THE GIFT (6 page)

The following day was heinous at the shop. Todd quit unexpectedly due to some home drama with his boyfriend, deciding that the hours there just didn’t work well with their relationship since his boyfriend worked a different shift. Already one employee down due to illness, Amanda and her remaining crew member were struggling to keep up. When Jagger arrived in a suit, he could see how frazzled she was.

“What’s going on around here?” he asked, his face reflecting his concern.

“We’re just shorthanded today. Todd quit without notice and so it is just me and Juan, who only works in the back,” she groaned as she rang up his drink.

“Do you need some help? I can help you,” he told her.

“You are going to work back here in your tailored suit?” she asked with a laugh.

“Sure, why not. Hold on, I’m coming around,” he told her.

“Jagger, you don’t have to do this. We will make it. It’s just going to be busy, is all,” she told him.

“I’ve watched you do this every day for close to a year now. I don’t know everything, but I can pitch in. Just tell me what you need,” he said.

“Okay, can you work the register and just maybe watch the front for me while I make pastries in the back?” she asked. She didn’t really want to, but she had been on the verge of calling her parents for help when he showed up and she was doing her best not to have them have to come in and bail her out.

“Absolutely,” he replied, laying his briefcase under the counter, stripping off his jacket and slinging a nearby apron over his crisp white shirt for protection.

“All right, well just remember, you asked to help!” she laughed. There was a bit of a rush during which he had to stop and look at the board for pricing and put strange shorthand on the cups that Amanda had to ask about from time to time if she hadn’t overheard the order.

“Hey, how much does this job pay?” he asked as he handed a customer her change.

“All the free coffee you can drink,” she called back to him as she slid into the kitchen to bring out some freshly baked pastries and assess what she was going to need to make more of to get through the day.

“Best job I ever had!” he said happily as he took another order from the next customer in line.

“What is an “L Chi Moc?” Amanda asked, puzzling over his latest markings on the cup he passed down to her.

“Large Chilled Mocha Latte,” he said, as if he couldn’t believe she didn’t get his abbreviations.

“Ah, coming up,” she said with a laugh.

Jagger spent the rest of the day ringing up orders for her, cleaning off tables and chatting up customers like he owned the place. He seemed to really enjoy being there and did a fantastic job of keeping up with the orders. In fact, there were a couple of times that he had to pitch in and help her make drinks because he was ahead of her.

By the time the shop closed, she was no worse for wear than any other day and the dining area didn’t look like nearly the train wreck she had expected it would. She locked the doors and both Jagger and Juan pitched in to help her finish up the usual day end side work and clean.

She worked on restocking behind the front counter while the two of them chattered enthusiastically in Spanish out front. Amanda knew only a few words of Spanish, most of which she had learned from Juan in the course of his employment. He knew very little English when her father had hired him to wash dishes years ago and over the years, it hadn’t improved much.

He could communicate in broken English here and there or sometimes, but mostly her father had spoken to him in Spanish. As time had passed, he had become much more than a dishwasher to the family and was sort of a jack of all trades around the shop.

Still, it seemed odd to hear him carrying on such a lively conversation with Jagger in the front. After a while, he said his goodbyes, smiling broadly and winking at her before leaving. Amanda had to wonder what exactly they had been discussing that had caused this unusual behavior on Juan’s part. She shrugged it off and let him out before locking the door again. Turning around, she found herself face to face with Jagger.

“Are you locking me in for the night?” he asked.

“No. You are free to leave whenever you would like. This is not the Hotel California,” she quipped back at him.

“Thank goodness. I checked into that place once and it was downright creepy,” he poked back.

“Funny,” she told him.

“I know. I have my moments. Anyway, I thought I would stay until you were ready to go,” he said.

“I’m afraid that I’m going to be here for a while longer. I need to go ahead and mix up the pastries and get them formed for tomorrow. I have to come in early to get them baked and if I don’t already have them made up, then I will be starting out behind. I’m going to have to call my parents to draw straws on which one is going to come help me until I can replace Todd as it is,” she told him forlornly.

“Your parents don’t like helping you out?” he asked.

“No, it’s not that. My parents will help me with whatever I ask of them, but they spent so many years in this coffee shop before handing it over to me and I just don’t want to have to bother them with stuff like this. I just don’t know what else to do. I know a couple of folks from my culinary class that want a part time job, so maybe I can get one of them in here in a couple of days,” she told him.

“Well, then it is settled. I will work for you the next few days while you find a replacement,” he told her with a broad smile.

“No way. I can’t ask you to do that! It’s too much! I feel bad enough that you felt you needed to bail me out today!” she told him.

“I don’t mind. I loved it here today. I don’t have nearly as much fun with my customers and they can do without me for a few days. Come on, let me help you. What are friends for?” he asked.

“Fine, but I don’t think you will like the pay,” she said.

“Oh no, I’m not going to let you pay me for having this much fun!” he objected.

“Seriously? No one has too much fun working at a coffee shop, Jagger,” she told him.

