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Cimorene liked working for Morning Mountains Consulting, she really did. Kazul was a wonderful boss, willing to trust her with far more of the management of the company than her job title actually implied, and certainly more than her on-paper qualifications merited. Kazul was a great believer in on-the-job training, and she liked to say that Cimorene’s general levelheadedness was worth more than any degree-- though she had offered to pay for the degree if Cimorene wanted to pursue it on nights and weekends. It was definitely a better job than she ever could have imagined when she dropped out of her parents’ alma mater.
That said, working at MMC could be...hectic. She always breathed a sigh of relief when it was time for her lunch break and she could head next door to her favorite cafe.
Morwen’s was an unassuming little gray building with a red roof sandwiched in the middle of all the towering glass and steel of downtown. It always smelled richly of the owner’s signature (and well-guarded) apple cider recipe. Cimorene took a deep breath as she went in, the bell on the door tinkling merrily behind her.
The corporate crowd could fill the little cafe to bursting during normal lunch hours, but Cimorene had been so caught up in putting out fires for Kazul- metaphorically this time, thank goodness- that it was nearly three. There were only a few customers lingering at the tables, and the pair of students behind the bar were paying more attention to their phones than to business. Morwen had a knack for picking up college strays, the scholarship kids or part-time students who needed some extra cash to make their way, and Cimorene could never quite keep up with the changing rota of faces.
There were three signs on the counter. The first, a little plaque propped in front of the cash register, said “None of this nonsense, please”. The tip jar had “textbook and alcohol fund” scribbled on a blank piece of receipt paper and attached with a paper clip. The other side of the counter held a much-erased chalkboard that declared her baristas' names to be “Jasmine” and something that had been crossed out violently and replaced with “Trouble”.
“Afternoon, Cimorene,” said the girl, presumably Jasmine. She had dark skin and hair dyed almost the same ginger shade as Morwen’s, and seemed disinclined to look up from whatever she was doing on her phone. “Get you anything?”
“Did the lunch rush leave you with any sandwiches?”
“A couple, I think, or we could probably whip you up something in the back.”
“Pita and hummus, wheat bread chicken salad, pumpernickel ham and cheese,” reported Trouble, peering at the picked-over pastry case. One of his ears was wrapped in a tattered bandage. Cimorene elected not to ask.
“Ham and cheese, please. And a piece of gingerbread to go.”
“You want the sandwich toasted?”
“Sure.”
Jasmine finally put her phone down long enough to ring up the order, Trouble muttering over the grill in the back.
“Is Morwen around, by the way?” asked Cimorene, dropping her change into the tip jar.
“In the other room,” said Trouble without turning around. “She’s arguing with Telemain about something or another. I don’t know why Morwen puts up with him, to be honest. If he put half of the effort into his classes that he puts into flirting with Morwen, maybe he wouldn't be such a terrible teacher."
“Flirting? How can you tell?” Cimorene was amused. “He seems to be indiscriminately incomprehensible with everyone, from what I've seen.”
Trouble shrugged; he obviously didn’t think that Telemain was worth any more of his attention than he’d already given. “I’ll bring your sandwich out when it’s ready,” he told her. Cimorene smiled her thanks and headed towards the cafe’s second room.
“But the behavior of the electromagnetic field can be resolved into four different parts of a loop,” Telemain was saying when she walked in, a frown on his face. “The electric and magnetic fields are generated by electric charges, the electric and magnetic fields interact with each other, the electric and magnetic fields produce forces on electric charges - ”
“And the the electric charges move in space, yes I know.” Mowen cut him off. “I did take physics in grad school, Telemain. Some of it stuck.”
Telemain looked cross, as he did whenever Morwen mentioned her short-lived academic career. Cimorene suspected that he wouldn’t be able to let the moment pass.
“I still can’t understand why you would willingly give up a brilliant academic career just to run a coffee shop!” he said. “To think you passed up several prestigious post-docs to spend your time among the ignorant masses.” Telemain gestured to the counter, where Jasmine was taking phone video of Trouble trying to balance a spatula on one finger.
Morwen shrugged. “Your kind of people give me a headache,” she told him. “I can really only handle you in small doses. I don’t need more academics in my life.”
