loligiary | Tea with the Queen

Tea with the Queen

Superheroing was great for the soul but didn't pay the bills. Genevieve subsidized her hobby and her rent payments through working the late shift at a coffee shop. Her coworkers were a relatively ordinary mix--some went out of their way to be kind and chatty, some had a chip on their shoulder, most regarded her with an apathy that was often a relief when she needed to be alone with her thoughts and the blender. The need to focus on each coffee-related task and complete it with practiced motions was soothing and kept her from wobbling in indecision. Some days were easier than others. Some days stress threatened to eat her alive.

The Queen helped with that, but you couldn't bring the Queen to work with you...and of course there was the problem of Jervis.

Genevieve heard the voice of a coffee order as she wiped down the spout of the latte machine. She turned and saw no one, and went back to work. Late night, must be hearing things. She was short, for any gender, and occasionally had to get up on a step stool to reach the spare beans and milk stored in the hidden cabinets behind the menu boards. Seeing particularly small people over the height of the counter was even more troublesome.

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Genevieve passed the hot chocolate over, feeling her ears burn with embarrassment. What a mess.

"If you could write down the address, I could," she says, as a fat man behind Mary taps his feet in annoyance.

Mary took teh hot chocolate. She had really made a scene. It was what she was good at. And poor Gen didn't deserve to have her life upset like this.

She quickly wrote down her address and her phone number.

"In case you just want to text me to forget it, and I promise, if you don't want to see me any more I'll get it..." She glanced behind her, trying not to be irritated that someone was impatient with her. The old her would have screamed at him to move his fat ass out of her light, but she wasn't that person any more.

For the most part.

Genevieve took it with a grateful nod, and then went back to her polite customer service voice for the next customer.

"You trying to date her or something?" asked her supervisor after Mary left.

"No! No, definitely not."

"Uh huh. Just less flirting when you're on the clock, okay?"

If she didn't have an appointment with Mary she'd have considered crawling into the latte machine and never coming out again.

After a disastrous attempt to cook, Mary ordered a pizza. She only hoped that Gen liked pizza.

The apartment was clean for the first time since she moved in and she felt a fraction of fear. If Gen didn't show up all this work would be for nothing. But she wouldn't blame her for not wanting to show up. She could only hope that her new friend wouldn't leave her without an explanation.

Gen buzzed the door at 8pm, and hoped that she wasn't calling too late. She'd tried to fingercomb her hair in the coffee shop bathroom and changed out of her work shirt into a slightly more attractive blue blouse, but to her own eyes she still looked very unprofessional and scruffy.

Mary had put on a clean dress, something pink and casual. She usually just sat around the house in a sweatshirt and leggings, but she didn't want to seem like the mental case she was.

"Hey." Mary answered the door, all smiles now. "Glad you came." She moved so that Gen could enter. "I ordered a pizza, hope that's ok."

"Certainly! Of course!"

'Speak in French when you can't think of the English for a thing--turn your toes out when you walk---And remember who you are!'

It would be nice if she actually spoke French, mind. Genevieve entered, tense with her hands in her pockets.

"Make yourself comfortable." Her hands shook a bit, her words halting at times as she tried to think of the next thing she should do as a good hostess.

"Did you want something to drink? I have ummm..." She didn't have much, she realized. "Water."

"Yes, definitely! I love water!"

Wow, Gen. Wow. She's just going to sit down on the couch so her legs don't run her right out of the building.

Mary had a little laugh at that. "Wow, you must really love staying hydrated!" At least, Mary was now safe in the knowledge that she was not the most awkward person here.

She got Gen a water and then sat down. "So, I'm sorry to have sort of...had a drama bomb at your work. I just...I knew that you had seen all that stuff online about me. Worried that you had actually. Like I said...I was not a good person, but I'm trying."

She wishes she hadn't opened that door. So direly, she wishes it. Genevieve hunches her shoulders up as if curling around the glass in her hands. "I was just...curious. I knew you'd had a show. I wanted to see what it was." She's near-whimpering. I'm so sorry, Mary. I ruined it. "And I--I know what it can be like. When you make a mistake, or hurt someone, and it follows you around forever."

Mary sighed and sat down on the couch. It was a small couch but she still had to climb up to get on it comfortably. Her home was a small one bedroom apartment, but it was at least her own. She decorated sparsely, a few stuffed animals here and there and a throw pillow or two. Her taste was mish-mashed with what was cheap and easy to get home.

