Chapter Text
It was certainly not an establishment Schpood would have willingly entered, or even given any attention to. He much rather would have preferred his usual coffee stop a few blocks down. It was larger, more staffed, its interior design much more cohesive and sophisticated than this one. Instead of sleek white walls decorated with oil paintings that were probably worth a hefty sum, TriColor Cafe looked like a crazy cat lady grandma had been given forty bucks and been let loose inside an antique mall. Crooked wall shelves held feline figurines and random glass bowls and old books; dusty wallpaper was peeling in the corners; every chair seemed different, every table a new style. The menu was written on a small blackboard that hung on the side wall (next to an acrylic painting of a cat nestled in a coffee mug, he might add). It featured absurd flavors such as mooshroom and happy ghast and ender pearl.
Schpood sighed.
But alas, he couldn’t say no to his best friends. Spyder and Owo had been begging him for a week to come visit their new favorite coffee shop with them, promising “incredible vibes” and “amazing lattes” and “an owner literally birthed from a ray of sunshine, like seriously, she’s awesome.”
So he let himself be dragged away from his usual happy place into the weird and wacky world of florals and felines. Whatever.
As they walked in, he couldn’t deny there was at least a little bit of cohesion with the decor, if you squinted. Three colors dominated the tiny space: green, red, and blue. As well as any shade and variation of the three. It made sense, given the name, he mused.
“Isn’t it so cute?” Owo asked, grabbing Schpood’s arm excitedly as they entered through the door. A small bell chimed, causing Schpood to wince.
“I guess,” he muttered. He did have to admit, the large windows allowed for ample sunlight to light up the cafe – that was quite nice.
Spyder took the lead, heading straight for the counter. Nobody else was in sight; not a single customer, nor worker. Quiet jazz garbled out of an old radio that sat by the cash register. Schpood reluctantly observed the menu as they waited for someone to show up and attend to them.
“I’m so sorry!” a voice gasped from behind the back wall. “I heard the bell, I swear – I’ll be right there!”
Schpood barely registered the apology, instead trying to decipher the drink menu. He felt like he was reading some sort of code. Absolutely none of it made sense. His attempts were thwarted, however, when his attention was captured by something in his peripheral. The owner of the soft-spoken voice appeared from a doorway in the corner, rushing towards the counter in a flurry of blonde curls.
The woman was tall, almost the same height as him. She wore a satin teal blouse and jeans, both covered in flour. Gold earrings dangled down to her shoulders, and a necklace framed her neck; three stones dangled from the chain. Green, red, and blue. She also wore an impossible amount of rings and bracelets, jangling like bells as she moved. Her eyes were wide, brown like chocolate. Her smile–
“And for you?”
Schpood blinked and realized he had been staring. Spyder and Owo had both already ordered, and the three of them were waiting on him to say something.
Say something. Anything! Quick!
“What the hell is a mooshroom?” he blurted.
Idiot!
The woman blinked in surprise, and bit her cheek. Schpood felt a twinge of guilt, but he just continued to stare, unable to do anything else.
“It’s, uh… Something I came up with. Like a cow, made out of mushrooms. The latte doesn’t have any mushrooms!” she clarified, waving her hands in panic. “It’s made with strawberry and vanilla syrup. Y’know, red and white, like toadstools! And the ‘moo’ because, y’know, milk…” She trailed off, probably realizing how silly she sounded.
Schpood swallowed – why the hell was his mouth so dry? “I’ll take it.”
“O–okay,” she stuttered, offering a nervous smile as she wrote his order down on the notepad. “I’ll get those started right away!”
She got to work at the coffee machines, and Schpood felt himself literally being pulled away from the counter and back to the front. They sat at the table pressed right against the window.
Schpood realized his friends were looking at them. Owo was wiggling his eyebrows, and Spyder had a shit-eating grin plastered across his face.
“What?”
They glanced at each other, then back at him. “So, what do you think of Jophiel?” Spyder asked nonchalantly, tracing the tacky paisley pattern on the linoleum top of the table.
Jophiel. So, that was her name. Schpood hadn’t noticed a nametag anywhere. “She, uh… She likes cats, I think.”
“That’s it? That’s all you have to say about her?” Owo snorted.
“What do you want me to say? I didn’t even want to come – you two dragged me here, against my own will.” Schpood tried to add a bite to his words, but he couldn’t. And his two best friends knew it. They just continued to smile, and eventually the conversation turned to work. The meetings they had later that afternoon, the deals that needed to be made. One particular writer had been pushing the limits on their patience, causing headaches to become a common occurrence.
“If we keep letting him get away with a slap on the wrist, he’s going to just continue to keep doing this shit,” Spyder sighed, rubbing his eyes.
Owo nodded in agreement. “Sidefall’s destined to be his own undoing. I swear, one day he’s gonna cause an incident on his own just so he can report it.”
Schpood was about to say something when he noticed Jophiel walked towards them, balancing three large coffee mugs on a tray.
“I got one golden apple, one dragon’s breath, and one mooshroom,” she said with a twinkle in her eye. Placing Schpood’s down last, she hesitated for a moment. He waited for her to say something, but she recovered quickly, and walked away.
He looked down at the latte. The milk had been poured in the shape of a toadstool mushroom, and two halves of a strawberry rested on the saucer next to the cup. He had decided on the strange flavor partially out of panic, but also because strawberry was his favorite fruit. And as he bit into the slices, he wondered if this was the best he had ever tasted. He felt eyes on the back of his head as he drank his latte; chocolate-colored ones, perhaps. But he just ignored them and stared out the window as Owo and Spyder continued to converse.