Hello everyone! Long-time no see, but my real AN is down at the bottom. All I wanted to say here, before anyone begins this version of Had a Bad Day, is that this fanfiction is rated T due to profane language and suggestive themes. If you believe I should up the rating due to either of these reasons (you can judge for yourself when you read what I mean), then I will comply without a second thought! Thanks so much, and I hope you all enjoy!
Ash didn't even like coffee.
But there he was, standing in the line of the unusually bustling café of Bluebell, his foot resisting the temptation to begin tapping in his impatience. With his teeth biting down on the inside of his cheek, he crossed and uncrossed his arms, rubbed his forehead, shifted his weight, and presented about every other tick that could reveal how utterly irritated he was with… everything. Just absolutely everything. He was precisely being the kind of customer that he couldn't personally deal with, nor respect.
Even as a simple farmhand to mother's thriving business, Ash had experienced more than his share of customer service. Before Cheryl came about to basically kick him out as Jessica's personal assistant (which he could only be so bitter about; with her girl scout's charm and silver tongue, she was more than a top notch pro at her job, as loathe as he was to admit it), he had helped out with sales and transactions, accounting, filing, and all of that other fun stuff that had essentially killed him and his childhood on a daily basis. Being out and about in the fields had proven to be more his forte anyways, given the fact that he apparently had a knack for settling down even the most nervous and skittish of animals that came through their stables and coops. The only person who ever seemed even close to passing his own abilities was –
"Next please!"
Snapped out of his stupor, Ash had realized with a flush that he had been off in his own world again, and he hadn't been moving up in the line as it had begun to dwindle before him. With enough space for there to have been as least four people ahead of him, he shuffled forward with the slightest air of shame, which only furthered his soured mood from before. Today just wasn't turning out to be his day.
"And people say that I space out," came a playful giggle from behind the counter. With a sigh, Ash rolled his eyes at the blonde girl, to whom the voice belonged, and tensed ever so slightly. What in the world possessed him to think that coming to the café could somehow lift his spirits? At his lack of reply, Laney quirked a delicate eyebrow, a grin passive on her face as she gave a shrug and continued, "Alrighty there, Smiley –better watch your immense cheerfulness, lest it make someone else feel good. What can I get for you?"
Frick. Now he really was being the worst kind of customer, if not the worst kind of person. "Sorry," he sheepishly apologized, averting his gaze as a notch of his irritation faded. There was no reason for him to be a jerk to Laney, of all people; she was an easy candidate for the friendliest resident between Bluebell and Konohana combined, and her smile was infectious at the worst of times.
Even now, at his pathetic excuse for an apology, she dismissed it with a wave of her hand and a genuine smile, "No worries. Are you just getting your usual?"
"No, not this time. Just a medium-medium, room for cream," he ordered, a slight pounding forming behind his temple. Hopefully actual caffeine, rather than his general white mocha of delightful sugariness, topped with extra whip and chocolate shavings, would better help him prepare for the long day ahead. With the natural grace of having worked in the café for the better half of her life, Laney had the steaming coffee poured and placed neatly on the counter in a ceramic mug before he had even finished counting out his change. Passing the money over, he couldn't wipe the small frown that dented his features as he looked at the coffee before him. "Sorry to be a pain, but could I actually get this to-go? Just pour this into the other cup. Sorry."
"If it'll help make you feel better, than that's hardly the worst thing you could ask for," she retorted with a grin, "I'd offer to give my best childhood buddy a hug to weaken his woes, but there's a line behind you. Next time, 'kay?"
With a glance over his shoulder, he quickly realized how true her words rang –there were at least six people standing behind him, and more seemed to be flowing through the front doors. As he shuffled out of the way, he casually noted that all the other customers, locals and tourists alike, seemed to be engaged in their own line-standing activities, whether that was chatting amongst one another, staring off into nothing, or a little bit of everything in between. Without wasting another moment, he gave the blonde woman a smile so procured that it could have been the lead exhibit in a museum of fake art.
Moving to the condiment stand, Ash absently starting pouring cream and sugar into his coffee, his mind muddled by a thousand fleeting thoughts, none of which seemed nearly relevant or important enough to focus on for more than a split second. Which is when a voice had to come and disrupt his peace.
"Would you like some coffee with your sugar?"
