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Kotoha’s setting up shop, mopping the floors and cutting up ingredients before Pothos opens for the day. The sun was barely peeking through the windows, so visitors were off the table until Pothos opened.
Or so she thought.
She’s about to reach for a rag to clean the tables when she hears a chime go off at the front door, and a loud creak of the door that follows after. She quickly glances in its direction as the unknown guest catches her eye.
“…Morning.” they mutter, rubbing at their face like they’d just dragged themselves out of bed just to run over to Pothos.
They were wearing a dark-colored hoodie, but the black-and-white hair was a glaring tell for who decided to barge into her cafe at such an early hour. Even Kotoha’s sleep-addled eyes could have seen who it was from a mile away.
“You usually aren’t up this early,” Kotoha observes as he moves towards her, “Sakura.”
“I actually needed to ask you somethin’,” the boy had his hands in his pockets, looking straight down at the floor, “Didn’t want to wait until you opened since y’know, you’d be busy.”
Kotoha’s now wiping down the countertops, turning towards the door here and there to keep her unexpected guest company, “Oh? Let me guess, you couldn’t wait until we opened and now you want some of my special omurice?”
A bright red blooms on his cheeks when he sputters, “It’s not like that!” before quietly adding, “But I guess I do want some.”
However, he does seem to have a sincere question that has nothing to do with Kotoha’s exemplary culinary skills, so she decides to hear him out. “I’ll make some when I’m done here,” she points at the table she’s scrubbing down, “Give me a moment.”
She motions Sakura to take a seat on one of the bar stools as she finishes polishing the last of the counters, before she starts scavenging for ingredients in her fridge. Kotoha wasn’t used to cooking this early before opening, but it was for a friend. So, she didn’t mind.
Before he knew it, she slid the perfectly-cooked omelette onto a heaping plate of rice, and voila.
“There you go!” Kotoha slides the plate over to Sakura, leaning over the countertop as Sakura starts shoveling bites of omurice into his mouth seconds later. “So, what did you want to tell me?”
“Uh,” Sakura attempts to say, muffled by the bite of omurice that was puffing up his cheeks. “I have a question.”
Kotoha pinches her forehead. “How about you swallow that, and then you can ask.”
“Oh. Right, sorry.” He swallows the rice with one bite, before continuing on. “How do you do,” he starts wildly gesturing, trying to find one that suited what he wanted to convey, “All of this?”
“Huh?”
“Uh,” He starts, before shutting his mouth and pausing for a few seconds, “Bringin’ people together every day?”
"You mean,” Kotoha’s scratching her head, “Me? Working here?”
“Yeah,” Sakura swallows another bite, “I talked to Umemiya, and uh, you came up. He was talking about how you were able to keep the town together n’ how you give ‘em a space to feel safe and warm— it’s nice here, actually.”
“Oh, I didn’t know you looked up to me that much! I’m honored.”
“Sh— Shaddup!” he screeches, instinctually pulling his hood over his head in a shoddy attempt to cover up his face.
“But now that I think about it, I see what you mean.” It reminds her of a distant conversation she had years ago, one that led her to running Pothos. Of course, she’s been running it alone for as long as she could remember, but…
“Uhm. Then, I was wondering— is there any way for me to do that?”
“Hm,” That question had Kotoha scrambling for answers herself, but she attempts to pursue that line of questioning anyway. “What’s your definition of bringing people together, then?”
There’s a long beat of silence that echoes through the room until the other boy clears his throat. “Uh.”
Kotoha scrutinizes the minute changes in his expression as he begins to contemplate what that meant to him. But she could already guess what he was about to say, it’s—
“Making sure people are happy with where they are, and being able to protect them. Isn’t that what Bofurin’s all about?” he rapid-fires with zero hesitation.
Kotoha startles at his immediate response, before letting out a pleasant hum. Umemiya really has helped him come a long way, hasn’t he? The entire town has, in fact.
“If that’s what it is, I think you’re doing a great job already!”
“Yeah, but,” He’s despondent only seconds later, his raving admiration dulling at once, “I think that I’ve let them down. I’m supposed to bring them together, but I keep on screwing up.”
“I don’t think I’m the best at leadin’ other people. But I want to be there for everyone.”
Kotoha isn’t sure about exactly what she can do to remedy this long-standing problem of his, but she isn’t making him leave without a solution.
