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"No more than 3 cups of water! It's going to taste flat..."
"I know, I know, you said I could make the coffee, so just let me make the coffee, ok?.…Dear God."
Bunga chuckled as he poured the desired amount of water into the reservoir.
Fuli's intense glare burned through the back of his skull. Watching, Waiting, anticipating his next move, nothing was getting between her and her morning cup. This act of shadowing would have fazed anyone else, but for Bunga, Fuli's intolerance was a common source of amusement that he could always rely on when things got boring, which was quite often in the office.
The quiet hum of the AC filled the room before the door was pushed open, revealing a fatigued, yet determined Kion. "Good morning you two!" He said with as much enthusiasm as he could muster, earning a smirk from Fuli.
"Hey Kion look, Fuli's letting me make the coffee today!" Bunga exclaimed, emphasising the machine in front of him."
"Don't say I’m letting you, it makes me sound like a massive control freak."
"Hey, your words, not mine."
Chuckling at the familiar banter of his best friends, Kion went to join Fuli on the couch at the back of the break room. Soft, woolly, and plush; the perfect place to relax before the storm of corporate life, sinking his head into the back cushions, before closing his eyes.
"What time d'you go to be last night?" Fuli grinned as she began to play with her friend’s golden-red hair, gently stretching out any loose waves she could find.
"As embarrassing as this is to admi-..." A silent yawn cut him off from his sentence, "2AM".
For the average young adult in the working world, going to bed at such a time was not that big of a deal, however, Fuli and Bunga both knew by now that their best friend was a man of order, and so staying up till such times clearly indicated that he must have been busy with something, or someone of major importance.
”Oh wow, that’s really unlike you….meet someone special?” Her grin widened into a cheeky smile, as Bunga chuckled from the counter.
Kion shot them both a stern glare through a single open eye which was enough to shut down anymore untoward remarks from the pair.
”Oh you know I’m kidding.” She giggled.
Her fingers softly ran through his hair. “So what had you so occupied then, hm?” He emphasised the large binder that was resting on his lap.
”Ah! The annual budget huh?” She said as she began lightly flicking through it. “It’s that time already?”
“Mhm, chief wanted me to adjust everything into a final draft for her and the board…”, he said with a profound yawn. “Nightmare fuel, I’m telling you, by 1AM, I was crawling on my eyebrows.”
Fuli gave a warm chuckle as she continued to flick through the never-ending pages. “And this couldn’t have been a PowerPoint or something?” Kion shook his head.
“She wanted a physical copy on top of digital.” Fuli shook her head. “You know Kion, sometimes I worry you’re going to burn yourself out one of these days,” she chuckled. “……Not to worry, a cup of coffee will widen those tired eyes, speaking of-”. She turned to look at Bunga who still had not yet added the coffee grounds into the filter basket.
”Albon!” She exclaimed. “How long does it take to brew a simple cup of coffee?”
”Cool your jets Fuli, it’s taking me a while to crush these beans..” He said with a pestle in hand. “Some idiot forgot to buy the powdered stuff.”
After what felt like an eternity of bean grinding, the coffee machine was loaded and was ready to start brewing. “Ok…now to switch it on”, Bunga muttered to himself as he pressed the brew button. There was it’s usual short ding before being followed by complete, silence?
“Uh-oh” he whispered as he pressed the brew button again. Still, nothing. “That can’t be good”, he said to himself a little too loudly, causing Fuli to perk up from her seat with a stern glare on her face.
“What’s not good?” She asked abruptly as she debated going over to check on how he was doing. “Fine, fine, everything’s good ok?” He answered concealing as much of his anxiety as possible.
“Fine, my ass”, she said as she marched over to the kitchenette where Bunga was, leaving Kion mid-slumber, on the couch.
”I don’t know, I didn’t do I anything I swear!” He chuckled, putting his hands up next to his head. “All I did was press the button, and it just never started.”
“You sure?” Fuli asked as she stared the machine down at every angle, looking for whatever it is that might be out of place. “I’ll try”. She gently pressed her finger on the brew button and held it down for a little longer than usual, yet to no avail as the machine dinged again, but refused to brew.