The farmhand harshly flinched, nearly knocking his paper cup over; how he had managed to handle it without the contents spilling on the counter, floor, or worst of all, his hand, Ash couldn't even begin to say. "Hey," he muttered, more preoccupied with setting his drink down before the shaking in his hand caused exactly what he was trying to prevent.
"My, my, Laney was right. You really are a grump today, huh? What's the dealio, broseph?" Ash sighed and lidded his coffee, finally glancing over at the eternal disruptor of his peace. Lillian.
It wasn't like that was necessarily a bad thing, though. Despite his irritation at her presence at the current moment, she was easily his best friend in the village, having even surpassed Cam by the barest margin. It just so happened that she wasn't at the top of his need-to-see list at the moment; frankly, his bed would beat out every other person in that position at the moment. But if anyone was gonna pull him on out of his stupor, she was the perfect person for the job.
"Oh joy," he replied with the most deadpan voice he could muster, attempting to keep his grin from showing –she was already influencing him in all the right ways. He needed to learn to seek her out whenever he was in one of his moods. "Just the pest I wanted to see. I mean person." With a dramatic gasp, the dirty blonde slapped his arm. "I lied. I meant pest."
"You are such a dick face," she pouted, putting a hand on her cocked hip as she took a sip from one of the café's signature ceramic mugs –if he knew Lillian half as well as any stranger assumed, he guessed she was drinking the day's featured dark roast, made to be black as her soul. He had learned early on that if she would be stubborn on anything, it would be on how she took her coffee. Question her upon her tastes (or lack thereof, in his opinion), and she would go on a drawn out rant about how cream and sugar "muddled the flavours" or about how adding such things didn't "give respect to the coffee itself". What a dork.
"And you had best be careful, or your own vulgarity will rub off on him," a new voice chimed from behind the duo. In perfect synchronization, Ash and Lillian turned, and the woman broke into a massive smile, wrapping her free arm around the waist of Cam as he approached the condiment stand.
"Oh, I'm sure that he would prefer me to rub something else off him," she snickered, shooting a disgusting, self-satisfied grin at the farmhand, whose face contorted in repulsion. "And by that, I mean he wants me to rub his diddly-hoo. His magic winter wand. His meat st-"
"Stop," the men begged in unison, their faces equally flushed from simply being associated with this conversation.
"My Goddess, I want to ask if you were raised in a barn, but that would just shame every good, hardworking farmer in the world," Cam sighed, shaking his head and rubbing his forehead with the hand that hadn't fallen across Lillian's shoulder. "I know that city live provides a very… different lifestyle. But are all people from there like you?"
"Yup. Every one. I'm not even that bad. There was this one time in my junior year of high school, where this girl –Sasha, her name was, and she was one smokin' hottie. But anyways –"
"Shhhhh, Lillian, shhh. There are actually decent human beings around. And I think we've both heard our share of Sasha stories before," Ash snickered, Cam nodding in support and agreement. While it was impossible to keep the farmer from going off on one of her tangents alone (she would shush them and scold them if they even tried, before continuing with a new level of unnecessary detail each time), the florist and the farmhand could more or less contain her when they tag-teamed, much to her dismay.
At that, she pouted, but shrugged it off after a moment, "I'm still not that bad. Just compared to you country bumpkins."
"So now we're bumpkins? Cameron, my good sir, I feel like we should be exceptionally offended right now. I do believe she just insulted our good natured, simple lifestyles."
"I must admit that you may be correct, my good fellow, Ashton. But I believe I should be more offended than you, sir, for not only has she slighted me, but you have as well." Ash's face twisted into the epitome of confusion, which only fueled Cam as he grinned, leaning closer to Lillian and using a mock-whisper tone to continue, "Notice how he still hasn't told us why he was so huffy earlier? I feel like our good friend, our so-called best friend, is trying to keep secrets."
"My, my," Lillian gasped, picking up the act now that she was given her part in the play, "I do believe you may be right, my darling gentleman. I bet it's about a girl or something equally as scandalous. What a sneaky bastard." At that, the two began to snicker as Ash rolled his eyes; he already knew that there was no chance he'd win this one.