"I didn't make a mistake." She didn't want to try to pawn off the responsibility she felt for how she acted. "And it's not your fault you were curious. I told you about it. It's only right to wonder. I did too. I wondered what you would find and when I found out, I was very sure you wouldn't want to talk to me any more." Water just wasn't cutting it here, she'd have to go grocery shopping soon and get something else. Water just shouldn't taste this bitter. But perhaps it was simply her feeling making everything taste disgusting right now.

"I wish I hadn't acted that way, but I didn't know any better. When I was a star I got what I wanted when I wanted and no one ever argued with me." Now, now everyday felt like she was battling something or someone, whether it be the washer or the land lady. "I know I did bad things, and I try every day to over come them." And poor Gen, what could she have done to upset any one? Mousy thing that she was. People probably stepped all over her all the time.

"That's...that's really all you can do, right?" She drinks, because it's what one does when one is given water, but it doesn't stop the lump in her throat. "I've been like that too. Hurt people...done foolish things, and put a black mark on myself for it."

"Yeah...sadly." She had tried to make amends, but nothing ever seemed to work out the way she hoped it would.

Mary glanced at Gen. "You? I can't imagine that. Maybe unknowingly, but I don't imagine you would hurt someone on purpose."

Genevieve swallowed hard. "No, I. I did. It's why I lost my job." Lost everything, and felt she'd deserved it. But why'd she'd let the conversation even go this way?

Mary bit her lip. "Sorry...that, sounds horrible." Mary hadn't lost her job because of her rudeness...well, no, that's not true. She kind of had. She had stepped on a lot of toes and that's why she didn't get to go back. "I know how that feels...obviously." Duh, that's why they were talking about it!

"But I don't think...I've had to work hard at it, you know, it is hard...I don't think you should have to carry that around your hole life." Words were so hard, why were words so stupidly hard?

"Don't I know it." Mary looked at her sad glass of water. "At least there are times when the load lightens a little, right?"

"It does, you know. At the right time, or in the right company." Genevieve drew in a deep breath, trying to inhale and exhale her away away from that mindset, as if it could make one float. Enough of that. Enough of her being horrid today. Please.

"Do you like to go out anywhere? With friends?"

Mary glanced at a stuffed animal sitting on the sofa next to her, throwing a pillow over it and turning back to Gen with a nervous smile. "Friends...yeah..." She glanced at the pillow again. Friends... "Umm...not particularly. I prefer to stay in. Watch movies. Do that sort of thing. My friends don't get out much."

"No, that makes sense. I stay inside a lot too. We watch a lot of movies. Or sports." She giggles. Surrounded by stuffed animals, and her with her china-cabinet and teacup house, and she knows enough about professional wrestling to have opinions on who was going to win this season. "My friend really likes them. So we watch."

"We?" It seemed Gen had a friend. A friend who liked sports. Now, Mary didn't like to assume things about any one or anything. Any one could like sports, regardless of sex, BUT! She smirked a bit.

"Sport, heh? I can't say I've ever watched much. My dad used to bet on football and baseball, and it always seemed so boring to me." At least Mary was feeling a bit better.

"I watch far too many movies. Mostly musicals and dramas."

"Oh, I love musicals!" And that took them back down the rabbit hole with shared love of fiction, that special place you can always escape to because nothing from the outside world can get to you there.

"I haven't really been to any in a while," she says with a smile, once they've gotten done fangirling about 'Into the Woods'. "There was a lovely children's play I saw about a year and a half ago, a charity benefit. I happened to stop in--really needed to see it that day." Or she'd have gone somewhere far worse.

Mary smiled brightly. "Really?" She felt like anyone she told that to usually thought she was silly.

"I love live theater, but most of the time I just end up at home curled up on the couch watching the movie ones." And singing along.

"Sometimes a little theater can change everything, I know the feeling." Of course, her's hadn't ended so well.

"You know, it really can." And it got Mary the biggest authentic smile she'd seen off Genevieve since she showed up. The play had changed her life. The play had gotten her the dress, which had gotten her Alice, which had gotten her the Queen, which had gotten her everything that made life worth living.

She wished she could tell Mary about it but, well. Secret identity as superhero, trans, and crazy.

Tea with the Queen

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/runs in late with starbucks

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