This unexpected predicament begins to resurface some memories from two years ago, when Umemiya suggested that she can put her mind to something else that happened to also form a community…
She’s got it!
“Sakura? What do you think about working at Pothos for a while?”
“…huh?”
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to. But if you want to know how I do, what’s better than watching me work?”
“Yeah,” Sakura brightens at the idea, but his mood seems to dampen immediately after. “But I— I don’t think I’m good enough yet.”
“At what?”
He points at his half-finished plate of omurice, an eyebrow beginning to raise. “At uh. Cooking things. Like this.”
Kotoha chuckles. “Oh no, I don’t mean that! Don’t worry about it.”
“There’s a lot of other things that you can do that aren’t cooking at a resturant. Like taking orders, and serving food—”
“So ya want me to do that instead?”
“Yeah,” Kotoha says, sighing as she thinks of how exhausted she typically gets in the mornings, “It gets pretty exhausting trying to take orders and cook at the same time, especially on mornings like these.”
Sakura nods in agreement, but his eyes flit around the room and only look into Kotoha’s every now and then. She can tell that he’s still shifty about the prospects of working with her for a while. “I guess I can try.”
Kotoha beams. “Okay. Great!”
Definitely better than how he reacted a few months ago, she thinks. “Anyways—", Kotoha clasps her hands, “If you do want to work here, then you’ll need to get up to speed with everything first.”
“Isn’t it just askin’ people what they want and giving it to them?”
“Yeah, I guess you could say that,” Kotoha trails off before she continues her sentence. “But there’s a bit more to it.”
“When’ll you tell me, then?”
She eyes his plate. “After you finish that up.” She places an apron beside his omurice, “I still have a while until I open up, so you can wear that and help me out.”
“Alright,” Sakura subconsciously grabs at the apron, already looping it around his neck before he stops in his tracks.
“Wait, huh?”
Green suits him, Kotoha muses as the other boy clumsily ties his Pothos apron around his back.
All of the ingredients they needed for the day were already cut and prepared for the day, and Sakura’s wiped all of the tables down before they were set to open for breakfast.
She sneaks glances at Sakura as he repeatedly taps his fingers on the counter, his eyes flitting between the clock and his drumming fingers. Kotoha can tell that he’s attempting to conceal his nerves, but she couldn’t blame him. She brought all this on to him very quickly.
But she’ll make it work.
"I’m not sure if I’m cut out for this, but I’ll give it my best shot.” he mutters, assumedly to himself, his fingers beginning to echo off the table once again.
“You’ll do great, trust me!” Kotoha appears behind Sakura, flashing a smug grin, “After all, you have me as your senpai.”
The knocking stops as he whips his head around with a scowl on his face, “H-Hey! You’re younger than me, you know!”
“And?” Kotoha quips with an innocent smile.
With Sakura’s incessant protests echoing behind her, Kotoha strides over to the front of the store and flips the sign from “Closed” to “Open” for all of Makochi to see.
Pothos was officially open for business.
Before they knew it, all the booths in the cafe were filled to the brim with people looking for both food & company. Even the seats at the island were taken up by some older ladies who were insistent on peering into the kitchen to watch Kotoha (and by extension Sakura) work.
Kotoha’s used to having eyes on her every morning, murmured chatter about her food echoing around her as she’s juggling eggs on the stove and batter that needs to be mixed.
But out of the corner of her eye, her temporary coworker bristles as she saw some heads turn out of recognition. She decides that it’s a good time to give him a notepad and send him on his way.
As Kotoha shooed Sakura to start taking orders, murmured chatter began to filter into the crowded space, and eventually some of the ladies sitting in the front came into earshot.
“Kotoha-chan!” an old lady with a cane asks, “Who’s that other young man that’s working with you today?”
“Oh, that’s Sakura! He’s one of my good friends who agreed to work here for a while.”
“That sounds nice,” Sakura’s half-white half-black hair catches her attention, and Kotoha sees him startle. She assumes that it’s in anticipation of a nasty comment or two.
Kotoha knew enough about his past, after all.
Before he lets out a “What about my hair, punk?” though, the lady decides to remedy the issue at hand on her own.
“Your hair is so beautiful, dear,” she says, “I’ve never seen anything like it before.”