"Lil, are you going to ignore the fact that Cam was eavesdropping before he came over? Knowing that myself, I feel dirty in his presence; who knows what levels he would stoop to, just so he could distort truths and spread lies about us." Ash wasn't half the actor of Lillian, so he opted to make every flourish of his hands and gasps as dramatic and over-the-top as possible.
"Now he's avoiding the subject," Lillian mock-whispered in return to Cam, entirely dismissing the ginger's comment. "If that isn't suspicious, I don't know what is. You know what I bet?"
"What do you bet?" the florist replied, continuing the charade.
"Please don't say what you bet. We're still in public. Be decent for once in your life."
That caused all three to grin amongst one another. "I have no idea what you're talking about," Lillian replied, her face becoming a false mask of pure innocence, "But I will grace you with my kindness, and keep that comment for another day –it's too good to use right now anyways. But there is one thing I do know." Stopping long enough to gulp down the rest of her coffee, delightful in its nutty, mountainous black aroma, Lillian popped her mug into a bin designated for dirty dishes, and wrapped her newly free arm around Ash's waist. "And that is that I haven't had a movie night with my two favourite boys in like, forever."
"I believe our lady-friend has a point, for once," Cam grinned.
"Excuse you. What is with this attitude? I think we need to have a sit down talk about our feelings, buddy. I'll go first. You two are buttheads who need to be nicer to the best girl you will ever meet. Like, ever. Forever and ever and then some. Besides maybe Reina-"
"Who's Reina?" they asked in unison, only to be dismissed without a second breath.
"-and Laney and Georgia and– you know what, nevermind. Us ladies are basically goddesses, and you guys should be worshipping us all the time for gracing your lowly lives with our majestic presences. I haven't been getting nearly as many offerings as a woman of my goddess-standing deserves, you know."
"Oh, the horror," Ash scoffed, rolling his eyes, but allowed the girl to lead him out with Cam all the same –she may have been a tiny little thing compared to the men she lead, being a head shorter than Ash, and even smaller compared to the florist, but she had been a proud Bluebell farmer for the better portion of almost four years now, and the strength in her arms wasn't something to doubt.
Their banter continued as the trio trekked to the southern area of the village, having moved from waist/shoulder holding to linked arms. As lame as they may have looked to a stranger, everyone in the village had grown used to seeing the sight, and any resentment the florist or farmhand may have once possessed had been dismissed years ago. When Lillian really wanted something, from a bag of seeds to the prized cow in Jessica's stables, to being publicly affectionate to even the most reserved citizens of Bluebell and Konohana, she got it one way or another.
Eventually, they split ways at Ash's home, where he turned off to get some extra work finished, and Lillian and Cam continued down the way. Before their casual, temporary good-byes (that all wound up being along the lines of "Later, nerds"), the three had decided that a movie night was indeed an important, formal event that required detailed planning, and so they would gather eventually the night after the next, for a marathon session of whatever recent hit series Lillian had brought back from her last city visit.
Before he really knew what had happened, Ash's mood had made a 180-turn in the last forty-some minutes, from when he entered the café, and he couldn't have been more pleased. While moping had become a little more common for him the last few days, it wasn't really something he enjoyed.
If only Ash had known how much time he would be spending doing just that in the weeks to come.
A/N: Well hello again, my darlings! I have returned, all in my might! I posted a quick update on the original version of this story that I have returned, and hopefully my stay will be a lot more consistent than it was back in 2013, before I went on my spontaneous hiatus. All kinds of things have happened since back then, and I can't even begin to start on everything I've learned in my time away. But one of those things has been the life of a barista; Lillian's views on coffee are actually my own pretentious opinions WHOOPS. But that's okay.
Anyways. Had a Bad Day, newly titled Just a Bad Day (because I don't want to delete the old version). I didn't think I would ever have the chance to get back into it, but I have been dying to write for a really long time. I had originally planned on just updating the original version, buuuttttt I absolutely hated the pace and the writing in general. I didn't know where I wanted the story to go back then, and I went into each chapter nearly blind –a mistake that won't be happening this time around! I have a vague idea of how I want things to pan out, which should help an immense amount. I wasn't planning on actually posting this until I had a few more chapters written, but I couldn't help myself c':
But I need to stop babbling. I'm glad to be back, even though I assume most of you don't know/remember me. Sorry that my writing style is kind of long winded now, but I hope that you enjoy what I have to offer from here on out c; Lots of love, everyone!