”Here let me try again”, Bunga said, gently nudging his friend out of the way to retest the machine. He pressed the button again, nothing. Again, still nothing. And again, and again, and agai-
“Stop!” Fuli cried as she swatted Bunga’s hand away from the machine, “You’re going to break it”.
“Oh what’s a few knocks on it when it’s pretty much already broken”, Bunga said as he reached for the button to try again, but was unsuccessful, as Fuli quickly grabbed his arm before it reached the control panel.
”Don’t”.
Fuli and Bunga’s bickering was loud enough to wake Kion from his relaxation, as he stretched his muscles and stood up. There goes his relaxation time. He came over to the kitchenette to see what the pair were arguing over now.
“Coffee machine giving us trouble?” He asked, as he leaned the side of his head against the upper cabinet; a result of his sheer fatigue.
“Yeah, Bunga broke it”, Fuli snapped.
”I already told you I didn’t break it, it stopped working on its own!” he retorted.
”Oh yeah, well it was working perfectly fine yesterday, so what happened?”
”I don’t know, ok? Maybe if you weren’t rushing me the entire time I could have focused on doing it properly”
”You were up at that counter for 20 minutes, how much time do you need?”
“You’re just a control freak Fuli, admit it!”, Bunga pressed with a mischievous grin across his face.
”c-o-n-”, he started.
”Bunga stop”
“t-r-o-”, he continued.
“Bunga, stop!”
”l-f-r”
“Kion!” Fuli practically yelled.
“Bunga please”, Kion said paying half attention to the situation as he scoured the cabinets for the coffee machine’s instruction manual.
“Alright, alright”, said Bunga backing down from the argument, feeling quite guilty that he pushed his best friend past her limits.
”I’m sorry”, he mouthed to her as he gently rubbed her upper arm. The look of sincerity in his eyes was enough for Fuli to forgive him as she gently patted his hand back with a shy smile. “Im sorry too”, she mouthed quickly to her friend, who returned the same warm response, as he softly smiled.
“There you are!”, Kion muttered to himself, his face grinning with satisfaction as he pulled out the coffee machines instruction manual out from inside a fairly disorganised cabinet. “Alright!, now we can finally figure out what’s wrong with this thing”, said Bunga to Fuli, who nodded excitedly, her spirits clearly lifted.
The pair gathered around as Kion started flicking through the instruction manual. “Contents, safety procedures, set up……here we go, instructions”, said Kion as he started silently reading through the instructions.
Fuli began tapping her fingers impatiently against the edge of the countertop. As much as she enjoyed this unusual bonding experience with her best friends, the sooner they could get this machine going, the sooner she could get her coffee. “So what does it say?”, she asked desperately, giving up on patience.
Kion furrowed his brows as he looked up from the page to the coffee machine, and from the coffee machine to the page again. “I’m not too sure, everything seems to be in order from the bottom up…there must be something small we’re missing”.
“Right, so what you’re trying to say is that our coffee machine is kaput, and until we get a new one, poor Fuli here’s going to have to survive off of green tea, and fruit smoothies, huh?” Bunga retorted, highlighting the sheer annoyance in the woman, as she; leaning on the countertop, therapeutically massaged her temples with her ring and middle fingers.
Kion, paying absolutely no attention to Bunga’s petulance, continued as he flipped back to the start of the instructions. “Let’s see here..” Fuli picked herself up from the counter and rested her chin on Kion’s shoulder as he read. Maybe she could crack this coffee caper.
“Before commencing…”, he read. “Please ensure your coffee machine is plugged….” Kion’s voice trailed off upon realisation, as he stared intensely at Bunga and sighed. Fuli closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose at her friend’s incompetence; How could he be so absentminded?
“Guys..what’s wrong?” Bunga nervously giggled at his friends’ disappointed faces, hoping it was all some sort of joke. “Kion?”, Fuli began to chuckle under her breath.
“Bunga”, Kion started. “Did you plug the machine in at the wall?”, he asked, praying that all of their troubles didn’t amount to such a simple solution.
“Y-yeah, I’m pretty sure I did, um-”. His eyes frantically darted all over the kitchenette, looking for the cable, until Fuli had the better idea of simply starting at the source. “Look, it starts here, so all we have to do is go to the outlet”. She looked at both of the boys, who nodded in unison.