Cimorene knew better than to take anything Morwen and Telemain said to one another too seriously. They both seemed to enjoy bickering over intellectual minutia, however exasperated they appeared with one another. It made Cimorene wonder if Trouble was right about the two of them.
She knocked on the open archway between the two rooms to announce her presence.
“Cimorene!” said Morwen. “I was beginning to wonder if we’d see you today. Honestly, you have to tell Kazul that just because she only eats once a day doesn’t mean you don’t need a lunch break like a regular person.”
“Things just get busy sometimes, it’s not her fault. Well, not entirely.”
“Your problem is that you're too competent for your own good. Kazul can’t trust anyone else to get things done properly anymore.”
“She trusts you,” Cimorene said, "which is actually why I’m here. We’re having another fundraiser tomorrow. It’s being catered by The Cauldron of Plenty, and you know -”
“Their dessert is terrible,” Morwen finished for her. It wasn’t the first time Cimorene had hired the popular catering company; they were reasonably priced, and most of their food was excellent. For some reason, though, all they could produce in the way of desserts was a somewhat burnt mint custard and strangely flavored ice cream. They had informed her that their flavors like Sour Cream and Onion were artistic, but Cimorene just found them unappetizing.
“Their dessert is terrible,” Cimorene agreed. “Do you think you can help us out? Kazul offered to pay you double, since you’ve stopped taking regular jobs.”
“I assume she wants cherries jubilee?” Morwen asked. “I’ll have to send out one of the baristas to pick up some ice cream, but it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Thank you so much!” Cimorene said, beaming. “You don’t want to see some of these donors. Its like having a bunch of dragons over for dinner!”
A muffled expression of frustration came from Telemain. Cimorene looked over, eyebrows raised. He was grading what had to be problem sets from his undergraduate honors seminar; it did not seem to be going well.
“My students are utter morons,” he groaned. “They keep trying to say that the quanta of the fields act in the same manner as the charged particles that generate the fields.”
“You’re their teacher,” Morwen pointed out calmly. “If they don’t understand it, you have no one else to blame.” Telemain scowled, and returned to his grading.
“So can I pick up the food around nine tomorrow evening?” Cimorene asked.
Morwen nodded. “I’ll be sure that Jasper knows not to lock up until you come by.”
“Sounds great,” Cimorene said. “Any chance of a cup of cider before I go? And Trouble still owes me a sandwich.”
“Of course,” Morwen said, leading her back to the counter. “Now, tell me about Mendanbar while I get it.”
Cimorene smiled. “He’s the same as always, really. Willin is always after him to hire more staff and take on more elaborate projects. He refuses, Willin grumbles about how Mendanbar’s father would have run things, and they carry on as they were.”
Mendenbar was a business associate of Kazul’s that Cimorene had met when he’d helped her bail Kazul out of one of her many messes, just over a year ago. They’d worked well together, and he’d proposed heading to Morwen’s for a cup of celebratory cider once it was all resolved. It wasn’t until he offered to walk her home that she'd realized he might be interested in more than a friendly drink.
“So when are you two going to move in together?” Morwen wanted to know.
“Oh, you know Mendenbar,” Cimorene laughed. “He’s been hinting for a while now, but I’m enjoying seeing what knots he ties himself into before he actually comes out and asks me. My lease is up in June, so he’s got that long to figure it out before I do it for him.”
“Sandwich is up,” announced Trouble, slicing it neatly in half and tipping it onto a plate. Morwen placed a mug of cider next to it.
“That smells amazing,” Cimorene said.
“Let me know when you’re heading back to work and I’ll give you a cup to take for Kazul, too.”
Just then, a klaxon wailed to life outside, only bearable because the cafe’s door was closed. Cimorene peered out the window; the flashing lights were definitely coming from her building.
“Is that what I think it is?” asked Morwen, but she was already pouring the cider into paper to-go cups.
“The fire alarm,” Cimorene said with a sigh. It would be nice to have just one day in which nothing exploded, or blew up, or was lit on fire. “Could you box up that sandwich? There’s no telling what they’ll get up to without me.”
“You are a queen among personal assistants,” Morwen told her, handing Cimorene her order.
“Don’t I know it,” Cimorene said with a smile, and headed out the door.