Volume 2, Chapter 26: I met the lady who saved me.
Risa followed Zeke to the hall and they heard a knocking sound from the door. Zeke raised the curtain over the glass window on the door to reveal a woman standing outside. Risa was hit with a strong sense of deja vu upon seeing her face.
Judging that she wasn’t a drunkard or a ruffian, Zeke opened the door.
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry to visit so late at night. I know I’m being rude, but I saw the lights were still on, and…”
She bowed to Zeke in apology, then noticed Risa behind him and smiled in relief.
“I’m glad you’ve gotten better. I was really surprised when you collapsed so suddenly…”
“Oh! Are you the one who rushed to my side when I collapsed?!”
Risa found out afterwards that when she had fainted, a woman who happened to be nearby had rushed her to her house. The woman had already gone home by the time she woke up, so she wanted to thank her later.
“Thank you so much for helping me. I was going to visit you as thanks! Would you like to come in?”
Risa asked her and looked at Zeke, who shifted from the entrance.
“Ah…well… Maybe just for a bit.”
The woman said after thinking about it, and she entered the café. She slowly looked around the now dimly lit store. Her back looked overcome with emotion.
Risa pulled back a chair for her to sit in and poured out a glass of iced tea from the jar in the small fridge under the counter. Before she brought it out, she peeked into the kitchen to see Zeke working on the syrup in her stead. She signed a “sorry” to him before placing the iced tea on a tray and moving out to the woman.
“Here you go.”
“Oh, thank you.”
Risa ushered the woman, who was still standing, into the seat she had pulled out, and sat down across from her.
“Again, thank you so much. It’s all thanks to you that I’ve completely recovered now.”
“I’m glad you feel better.”
She smiled, truly relieved, and her almond, purple eyes smiled with her. Her milk tea colored hair swayed softly as she tilted her head a little to the side.
The woman was a few years older than Risa. Her name was…
“Uhm, Miss Olivia, right?”
“Yes.”
“You probably already know this, but I am Risa Claude. I’m the owner of Café Omusubi.”
“Fufu, I’ve actually come here as a customer before.”
“Eh?! Really?”
“It must have been more than half a year ago, though. I had suspected as much.”
“I see…”
“I came here on a rare date with my husband.”
“How wonderful!”
“I was very happy about it, since my husband invited me here. I’d always wanted to come here at least once.”
“Ahh, was that why you looked around the café just now?”
“Yes. It was so busy when we came, and we were so focused on the food… I didn’t manage to look around the café properly.”
“The atmosphere is completely different when there are no customers, after all.”
As women do, the conversation smoothly passed through many topics. Olivia sipped a bit of her tea and suddenly looked off into the distance. Risa wondered what was wrong and watched her quietly.
“Right after that, my husband passed away in an accident…”
Risa could only look at the woman at her sudden confession.
“Ah, I’m sorry for turning to such a heavy topic. I felt like our visit to this shop was our last memory together. That’s why I’m glad we came that day. If only we brought our son with us, too…”
She forced a smile as if to push her sadness back down.
“You have a son?”
“Yes, he turns four this year. What a troublemaker he is.”
She said, shrugging. Risa wondered if she was like the single mothers back in her previous world. It was the first time she had met anyone with that kind of situation in this world. Then she realized something.
“Oh! I hope I didn’t get in the way of your work when I collapsed!”
As she was a single mother, she must have been working to support her son.
“Ah… It was okay, don’t worry about it.”
Olivia shook her hands back and forth.
“Really? You weren’t late to work or anything?”
“It didn’t affect my work. It’s just…”
Olivia sighed and began to speak of her troubles.
“I’ve been working in the kitchen at a noble’s mansion since last month. The work is good, but the time commitment… It’s always very late before I can go home, so I’m not sure if I will keep at it.”
“Are you on your way home now?”
“Yes.”
“What about your son? What is he doing at this hour?”
“He is at the relief home.”
“The relief home?”
Olivia explained to Risa that the relief home was a public-owned facility that was a combination of a hospital, senior care, orphanage and nursery. It provided services mostly to the poor or people born into disadvantageous circumstances in society. Widows and retired maids cared for children and the elderly there.
Olivia had also wanted to work there, but the director stopped her as she was still young. They did not want her to be discriminated against by her occupation in the event that she remarried. She persisted, saying she did not see marriage in her future as she was still very much in love with her late husband, but was persuaded against it as there may come a day when her son would need a father.
“So you can only meet your son on your days off?”
“Yes. If only my work didn’t end so late, I would be able to pick him up and have some time with him then…”
She must have been her son’s anchor since her husband passed away.
Risa gazed at Olivia sadly as the woman talked.
“Oh! I’m sorry. Somehow this turned into a rant…”
“It’s nothing. Uhm, Miss Olivia. Would you like to work here?”
Risa offered. Although it wasn’t without pity, Risa’s decision was built upon Olivia’s character. Her hands were rough from dishwashing. Unlike the ladies who came to the interviews, she knew the hardships of working to make a living.
“Work…here?”
Olivia blinked, caught off guard by Risa’s completely unexpected offer.
“You would be serving customers instead of working in the kitchen, though.”
Risa offered the same waiting job as Helena to Olivia. Her work hours would be from 9AM to 7PM. For the first half year of the café, they had stayed open until 8PM, but there was too much to do with not enough staff so the café now closed at 6PM. Food preparation for the next day took time, and Risa was also worried about Helena’s commute home so late at night.
Risa and Zeke usually stayed until 8PM for food preparation, but Olivia could go home at 7PM like Helena. That way she could pick up her son and they could go home together.
So Risa explained to Olivia.
“That would be wonderful! I can even work at this café, where my husband and I had such a good time… I’d love to accept right away, but I need to talk about it with my current job, so…”
“Of course. We are currently recruiting for employees, so it would be great for you to come earlier than later, but I don’t mind waiting for you to wrap things up first.”
Olivia sighed in relief. Risa was also thankful that she solved the café’s employee shortage without too much trouble.
The night was growing old, so Olivia went home after promising to come by again.
Risa brought the teacups into the kitchen to see that Zeke had finished making the syrup. She apologized to him for throwing the work onto his shoulders.
“Sorry Zeke, you had to do everything.”
“It’s fine, this much is a walk in the park. Are you hiring her?”
Zeke had overheard their conversation.
“Yeah. My gut tells me she’s a good person. She might have gotten some extra points for being a mother.”
Although Olivia looked clearly tired from her daily responsibilities and work, her determination clearly stemmed from a strong will to protect her child…or so Risa felt.
“I said we would wait for her to be ready to start working, but our problem with not enough people on the team is finally solved!”
“Yes. We also got Alan, after all.”
“Right? I hope he learns how to cook soon!”
Risa thought of his excited wagging tail and chuckled. She quickly rinsed out the cup and handed it to Zeke, who held a drying cloth next to her.
“Thank you.”
Risa said, her eyes meeting Zeke’s. Her heart skipped a beat, and Zeke placed the cup on the counter before pulling her waist towards him and leaned in for a kiss.
They parted and Risa blinked up at Zeke, stunned.
“Please don’t forget about me.”
Risa immediately remembered the events before Olivia came and her cheeks flushed red. She quietly nodded her head.
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