Chapter Text
It was far too early for someone to be shouting at him. Don’t get him wrong it was never fun to have an angry customer telling you everything you were doing wrong, but 7 am felt like a new low. Saparata wasn’t even five minutes into his shift.
“I understand miss, would you like me to remake your drink?” It was a kind courtesy, one he didn’t think should be extended to people so rude, but he felt the need to at least try to diffuse the situation.
The woman across the counter angrily slammed the drink down, “You must be trying to kill me by giving me something this hot!” she spat, “I demand to speak with your manager.”
Should’ve ordered something iced then, Saps thought, though the words didn’t leave his mouth.
He would’ve been more apprehensive about getting his manager but Ish was more relaxed than he was. It was one of the only things that got him through the job. That and the money, which he would be asking for more of if things like this kept happening this early.
He smiled sweetly, “Of course ma’am.”
If anything he felt more guilt than apprehension, dragging Ish out for something as pointless as this but what was the saying? The customer is always right?
Ish, of course, took his side.
“I understand your frustration ma’am but unfortunately all our coffees are served at the same temperature so if that doesn’t work for you I’m afraid you’ll have to find somewhere else to go.”
The woman stood, her mouth agape. Saps assumed she had expected some kind of evil manager who would listen to her and fire him on the spot. After a moment of looking ready to combust, she stormed out angrily muttering about corporate, which would get her nowhere seeing as Ish owned the cafe outright.
“Sorry about that, Saps. In the future feel free to refuse anyone coffee who’s going to behave like that.”
“You know if I kicked out everyone who was rude we’d have like five customers left.”
Ish frowned, “remind me to give you a raise soon.”
“Not just Saps I hope,” a new voice pitched in. Magic, his coworker and friend, who had been busy setting up during all the drama.
“I’m just hoping that doesn’t set the tone for the whole day.” He mumbled watching the woman sashay her way down the street.
“Me and you both,” Magic agreed.
He was lucky he got to work alongside Magic. She was the same age as him but considerably shorter, her hair was thrown up into two messy buns, a clear streak of blue running through both sides. They’d known each other since she’d started working at the cafe about a year back and Saps instantly knew they would get along. When she spoke, which was often, it was fast and laced with humor which made it easy to keep up a conversation with her.
Saps prided himself on being easy to get along with and, at risk of sounding egotistical, he was pretty sure she also enjoyed his company.
Ish left them to get back to work and Magic wasted no time finishing setting up. “We’ve got about ten minutes before the morning student rush”.
Ah yes, 7:30 am lectures. Saps bane of existence. Not because he had to take any, but because of the rush of zombified students who were too tired to lack any cohesiveness. At least they, mostly, weren’t rude.
As soon as the thought had entered his brain the universe decided to mess with him. Who else would walk through the doors next than Fluixion, worlds biggest asshole.
Saps liked to think he was well-liked, popular even around campus. He always found it easy to talk to new people, but Flux… he just couldn’t stand him.
Despite taking a few of the same classes the first time they officially interacted was at a party almost four months ago.
…
His friend Cass had invited him, proposing it as a way to meet new people but he was sure she just wanted to go because it was being hosted at her crush Cynikas’ house. Normally Saps wouldn’t have complained about a party, but this was of a much bigger scale, and filled with people he hardly knew.
The night was mostly uneventful. He had tried to stick around with Cass but she had run off with Cynika early on into the night. Then he’d spent some time with one of the sorority leaders, Schpood, but by the time he was seeing how many shots each person could take in one go he figured it was time to talk to someone else. Cue him coming up with a ridiculous excuse, which everyone was too drunk to notice luckily, and quickly exiting the room.
It was here he ran into a problem. Literally ran into a problem. Thinking back on it, the moment seemed to play in slow motion. Him stumbling backwards muttering his awkward excuse, and then the second he turned around and realised what was about to happen with no way to stop it.
He collided with the raven-haired boy. The drink in his hand splashing dramatically out of his glass and soaking the other.
At a party, any reasonable person would laugh it off. Maybe get a little annoyed but ultimately decided it wasn’t worth the fight.
Fluixon was not a reasonable person.
He jumped back, his eyes sparking in a mix of surprise and anger. “This is an outrage!” He shouted, far too loud. Saps was surprised no one turned to look, but then again everyone must have been preoccupied. “Do you know how much this sweater costs? And now look at it absolutely ruined! Outrageous, absolutely outrageous!”
Usually Saps was good at defusing situations like this. It had earned him the nickname ‘the mediator’ with his friends. Usually that was.
“I- uh- it’ll wash off?” He offered, half apologetic half unsure. It wasn’t like he had purposefully crashed into the guy. And no, he wasn’t sure how expensive the sweater was, he didn’t make a habit of buying designer clothes and if he did he was sure he wouldn’t wear it to some college party.
The guy scoffed again, not even bothering to respond, harshly pushing past Saps.
…
And now here he was. Stood obnoxiously in the entryway of the cafe, someone else Saps didn’t recognise next to him. He felt his hands clench, he did not want to deal with this. Luckily for him, Magic swooped in at the right moment.
“Hey Saps, do you mind grabbing me some more salted caramel syrup, we must’ve run out last night and you know I can’t reach the top shelf.”
He wasn’t sure if she had noticed how annoyed he looked or she somehow knew about the party. Or maybe she did actually need the syrup, though based on the slight glint in her eyes he was sure it was one of the earlier options.
“Of course,” whatever the reason he took the excuse to hastily dip into the back, rummaging about for the syrup just in case they actually needed more upfront. Had it been any other time of day he would’ve stayed in the back until he was sure he would’ve left, but no matter how generous she was with coming up with excuses, he was sure Magic wouldn’t appreciate handling the morning rush on her own.
