Chapter Text
Dan Heng liked mornings the best. That brief, serene stretch of time before the campus fully woke—when the air smelled crisp after a chilly night, when frost clung to the grass, and the world felt paused, unhurried.
At this hour, Pom-Pom’s Platform belonged to a routine known only by him.
The café sat just off the edge of campus, tucked beside the old light rail stop that students pretended was charming rather than inconvenient. Its name was printed in large, looping letters above the entrance, accompanied by a cartoon bunny mascot wearing a conductor’s hat.
Dan Heng had questioned the design choice of it once. He stopped questioning it shortly after being hired.
Now, waking before the sun, hazy and sleep-lidded, opening shop with two other people…felt natural. The early shift suited him.
Inside, the espresso machine hummed steadily in the back, disturbed ever so often by the soft hiss of steamed milk and the muted clinking of ceramic cups being stacked behind the counter.
Outside, January's winter pressed gently against the windows, fogging the glass and blurring the awakening campus into pale shapes and drifting colors.
Routine settled in easily when the air conditioner ran a little longer than usual and the Lofi playlist his boss made, played softly in the background.
Humming along without even realizing it, Dan Heng wiped down the counter, checked the register, and reviewed the prep list—not because he needed to, but because the sequence mattered.
He adjusted the tip jar until it sat just right, then leaned over the counter to critically eye the chalkboard menu above his head.
Stars, hearts, and an alarming number of doodled rabbits (courtesy of his co-worker) surrounded the same list of drinks it always had.
Predictable. Familiar.
To no surprise, Dan Heng was a biology major. He liked systems. Processes. Things that followed rules, even when those rules were complex. Working at the café was not related to his studies in any meaningful way, but it offered something similar: repetition. Input, output. Cause, effect.
People ordered coffee. He made it.
And the world continued onward just like that.
At exactly 7:00 AM, the bell above the door chimed softly, and a few regulars filtered in. Students with headphones, professors clutching thermoses, all the sights that came with college life, and the struggle of keeping up with demanding classes.
Dan Heng merely nodded, took orders, wrote names, and moved on. He did not linger.
Then—
Boots.
Not the soft shuffle of sneakers or the careful steps of someone half-awake.
These were unmistakable, slightly too loud against the tile, and uneven in a way that suggested their owner was either rushing or distracted. Today, it sounded like both.
Dan Heng didn’t look up immediately, where he stood at the sink, washing used cups.
He didn’t need to.
She came in most mornings around this time. He didn’t know her name, but he recognized her presence the way one recognizes a melody played too often to forget.
Bright energy. Sparkling. She greeted the baristas and staff like they were old friends, leaned over the counter to comment on the chalkboard art, and laughed too easily.
She always ordered the same thing. Or almost the same thing. Anything and everything related to fruits. The drink had to have a fruit in them.
Dan Heng knew this because he noticed things, even when he didn’t intend to.
He never worked at the register. He was more than happy with getting lost doing inventory or the busyness of handling orders in the back. Not with greeting customers and attempting to smile back at them when he didn’t have the energy to smile himself.
Today, however, the routine shifted.
One of his coworkers, a white-haired upperclassman named Jingliu, waved him over, whispering something about restocking the back and a sudden shortage of hands at the register.
Dan Heng hesitated for a fraction of a second, a wave of unfamiliarity washing over him, before he stepped forward, adjusting his apron as he took his place behind the counter.
By the time he looked up, she was already standing there.
Up close, she was…a lot he realized.
White scarf slightly crooked, pink hair half-tucked into her coat and half very much not. She smiled at him without hesitation, like this was the most natural thing in the world.
“Morning!” she said, cheerful and entirely too awake for this weather.
“Good morning,” Dan Heng replied, voice even.
She squinted at the menu like it had personally wronged her.
“...Okay,” she muttered, tapping her chin carefully. “I swear this changes every time.”
“It doesn’t,” Dan Heng said flatly.
She startled, then laughed, her eyes crinkling upwards. “You sound so sure about that.”
He met her eyes briefly, then looked back down at the register, stomping down the urge to remind this ridiculously energetic pink-head that he works here, and he should know regardless.
Instead, he fidgeted with his sleeve and forced something to leave his mouth. “What can I get you?”
She leaned forward conspiratorially, testing the waters. “Surprise me.”
“No.”
“Worth a shot,” she said cheerfully. Then, after a beat. “Fine. Grande strawberry crème frappuccino. Extra whipped cream. Two syrup pumps. Please and thank you.”
Dan Heng paused.
Just for a fraction of a second.
“...No strawberry purée?” he repeated.
She blinked. “Yeah?”
“You usually add strawberry purée.”
Her eyes widened. “I—wait, I do?”
“Yes.”
“Oh my god,” she gasped, pressing a hand to her chest. "You remember my order?”
“I usually make orders.”
She beamed anyway, cleared unconvinced. “Well! I’m branching out today. Personal growth and exploration, if you will.”
Dan Heng nodded, already typing in her order into the register. “That remains to be seen.”
She laughed again, bright and easy, and moved to the side while he worked.
“Name?”
“March 7th,” she said brightly, gesturing vaguely in the air. “Like the month.”
His pen hovered for half a second above the cup before moving. He wrote carefully in neat, curving letters.
March 7th.
As he slid the cup across the counter, rolling up his sleeves to prepare her drink, she inspected the name on the cup and smiled, softer than before.
“Thanks,” she said, reading his name tag by leaning her head forward with squinted eyes. “Dan Heng.”
The way she said it, clearly, deliberately caught him off guard.
“You’re welcome,” he replied, sounding a bit more surprised than he intended. “...Enjoy your drink.”
She saluted him and then wandered toward the pick-up counter, boots tapping against the floor lightly as she went.
The door chimed again as she left sometime later, humming off-key as she disappeared into campus in a gleam of pink hair.
Dan Heng watched her go for exactly two seconds longer than necessary.
Then he turned back to the counter, the café settling into its quiet rhythm once more.
She was just another regular he’d forget eventually.