Sakura freezes, his mouth hanging open, “Uh,” he goes, before scurrying in the other direction. Kotoha covers her mouth to hide the laugh that threatens to leave her mouth.
It’s absolutely endearing how he takes compliments.
“Sakura! Don’t worry about it!” she calls before he detonates on the spot. He shakes his head before moving along. Kotoha figures he isn’t used to this many people talking to him. She supposes that she should have warned him about that before she opened, but she’s sure he could manage.
Before she knew it, there were swarms of order tickets that she had to go through at lighting speed. Rush hour tended to have her on overdrive, where her hands worked faster than her mind, moving from cracking eggs on the frying pan to checking on whether her broth was simmering to whether her tamagoyaki would fold correctly—
Even Sakura was rushing back and forth from table to table to counter again, barely keeping up with the constant intake of customers. His matted hair flopped over his face, and his feet shuffled at record speed.
She admits that having someone else handle the customers helped her manage the kitchen with relative ease, but Sakura seemed to be pretty out of breath as well as she saw him scurry about.
He was doing good for his first time, though, she observes. Despite the poor boy nearly dropping two orders’ worth of food on his first delivery while precariously balancing both and shuffling his feet to the opposite side of the cafe, he was up to the task.
All in all, the morning went smoothly.
Kotoha’s cooking yet another serving of tonkatsu when a thud followed by a sharp clatter echoes throughout the cafe. Everyone’s eyes were drawn to a hand slamming down on a plate of yakitori skewers.
Business has certainly gotten slower, the afternoon sun already bathing Pothos in a bright glow. Rush hour had come and passed with the rising sun, giving Kotoha the time to stuff her face with a cutlet sandwich she haphazardly made out of the leftovers in the fridge.
She offered one of the sandwiches to Sakura on what she dubbed her ‘work-mandated lunch break’ (which was in fact, not work-mandated), but he turned her down, insisting that he had a bit of steam left in him.
She didn’t stop him. After all, the more experience he got on the floor, the better, right?
Right?
Her eyes sharply turn towards the sight before her, and her eyes immediately glaze over with worry. She chides herself for not being insistent enough about the meal.
“Stubborn idiot,” she mutters, hearing the grumbling of an old man who just slammed their plate of yakitori skewers on the table.
“Is this what you call yakitori, kid?” One of the customers bellows, “What’s this supposed to be?”
Kotoha could only imagine how much of this Sakura was taking to heart. Most of the folk in Makochi were kind souls, but there were some who were… picky.
“It’s chicken. It’s got the sauce, it's got the everything. What’s your problem with it?”, Sakura groans in return. He’s right, she didn’t change anything about the recipe she typically used.
But then she eyes that she accidentally put three pieces of chicken on the skewer instead of the typical four. Kotoha wants to telepathically tell this old sap that it's on her and not her friend who didn’t even cut the chicken, but—
They suddenly rise out of their seat, their voice resounding throughout the empty cafe, “It’s your first day here and you’re already getting mouthy?” they snap back, “I’ve been comin’ here for years and this is the first time my order’s been messed up. Think it’s better if the girl just fires you.”
“Hey.” Kotoha finally decides to step in. She knows it’s a regular of hers who’s always been here for years, but she can’t stand the prospect of one of her friends being disrespected for a fault that wasn’t his.
“I know that he messed up. But last I checked, this is one of my employees. So be a little more polite next time.” Her customer-service smile threatens to slide off her face, her tense brows remaining taut. The customer grunts in surrender, lowering themselves into their seat once again.
“Sakura, I can deal with it from here. Don’t worry about it.” she smiles, placing a careful hand on his shoulder as a gesture of reassurance. “We all make mistakes.”
However, the subtle frown beginning to form on his face did not budge.
“I know.” he mutters, and she wonders how much of this he was taking to heart. Nothing’s changed about him, but—
“Maybe it’s a good time to take a break, hm?” she suggests as he continues mumbling, “You’ve been working hard today.”
“I—It’s fine. I can still help.” He’s walking in the other direction before Kotoha follows him and grabs onto his shoulder.
“Last I checked, you haven’t given it a rest in hours,” she grits her teeth as she reminds him before returning to her typical smile, “It’s not as busy now, so it’s alright. There’s some extra omurice in the fridge, so—”
He jolts like a harried cat as he begins to process the last word that came out of her mouth. “Omurice?” is the last thing she hears from him before the other boy dashes towards the back of the kitchen, nowhere to be seen.