So, after taking a deep breath, he slowly made his way back round to the front trying to put on his ‘happy to be serving you’ face.
He placed the bottle of syrup next to another half-full bottle on the shelf where they kept all the flavouring. He hated to admit he was relieved to see that Flux had already been served, but less relieved to see he was sat in. Seriously, wasn’t the whole point of the morning rush that people got their coffee and left in time for morning class?
“So what was that all about?” Magic finally got the chance to ask almost two hours later. The cafe had, expectedly, filled up quickly leaving little time for the two to chatter but around 9 there was finally a break where the cafe was empty.
“Hmm?” he questioned wiping down one of the tables, mentally complaining about how messy whoever had been sat there had been.
“Don’t play dumb, when that guy came in earlier you went practically red. Not to mention your hands were shaking.”
He quietly cursed himself for being that obvious, “he just irritates me.”
She hummed, clearly not buying the response, “I didn’t realise you guys spoke that often.”
“We don’t,” he corrected, “much. I don’t know- he just seems arrogant.”
“It's not like you to judge someone without knowing them.”
“The one time we interacted he just had a bad vibe. Plus Sidefall was telling me all these stories-”
She cut him off with a bewildered laugh “You’re going to trust Sidefall as a source of reliable information?”
He frowned, “No but- why are you even interrogating me over this anyway? Don’t you have more important things to be doing.”
She shrugged, “You’re Saparata, The Mediator, you get along with pretty much everyone.”
“You are holding me to unfair standards.” She was right, though. He did get along with pretty much everyone, and he wasn’t exactly the type of guy to hold a grudge. Except for when it came to Flux.
…
Saps’ first class of the day started late afternoon, the cafe stayed open much later but someone else would take over his shift. The walk down through campus was short, but seeing as it was a pleasant day and he had a little bit of time to spare, he decided to take a detour to walk past the pond. It was his favourite place on campus, it wasn’t a far walk but just off the path enough that it was always quiet. Well, usually, but seeing as the universe had it out for him today that was not the case.
He heard the voice before he’d even rounded the corner, cocky and arrogant, the same, strange vocabulary as before, “Outrageous, absolutely outrageous.”
He froze, unsure whether he should just turn back around or commit to the walk he had planned and just ignore whoever else happened to be there. It wasn’t like he was doing anything wrong by taking a different route, so why didn’t he want to? Maybe he should just turn around.
As the thought continued to swirl in his mind he felt a sudden hand on his shoulder.
“Saps! Just the guy I was looking for,” another voice he recognised, though one he was more ready to deal with.
Turntapp smiled brightly, he always seemed to show up at moments where Saps felt awkward. He really should be grateful for the guy but he always had a strange feeling when he was around that he just couldn’t place. No matter, he was glad he was here now.
“Hey dude,” he carefully stepped to the side to break the physical contact in a way that wouldn’t offend the other, “I was just headed to class.”
“Me too, I remember you saying this was your favourite way to walk so I thought I might catch you.”
Well now he had no choice, he couldn’t exactly turn around without a decent explanation and his brain wasn’t providing him with a reasonable one.
“Oh seriously? Is everything alright?”
They’d already started walking again and Saps didn’t like the way his heart was beating faster as they rounded the corner.
Turntapp, completely oblivious, smiled, “It’s nothing serious, I just wanted to invite you to a party Friday, this week.”
Saps smiled awkwardly, “I’d love to but with exams coming up I’m not sure I’ll have time.”
It was a decent enough lie because it was partly true. Sure exams were a month away but he had plenty of work to do if he wanted to get top of the class. It wasn’t explicitly his goal, as in he would never tell anyone that he was aiming for it. Everyone knew he was smart and did well but he tried not to let on to his friends just how much effort he put in.
For a moment the guy next to him looked dejected but it passed too quickly for Saps to linger on it, “well if you change your mind, you’re always welcome. I’ll send you the details.”
You don’t need to send me the details, I’m not going, Saps thought but decided a better reply would just be to smile. It seemed to satisfy Turntapp who immediately started rambling about random things.
It wasn’t that he purposefully wasn’t listening, it was that his mind was preoccupied and all his effort was going into not turning his head to the side to look at where he could hear Flux’s voice coming from.
He was… laughing? At least Saps had to guess it was him because his brain was telling him it would be worse to check. But, then again, he wasn’t sure Flux was capable of laughing, so maybe he owed it to himself to check.
Against his better judgement, his eyes wandered to the side to confirm where the noise was coming from. Had he ignored his judgement further he would’ve stopped in his tracks to better assess the situation. It was Flux laughing, alongside the guy he had been in the cafe with earlier and a few other people he only vaguely recognised. He looked different when he laughed, less stuck-up, happy even. Someone Saps might get along with.
Then almost as if he could tell he was looking, Flux stopped, his gaze shifting till it met Saps’s, who was definitely staring.
They locked eyes for a moment, both of them refusing to give in.
“Hey Saps, you listening?” the words dragged him out of his mini staring competition,
“What? Sorry I zoned out…”
The rest of their conversation faded into the background. Seriously, did this guy think he was so special that only certain people got to hear his laugh? Was that why he had stopped when he saw Saps looking, or did he just recognise him from the party and still hate him?
Something about Flux had lodged itself into Saps’ mind and no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t get free of it. It’s probably just because of his reaction at the party, Saps tried to convince himself, but he wasn’t fooling anyone. It was something more than that.
Something which he hadn't worked out yet.