I almost tripped as I rushed up the stairs.

As soon as I got to my room I shut the door, leaned against it and took a long, deep breath. I didn't know what just happened. And I didn't want to know why what just happened, happened. And I especially didn't want to know why my pulse was misbehaving as a result of what just happened.

And yet, I still found myself asking, what in the heck just happened?

****

I changed into clean clothes before exiting my room, intending to ignore and forget and not try to understand whatever had just happened, but as soon as I closed my door and turned to the stairs, I saw Elliot. His sleeves were still rolled up, his curly hair scruffy from the full day, and his black trousers had flour on them. I just stood by my door, waiting for him to continue, but he remained where he was.

I forced myself to snap out of whatever trance I was in, reminding myself that Elliot was my cousin. Meaning we were related. Meaning I was probably just overreacting and taking whatever happened out of proportion. There was nothing weird or significant about it, and I tried to convince myself of that so my damn heart could quit misbehaving in my chest.

"You've got flour on your trousers," I said casually and stepped away from my door. "You should probably clean that."

"You've got flour on your face," he retorted. "You should probably clean that."

"I do?" I asked then narrowed my eyes at him. "Liar, I just changed."

"But did you look in the mirror?"

"Maybe."

Elliot chuckled. Oh, why did he have to chuckle?

I cleared my throat and stood straighter as I made to walk past him, but I had barely walked down the first step when I tripped. On what? Air? My dignity?

Luckily—yet also unluckily—Elliot caught my arm, sending spasms of... something, up my hand.

"Careful," he said, and I freed once I stabled myself.

"Mhm," I hummed, rubbing the spot where his hand had been wrapped around my arm. "I'm careful."

Elliot grinned again, and I wondered if he was doing that because he wanted me to make my heart misbehave and—

Oh my dough, what was wrong with me today?

Ah yes, the dough. This all started because of the damn dough. Whatever I was feeling was the dough's fault. It was the dough's fault that Elliot stood behind me. He was close as he helped me knead it, and it wasn't weird until I started to feel his body heat radiation toward me, making me feel all hot. It wasn't weird until the feeling of his hand on mine made me all jittery. And it sure as dough wasn't weird until I decided to look at him and my heart detached from my chest and dropped to the pit of my stomach.

He—my cousin—was simply showing me how to knead the dough properly, so I honestly didn't understand why I suddenly felt the way I had. It was so sudden and so foreign and it made no sense.

"Oh, by the way," Elliot suddenly recalled something. "You're coming out with me tomorrow." I scrunched my brows in response and he elaborated, "I found you a job."

"You did?!" I exclaimed and Elliot nodded. "What kind of job?"

"You'll be working at a café," he told me. "I don't know what exactly you'll be doing."

"I don't care what I'm doing as long as I'm doing something," I said, forcing myself to stop thinking about the dough situation and to focus on the fact that I now had a job. "One can only talk to the objects around the house for so long."

He snorted, "I'm sorry, what?"

"What?" I asked despite having heard what he said.

"What did you just say?"

"Go clean your trousers."

"That's not what you said."

"Well, that's what I'm saying now."

He rolled his eyes but said, "well then, go clean your face." And then with a grin, he added before leaving, "and then you can talk to your inanimate friends afterwards. I'm sure they miss talking to you."

****

I was excited about the job up until I woke up the next morning, and my nerves only got worse as I got ready, and much worse when I was done getting ready.

"Ready?" Elliot asked me as I descended the steps.

"Yep," I said stiffly, meeting him at the bottom, but when his brows knit together at the sight of me, I couldn't help but ask, "What is it?"

"You're ready?"

"I... yes, I'm ready," I said, suddenly looking down at my outfit and thinking that maybe black tights and a white shirt were too informal. But it wasn't like I needed to dress formally, it was a café I was going to be working at, not a law firm. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Aren't you going to... I don't know... put on makeup?"

My upper lip curled to form a mock sneer and I narrowed my eyes at him, "Is my face that ugly that I have to cover it up with makeup?"

"No, that's not what I meant," Elliot said quickly. "Forget I said anything. You look great. You're perfectly fine the way you are," he told me rashly, making my heart misbehave again. "I was just thinking about Jess, she never goes anywhere without makeup."

"Well, I'm not Jess," I told him. "And I do wear makeup, but only on special occasions."

"Why only special occasions?"

"Because if I wore makeup every day, I would have to wash my face every day," his answering expression was nothing short of hilarious, though I hadn't expected to laugh as hard as I did. "I'm joking. It was just a joke, fix your face." He fixed his face, and a corner of his lips threatened to quirk upwards.

