Short Story
Start writing here…Janet hated this part of the day. This was the time when Richard came to the patisserie. Every time she saw Richard, her heart started to flutter and her co-ordination faltered. Her palms would start to sweat and she would forget whatever she was doing at that time. She was head over heels in love with him, even though she knew nothing about him except his name and his favorite flavor of cupcake – Banana Chocolate.
This had never happened to Janet in all her years. She had never felt so irrational before and she was a very practical person. Falling in love was a process for her, which involved meeting someone, knowing their characteristics and assessing if it went well with her nature. Only then had she allowed herself to fall in love all of the two times that it had happened before. Of course, those two times having not worked out was in no way a reason for her to not continue her process of scrutiny.
But Richard had swept all those thoughts away from her mind. She was besotted. So much so that, she did something she had never done before – consulted her psychic sister if things would work out between them. However, her sister’s prediction was not positive. Her sister had predicted that Richard would bring trouble to her. Janet had never believed in psychic powers anyway. It was just her desperation that made her consult her sister. The negative news did nothing to stow away her feelings for Richard. She just had to try once.
Since she did not know anything about him except for his favorite cupcake, there was only one thing she could do to subtly get his attention – put a message in his cupcake. She decided to keep the message simple but interesting so as to not sound very desperate – Would you like to catch up for coffee someday? She did not want to put in her name as it was quite obvious who could have put the message. She wrapped that particular muffin in red wrap paper to distinguish it from others. But she did not want anyone else to know of this so she kept that muffin in the display window along with other cupcakes. Now all she had to do was to wait till he arrived. That was when her sister’s prediction came true and everything went wrong.
Apart from her, Janet had a couple of employees working for her in the patisserie. That day, there was an exceptionally large rush of people and all three of them were busy serving customers all through the morning. In the commotion, Janet did not notice the dwindling supply of cupcakes. So when Richard arrived and Janet went to pick up his special cupcake, she noticed in horror that the cupcake was missing. She looked around the store in panic and saw the red wrapped cupcake being sold to a formidable looking woman by one of her employees. She hurried forward as the woman turned from the counter and started walking towards the exit. In her rush to get to the woman, she did not slowdown in time and went dashing into the woman. The woman gave a cry of horror and the cupcake flung from her hand and landed in the coffee of an old man sitting near the exit, splashing hot coffee all over him. Shocked by the noise and the torrent on coffee towards him, he gave a start and threw the cup down.
The cup fell down and broke into tiny pieces right next to a bulldog who was sitting next to his 10 year old master. The dog jerked awake and being scared, darted towards the exit pulling the kid along with it. The kid, in his haste to gain control of the dog, tumbled onto the old man. The old man, already burnt with coffee, was not very steady and ended up crashing on to the floor. His cry of pain made it very obvious that he had broken quite a few bones in his rattled old body. In the midst of the chaos that followed, Janet managed to reach the counter and call 911. Paramedics soon arrived and rushed the old man to the hospital, where it was declared that the chaos had caused him a minor heart attack and he had broken bones in his leg and shoulder. In all of this mess, Richard had rushed off without offering help to anyone.
It took her many hours to convince the old man’s family not to sue her patisserie. She had agreed to cover all of his medical expenses in the offering. Finally when she could come back home, she found her sister waiting for her by the door steps. Rushing into her arms and sobbing pitifully, Janet realized this was the trouble her sister had warned her about. If only she had listened to her and kept a strong rein on her heart!