The boys began to follow Fuli as she paced around the break room, cable in hand. The break room in the office was evidently a communal room between the faculty at Pridelands Co., as it was filled to the brim with an assortment of clutter; such as boxes, clothing racks, corporate themed books, and more.
The extension that was used by the staff was plugged into an outlet in the back corner of the room, which to nobody’s surprise, had nothing plugged into it, much to Kion’s amusement and Fuli’s displeasure.
“God damnit Bunga!” She exclaimed with an exasperated cry, “How could you be so incapable?”
“Hey, hey, hey, it’s not all my fault, you guys never even thought about it earlier too!” He retorted.
”Because we wouldn’t expect someone to make such a stupid mistake!” Fuli almost laughed.
Before Bunga could fire back, he was interrupted by Kion, who clearly had enough of their bickering.
“Alright, alright! Thats enough from the both of you. There’s no reason we should be arguing anymore.” He turned to Bunga, who was ready to fire away, before a stern look from Kion shut him down. “You really need to start paying more attention to your surroundings Bunga”. He calmly told his friend.
“I know, I know”, he started. “I do try Kion, I really do…….I guess I just have my days”, he said following a down casted sigh. Bunga felt Kion’s firm hand on his shoulder as he looked up into his friend’s eyes. “Well as long as you’re trying”. He said with a smile, which Bunga returned warmly.
“And Fuli…”, he said as he turned to his scowling friend. “So what if Bunga accidentally forgot to plus in the machine, it’s plugged in now, so instead of arguing about what could’ve been done, why don’t we all just go back over to the kitchen, and finish what we started mhm?”.
Seeing the sheer exhaustion in Kion’s eyes was enough to snap Fuli out of her cold-shouldering. Dropping her arms, she took a deep breath in and apologised, again. “Ok, ok, I’m sorry too you guys”, she said with the utmost sincerity possible before pausing. “….God, it’s really hard staying angry with you two”, she said softly before letting out a light chuckle, to which they all joined in on.
And just like that, the coffee machine was turned on, and much to everyone’s relief, it started brewing. All of their suffering had led to such a brief conclusion, as the coffee was already finished in around 5 minutes. Kion took the pot out of the machine and carefully poured the coffee into three separate mugs.
“Relax, it’s not running away from you”, he laughed at Fuli’s impatient hand around the cup while he was still pouring. ”This is so embarrassing”, she laughed “I’ve never gotten this excited over a stupid cup of coffee before.
“I don’t blame you, it’s been a long morning”, Bunga said sympathetically as he took his cup from Kion, before holding it out between his friends. “Cheers on three?”
Kion smiled at his friends optimism as he took his cup in his hand. “Sure”.
Fuli winced at the sappiness of the situation but still held her cup out and smiled profoundly. “On three”.
”One….”, Bunga started, gesturing them to follow along. “Two, three”, they all said in unison before clinking their mugs. “Cheers!”, the trio giggled before each taking a deep sip of their drinks, nothing out of the ordinary, just plain black coffee.
“How anticlimactic”, Kion laughed before taking another sip. “I know right”, Bunga agreed. “So much trouble for a cup of black coffee”. Fuli shook her head.
“You two can say all you want, but this is already the highlight of my day”.
“Day?”, Bunga questioned before glancing at the clock. “It’s only 8:55..”.
”8:55?”, Kion blurted out, quickly turning to the clock on the wall. He turned back to his friends, both with looks of pure confusion on their faces. “We’re supposed to be in the boardroom by 9, remember? We have a faculty meeting!”
”Oh God, you’re right, yeah”, Fuli said, putting her mug down on the countertop and dusting off her front. “We’d better hurry then!”, she said before rushing out the door, Kion right behind her.
Kion stopped at the break room door and turned to notice that Bunga was still at the kitchen, drinking his coffee without a care in the world. “Bunga! Come on, let’s go”, he said gesturing him along, appalled at his lack of urgency.
Bunga took a deep exhale before carefully placing his mug on the countertop next to his friend’s.
“Of all the days possible”. He muttered to himself angrily before following Kion out of the door.