Kotoha sighs, before letting out a short chuckle in spite of herself. She knows him too well, doesn’t she?
After Kotoha flips the sign over, she clicks the door shut. Most of the lights in Makochi’s shopping district have shut off for the night, but she’s still well aware that she has closing duties to reluctantly look forward to before she can go home for the night.
She yawns as she makes a mental checklist of what has to be done. Cleaning the cafe, washing the utensils, putting everything away to take out again for prep in the morning…
There was also an unexpected addendum to Kotoha’s to-do list for the night. She also had to deal with her new coworker moping around.
A gloomy haze covers Sakura’s face, his lips trapped in a unmoving frown as he sits on a barstool close to the kitchen. He did well for his first day, but she can wrap her head around why he’s feeling so glum.
“Sakura, what’s up? You look pretty down.” she approaches him from behind, hoping to remedy whatever’s had him hunched over the table since they closed up shop.
“I think,” he mumbles, “I messed up.”
“You did well today,” she plants a reassuring hand on his shoulder, “Where’s this coming from?”
"That guy.” are the only two words Sakura has to say before Kotoha nods at him, which makes the boy’s face fall even further.
“I know enough that blowing my top isn’t going to bring anyone together. It was my fault for not handlin’ the situation right. I’m sorry.”
“Hey, don’t worry about it,” she chides him, “We’re not all perfect on our first day. I wasn’t either.”
“At least you didn’t start tussling with some customer when you were supposed to—” Sakura’s beginning to get a little red, out of mortification or rage she cannot tell, “Supposed to uh. Not.”
“I get it, that’s happened to me before,” Kotoha rubs her forehead, attempting to grasp at what encouragement would raise his spirits.
She doesn’t bother to admonish him that he’s wrong for arguing with a customer; thinking back to her more unruly days and settling that she would have done the same in Pothos’s early days.
“You know, there’s a lot of things that stand in the way when you’re running a place by yourself.”
“When I first started here a couple of years ago, I was always messing up!” she grins, a laugh beginning to bubble in anticipation for what she says next, “I wasn’t the best kid back then, and I screwed up a lot. Hey, did you know? I ended up overcooking so much of the meat when I first started working here, that I made yhr regulars go vegetarian for a month!”
She could see a slight smile form on his face once memories of her various blunders since taking over Pothos come over her. Kotoha’s body heats up out of pure mortification while recounting those events, sure, but she decides that if it drove the point home that Sakura didn’t need to be perfect, then so be it.
“But I had people who told me that it was okay to mess up. That I’d get better eventually.”
“Eventually, I was able to find people that came here so often that they could live here if they wanted,” she’s silently praying to herself that her lighthearted joke would loosen the other boy up, “You could say this place really brought them together.”
“So what you’re sayin’ is that you messed up too?”
“Yeah, and guess who decided to ask me for help today,” A smug grin begins to form on her lips, “So you could say that it all worked up in the end.”
“H—Hey!” Sakura goes red again, his cheeks flushing in the familiar red that’s found a permanent home on his face. Kotoha believes that he is back in working order.
“Either way, I really appreciate all the hard work you’ve done today,” Kotoha lets out a sigh of relief, wiping the beads of sweat forming on her forehead with her hand. “Running this place myself every day takes its toll, so I’m glad I was able to have some company.”
“It was nothing,” the other boy mumbles, that same deep red remaining on his face.
“Are you coming at the same time tomorrow?” she asks. “You don’t have to, of course, but—”
Due to his initial apprehensiveness, Kotoha covers her mouth in near-shock when she sees the most resolute look in his eyes that she’s seen all day. “I’ll come. It was fun. Working here today.”
“I’m glad to hear it! Now off you go,” she flicks a hand towards the door, the sky growing darker by the minute, “I still have to clean this place before I head home for the night. Plus, I don’t want you out too late.”
“Nah,’ Sakura grabs a rag that she left on the table, “Wouldn’t be right if I left you here without helping.”
“Okay, suit yourself.” Kotoha has the largest smile on her face as she begins musing about how far Sakura has come, and how much further he will go as he begins to wipe down the tables in her stead.
What was he saying about not belonging in Makochi, again?