"The real reason I only wear makeup on special occasions," I told him as I made my way out of the house, "is because... well, you know how makeup transforms one's face? It makes you look good, like really good. And I guess that's not bad, but I don't want to base my looks on makeup if that makes sense."

"Not really, no," he said honestly, locking the front door and making his way to the car.

"I don't want to become self-conscious about my natural face." I opened the passenger door to enter while Elliot made his way to the driver's side.

"But there's nothing wrong with your natural face," Elliot told me nonchalantly, and I froze mid-entering the car.

I stood fully and his car was low enough that I could see him over the roof. His eyes met mine.

"You actually look good without makeup," he said, which made something in my chest do what felt like a failed attempt at a backflip.

Eventually, he broke eye contact and entered the car, and it took me a second to breathe properly before I entered after him. I put on my seatbelt before he started the car and we drove in silence for some time.

"But, just so you know," I began, breaking the silence. "I am wearing makeup."

"Really?" He glanced at me. "What are you wearing?"

I grinned at the question and looked at Elliot as I answered, "Lip gloss."

He snorted, rolling his eyes, and I didn't know why it made me feel so good when I made him smile.

I opened the window and stuck my hand out, and after a moment I suddenly remembered where we were going and what I was going to do. I was going to work. That remembrance knocked the nerves back into full drive.

"You'll be fine," Elliot said, somehow sensing my nerves.

"Yeah, I know," I said smoothly. "But then what if I'm not?" The smoothness immediately disappeared. "I've never worked in a café before."

"And how would you know?"

"You're not funny," I narrowed my eyes at him, but he didn't wipe the smile off of his face, pleased with his own joke. "This could go horribly."

"How much could possibly go wrong working in a café?"

"Oh, I don't know, I could spill burning hot coffee on a customer," I told him, checking the possibilities off with my fingers. "I could get an order wrong, I could—"

"Zara," Elliot chuckled. "You were perfectly fine just now."

"Just now was then, right now is now," I explained. "They're two completely different periods of time."

"You'll be fine," Elliot assured me and parked the car.

"Did you park the car so I could calm down?" I asked, touched.

Elliot smiled, and I noticed a glint of amusement in his eyes as he said, "I parked because we're here."

I looked out the window and found we were parked in front of a little, chic café. Reed's Café. A tall, familiar-looking male walked out of the café and approached our car, but rather than going to Elliot's side, he came to mine.

I threw Elliot a look, "don't roll down my window."

"Roll down your window?" He acted as if he misheard me. "Okay."

He rolled down my window and I forced calm into my being.

"Reed," Elliot greeted.

"You brought my new employee," he grinned at me. "You remember me?"

"Yeah," I said, and Reed glanced at Elliot who glanced back at Reed, something unreadable in their expressions. "We met at the funeral, right?"

Their expressions fell back to normal and Reed said, "oh, you're talking about that. Then yeah, we did."

"Out you go, Zara," Elliot said, unbuckling my seatbelt.

"I could have done that myself," I grumbled.

"I am aware of that," he smiled, and I sneered which only made his smile grow wider. He was enjoying this far too much.

"Follow me, Zara," Reed said and walked into the café. I looked at Elliot and quickly unbuckled his seatbelt before following Reed into the café, casting a glance back at Elliot over my shoulder and smiling sweetly at him.

As soon as I entered I was greeted by another employee, Bridget, who explained everything I would be doing, which was simply taking the orders to the tables. Reed was the one who got the orders from the counter and handled the register. Bridget was the one who prepared whatever drink was ordered, and I was going to be the one dealing with the food and taking the orders to their respective tables.

They went over a few more things with me before the customers started pouring in at exactly 7:30 am, most of which ordered coffee and a small snack to start their day. Most of the orders were takeaways, and for the ones that were sit-ins, I managed not to fumble any. The job also wasn't as boring as I thought it would be. There were so many different people that came in, so many different faces and personalities, and I was almost always on my feet.

Seconds turned to minutes, minutes turned to hours and before I knew it, it was closing time. The bell above the door jingled, signalling the entrance of another customer and when I looked up I saw Elliot. I was on the other side of the room, wiping down a table, but he spotted me instantly and smiled, making me smile in turn.

"We're as good as done here," Bridget said from the table she was wiping down. "You can go if you want."

"Nah," I said, still smiling at Elliot. "He can wait."