“I did. Listen, you have no idea how down I’ve been this past year. Working here with you and the quirky bunch of folks that show up to buy coffee has been the best time I’ve had in ages. Don’t take my joy away from me, Amanda,” he told her with a big grin.

“All right, but from now on, all of your coffee is on the house. If you won’t accept a paycheck, you are banned from paying for coffee here until the end of time,” she told him.

“Deal! Now, let’s go make some pastries!” he told her.

“What? No, not a chance. You’ve done too much as it is. I’m not letting you ruin those pants with a bunch of sugar and flour,” she told him.

“Fine, I’ll strip down and make pastries in my boxer briefs like we’re in one of those cocaine factories you see in the movies,” he said, feigning removal of his pants.

“Whoa, there! No!” she laughed.

“Fine, then we will sacrifice these pants for the greater good of Bliss Cafe. It will be fine. My cleaner is a genius and I can assure you that flour and sugar are no match for him,” he told her.

“You know what, fine. You want to make pastries, I’ll let you make pastries. Come on and let’s get this over with!” she told him. She felt a little out of sorts with him watching as she usually reverted back to working in the blind when making pastries, though she was getting the hang of actually looking for things rather than feeling for them. Still, even with her eyes open, she instinctively reached for things without looking.

“That is fascinating,” he told her, as he kneaded some dough she had passed over for him to work with. Amanda realized that she had lapsed into closing her eyes to find things without even realizing it, despite her efforts not to do so with him there.

“Habit. I spent years coming in here and helping Mom make pastries after my accident. At first, I did the simple things like what you are doing now and she gradually increased what she would let me do, though she would never let me near the ovens unattended. She arranged everything in this kitchen so that I could memorize and find things. Sometimes, I just find it easier to feel my way around the kitchen rather than read the labels,” she told him. It was the first mention she had made of her accident since the first time when it had killed their conversation.

“How long were you blind?” he asked, catching her off guard.

“Five years, since I was a senior in high school until about a year ago,” she replied.

“You had a transplant? How does that work?” he asked.

“It’s really a pretty simple procedure. They take a section of donor corneas and replace your damaged ones with that material. They stitch it in and let it heal for a few days and when they remove the bandages, you can see again,” she said. It was funny that she was able to simplify it in such a manner now when it had seemed like such a big feat at the time. It was the longest three days of her life.

“Just like that? Everything is clear again?” he asked, continuing to knead the dough.

“No, it took a while for my vision to improve. At first it was shadowy figures and then things began to become clearer,” she told him.

“That sounds fascinating,” he said, but the tone of his voice relayed a sadness that had not been there before. She decided to redirect the conversation rather than get bogged down in her whole sob story.

“Okay, I think we are done with that dough. Let’s make something with it,” she told him. She put him in charge of dusting the dough as she rolled it out to make cream cheese pastries that were unique to her shop. He seemed fascinated by the way she manipulated the dough and added ingredients until she had several baking sheets filled with ready to cook pastries.

“Wow, you do that so fast,” he told her.

“You get used to it. You want to slide those in the rack for me?” she asked.

“Yes, boss. Right away, boss,” he told her, mimicking a hunch back as he hobbled over to the metal rack and slide each tray in.

“Don’t make me get the whip out, Igor,” she told him.

“Ooooh, that sounds incredibly naughty of you. No wonder people like working for you so much,” he said with a wry grin. Amanda blushed, not having thought about how her comment would sound when she said it out loud. She tried to recover by latching on to his employee comment.

“How would you know if my employees like me?” she asked, still slightly flushed.

“Juan told me. He said he has known you since you were a little girl and that he was glad to see you take over the shop. He said your parents are good people and have done a lot for him and his family, much more than just giving him a job. He also said that he knows that your family always has his back and will never let him or his family go without. Did you really give him all of your dolls when you were only ten to take home to his own daughter?” Jagger asked.

Amanda stopped what she was doing for a moment and stared at him, stunned. She had no idea that Juan had shared all of this with him and she had forgotten about the dolls completely until just now.

“I did. I haven’t thought about that in years. I guess my mind has been on so many other things. I was playing with a Barbie in the shop and Juan’s daughter, who was about six or seven at the time, kept staring at me. She looked sad, but she didn’t speak English and I couldn’t talk to her. I asked Dad what was wrong and he spoke to her in Spanish. I remember that she cried a little as she spoke,” Amanda said, thinking back to that moment when she had looked at a young Carmella Ortiz.

“And what did she tell him?” Jagger asked, though Amanda suspected he already knew the answer from Juan.

“She told him that men had come to her house in Mexico and hurt her mother. They had thrown her out into the yard and kicked her and then set the house on fire. She tried to get back in to save her mother, but the door was locked and she couldn’t get it open. Then something exploded and she had been hit in the head with something. When she awoke her father was there, holding her and crying and the house was gone. That is when they came to America,” Amanda sad, remembering the sad story for the first time in years.