riku, who had become a regular with the constant studying and enticement of caffeine.
Ventus couldn’t resist taking a moment to close his eyes and breathe in the sweet notes of cinnamon and cardamom and all kinds of spices he didn’t know the names of, that overlaid the warm scent of freshly baked bread that made anywhere feel like home. And in the background, the pleasant din of a mixture of piano music from the speakers and chatter from the counter rounded out the experience of simply walking into the shop.
He heard a couple of employees greet Terra in front, but most of his attention was reserved for not dropping the other boxes he was carrying along with Aqua’s gift. Ventus had already dropped one package before, on his third day of work, and wasn’t keen to do it again. But his focus was broken when something hit him on the head.
“Ow,” Ventus looked over at the board that had fallen onto him. Apparently, someone had let go of the countertop without seeing him walk in after Terra.
“Crap! Crap, sorry,” One of the employees replied hurriedly as he cautiously tried balancing the packages on one hand to rub his head with the other. He winced at the ache as the countertop was soon lifted away. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you there!”
“It’s fine, it wasn’t bad,” He’d experienced worse a couple of weeks ago when he’d slipped on a puddle from a leaking package back in the warehouse. Ventus had busted his butt, literally, and figuratively when he had to clean it up afterwards. This was nothing next to that.
As he regained his hold on the boxes, Ventus began to try and say something else, though he wasn’t sure what it was.
Because he’d seemed to have forgotten the second he looked over and saw her.
Her long brown hair was wrapped up in a careless bun, hastily done and finished off with several of the ends beginning to fall out, with her bangs spiking out and nearly defying gravity as flour looked to have left a dusting on her like freshly fallen snow. The apron she wore was riddled with stains and clearly told, alongside the whole countertop thing and compared to her coworker’s almost spotless apron, of a person that wasn’t always the most careful. That was perfectly okay, Ventus figured, because he tended to throw caution to the wind himself—Life tended to be a little more fun that way.
Ventus knew well that life was for living.
Her eyes, blue, so blue, were staring back at him with an expression that had started off apologetic but had turned to something a shade more…interested? Amazed?
Ventus couldn’t pinpoint what it was, but he knew in that moment that that look meant good things. Great, even. That was a look Ventus would give anything to see in her eyes forever.
He faintly registered Terra’s laughter from their side, but barely heard what it was he’d said.
That is, until Ventus heard the words, “Sora, meet Ventus. He usually goes by Ven. Ven, meet Sora.”
Sora. Sora.
Eyes like the sky she was named after. Perfect.
…Did she like him too? Ventus really, really hoped she did.
And only then did he realize it was quiet. Sora wasn’t saying anything, and neither was anyone else in the room. Terra had already left.
Oh, wait. She looked as though she were going to say something. He’d better sober up fast, Ventus had a bad habit of completely embarrassing himself. Well, he didn’t usually, but now was a really, really bad time to start having that habit.
“Hi, wow,” Somewhere deep in his chest leapt at that—was she saying wow to him? To Ventus? Sora shook her head and scrunched her nose a little bit, and suddenly Ventus liked that about her, too. “Sorry.”
She tucked a strand of hair behind her ears, and it was the most perfect thing he’d ever seen. He’d seen other people doing the same thing a million times before, it wasn’t usually the thing you’d bother noticing, but somehow the way she did it was just…wow. All of it was just ‘wow’.
Oh, wait. Sora had apologized again. Why was she apologizing? She could call Ventus ‘wow’ any day of his life and he would be perfectly okay with that. Ecstatic, even.
Hell, he’d go down to the courthouse as soon as his shift was over to change his name to it. That would be the first time in his life that Ventus actually liked paperwork.
Oh. Crap. Crap again. She was waiting for him to say something.
Ventus prayed that he wouldn’t screw this up.
“I—no, it’s okay,” He attempted, and his voice faltered a little bit. He shook his head too, and that leaping feeling in his chest returned with gusto when Ventus saw her eyes following the motion. He held out his hand. “Better than okay. You’re Sora? I’m Ventus. Call me Ven—wait, you already knew that,” He cursed himself for already screwing it up. This was just like him.
But, somehow, Sora managed to find it funny. She laughed, and shook his hand back.
Another leap. Two.
Ventus had never been the anxious type, or even particularly nervous, but now he was trying to double-check himself on every part of this introduction. Had his handshake been too soft? Too firm? Oh, crap, he’d done it again, hadn’t he? He’d messed it up somehow. Ventus was always giving those weird bone-crusher handshakes and scaring people off and oh god did he let go on time? He didn’t hold on for a half-second too long, did he? Ventus didn’t want to come off as a weirdo or anything, he was suddenly more afraid of that more than anything in the world.
“That’s okay,” Sora replied. His newfound anxiety didn’t increase, but it didn’t lessen either. “Let’s both try again. I’m Sora. It’s great to meet you. Terra said something about recurring shipments?”
Oh. Good. She somehow, against all odds, didn’t think of him as weird or scary or anything at all. Ventus let out a breath he didn’t realize he had been holding.
Right. Whoops. Terra. Ventus was supposed to be at work right now.
Now, what was it Terra had wanted him to do here? Something besides meeting the best person ever. Recurring shipments? That made sense.
“I’m Ven,” Duh, dummy. Don’t be redundant. Whoops. Well, they were supposed to be re-introducing themselves right now anyway. Ventus figured that couldn’t hurt much. He had half a mind to say his name was ‘great’, like Sora had said. She said that! That he was great! And it was great! Everything was great! “It’s great to meet you too. And, um, yeah. I-I’m a new hire.”
Whoops. He’d stuttered.
But that was okay. Because not long after that both Ventus and Sora had finally gotten around to the ‘work’ part of work, and he got over himself long enough to really listen to what she’d told him about recurring shipments and placing orders and all sorts of stuff. Ventus would listen to her read a phone book, even, and he’d hang onto her every word.
And not only that, but he’d come to love work as well. This, he realized…this was what made it fun.
Not games, or scoring points, or even continuous bouts of Mario Kart against Terra. Not even the outdoors he’d loved so much.
It was her. Sora. She was what made work fun.
Ventus had started to hate the color brown, before: It was the color of endless cardboard boxes that went to uppity customers, the color of the concrete floor of the warehouse. The color of mud on the bottom of his running shoes.
But it was also the color of Sora’s hair. It was the color of freshly baked croissants and cookies, the color of cinnamon. The color of a new day of work where Ventus would get to see her.
And in that moment, in moments over the course of so many moments over so many shifts and trips and hours that went on forever without her and hurried by with her, in the course of a friendship that didn’t take long to bloom into something perfect and new and great in a way he couldn’t live without, that he couldn’t stop thinking about, Ventus realized one thing.
He loved the color brown.