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Coffee Shop Love
Chapter 1: Love at First Order
"Himari, your grande Mango Dragonfruit Lemonade is ready!" Enma Kozato calls out as he sets down the plastic cup that is nearly filled to the brim with the magenta colored drink on top of the granite pick-up counter. As soon as he places the cup down, he directs his attention back towards the row of blenders with unblended drinks in front of him, not bothering to make sure whether or not the person picked up their drink or not. Why should he? He's been working in the coffee shop since 11 in the morning and seeing that it is nearing late 3 o'clock in the afternoon, the redhead is more than happy to do whatever he can to ensure that he can go back to his dormitory as soon as possible.
Enma Kozato would consider himself a fairly normal person. He is a twenty-year-old college student attending Namimori University and majoring in Business whilst working part-time at a rather popular coffee shop chain, NamiCoffee. He is almost always exhausted, as most college students are, and tends to spend a majority of his free time sleeping or procrastinating on his school work by watching the latest anime episodes that are out. While Enma realizes that his daily routine makes him sound very much like a loner - he wouldn't disagree there - he surprisingly has six friends, which is more than he ever expected to have in his lifetime. He is quite content with the way his life is going, although he does wish that he'd be paid more for having to deal with half of the customers that come into the shop-
"Excuse me?"
A melodic voice tears Enma away from his thoughts. He looks up from the Pink Drink that he is about to blend to the direction in which he had heard the voice and he nearly drops the lid of the blender as a result. Because there, a few mere feet away from him, is the most beautiful girl that he's ever seen. Her short, dark brunette hair is up into a ponytail with her bangs covering just a bit of her forehead. Honeyed doe eyes stare back at him oh-so-innocently and it doesn't help that her arms are behind her back, making her seem all the more innocent and lovely. She is wearing a Midori University t-shirt paired with a pair of jean shorts and that doesn't do much to dim down his attraction for her. Because a girl who is both cute and smart? That's perfect.
"Uh-Uh y-yes?" Enma manages to get out, all the while scolding himself mentally for stuttering in front of her. Kami, he's so lame.
"Har-I mean, I ordered a grande Coconut Frappuccino for awhile now and I still haven't gotten it yet." Her bottom lip jots out in what appears to be a pout and if Enma had found her cute before, she is adorable now.
He furrows his eyebrow in thought. "What's your order number?"
"Number 86~desu."
He quickly looks down at the sticker on the drink that he is currently working on. Number 103. She had to wait for such a long time-
"I'm sorry for the inconvenience. Let me get you a free venti." He bows before her - why he bowed, he has no idea why and he is sure that he doesn't want to know why - before he haphazardly grabs a nearby empty blender and begins dumping in the necessary ingredients to make her drink.
"Wait-" Is all that he can hear the girl say before he starts up the blender, making it whir and growl aggressively, essentially drowning out anything that she has to say in protest. Once the drink is nice and blended smoothly, Enma grabs an empty, plastic venti-sized cup before he carefully pours the drink into said cup. Looking up at her, he finds her honey eyes gazing back at him and he fumbles for a bit, trying to regain his ability to speak.
"Would-Would you like whipped cream?" The redhead is surprised that he is still able to form a sentence that is comprehensive.
Her eyes light up and in that moment, he is more than glad that he remembered to ask a customer if they'd like something added to their drink. "Yes, please!"
He shakes the bottle of whipped cream and aiming it towards her drink, he attempts to cover the top of her drink with whipped cream only for the bottle to sputter, leaving no trace of the sweet cream. Of course there just had to be no whipped cream left for this beautiful stranger. Of course.
Enma looks up at her and to say that he feels embarrassed would be a huge understatement. "S-Sorry, there's no whipped cream left." Kami does he want the earth to swallow him up.
"That's all right!" She replies cheerfully as she takes the drink when he slides it over to her. Grabbing a straw from the container of straws, she picks up her drink. "Thank you for the drink..." The girl leans slightly forward, staring at his shirt. "Kozato-san!" She beams brightly, as she turns her back to him, intent on leaving.
Before he knows what he's doing, he's calling out to her, "Wait!"
Upon hearing that, she turns back to him, her face is etched with concern. "Is something the matter, Kozato-san?" The mystery girl asks, cocking her head to the side in concern.
"Ah, w-well, I-" Is all Enma can say intelligently. Besides his brain not properly functioning enough for him to form comprehensible sentences, he doesn't know how to tell a girl that he hardly knows that he wants to ask her out without seeming like a complete douchebag. He knows that it might seem weird - oh, who is he kidding, it is weird - for him to ask a complete stranger out, but there's just something in him that's telling him that it's her. That she's the one-
Just then, the door to the coffee shop opens and in comes a brunet male, his brown eyes searching frantically around the coffee shop before they land on the girl.
"There you are! You worried me to death!" He exclaims as he makes his way towards her, his arms wrapping around her waist. Enma's breath is caught in his throat. Oh Kami, no-
She giggles, her laugh gentle and airy. "Sorry about that, Tsuna-kun." And with that, she stands on her tiptoes to give this 'Tsuna-kun' a kiss on the lips. It takes all of his willpower to not collapse right then and there and Enma knows that he's being overdramatic, but he doesn't care. He should have known. Someone like her is bound to be taken, not single and waiting for a loser like him. He should have known. He should have-
"Oh! Were you about to say something, Kozato-san?" She diverts her attention back to the redhead, who has to then plaster on a fake smile.
"N-Nothing. Have a nice day." He forces his voice to sound cheerful. She beams back at him, her dimples appearing, before she turns her back to him once more, walking out of the shop hand-in-hand with her boyfriend.
He watches them until they disappear from his view and he would have been fixated on nothing in particular had it not have been for Julie.
"Enma! Come on, get back to work!" The brunet male nudges him, almost making Enma trip. "You wouldn't want Adelheid to yell at you now, would you?" At the sound of Adelheid's name, Enma immediately set out to work, though his mind always came back to the mystery girl. Kami he would do anything to see her one more time.
End of Chapter 1
(6/10/21): Hello hello! This is my first ever KHR! story that isn't a challenge of sorts AND it's my first ever KHR! story involving a love triangle! As you can probably tell from this story's description and the characters involved, it is indeed a love triangle involving Enma, Haru, and Tsuna! I would like to point out that I have never worked as a barista before at any drink shop, so I apologize if I butchered anything in this chapter relating to drink-making. Anyways, do let me know what your thoughts of of this first chapter, and I shall hopefully see you in the second chapter! Ta-ta! ( ˘ ³˘)❤