Mona Liza Lies

3 | Foxes with Flowers

It was the day after Dennis burst into Mona's place unannounced. 

She was in her office at the moment, looking through the curtains at a woman arguing with the sales representative, Tara. This might be the time to say that Mona was the manager of the jewelry store, Allure. It was a part of Allure's small chain company located in malls, like the one she's in right now. She loved most bits of the job as it included decent pay and bossing around others. Parts she did not like were times like these when the customers show up with ridiculous claims. She was hoping against hope that Tara would deal with the mess instead of saying, "I'll call the manager."

So far, Tara looked exhausted but kept on fighting, pointing at the piece of paper Mona guessed to be the receipt, and back to the angered customer. She even glanced at Mona's door, where Tara herself knew the manager must be sneaking a peek to see how she was responding to the situation. Mona thought any second she'll snap but Tara tore her eyes away and started explaining more shrewdly. 

Mona relaxed. But something kept nagging at her. She didn't like how this lady was yelling at Tara, her friend, and a hard-working employee. She hated feeling guilty. She bit her lips and decided to intervene anyway.

She took a look at the mirror, adjusting her dark hair by patting down the messy parts. There wasn't not much to do in the office anyway, except paperwork, which she'd rather not be doing. She took a look at the dark circles under her eyes and how tired she appeared even to herself. To anyone else, she was pretty. Tall, jet-black hair, her skin a deep shade of chestnut brown, and her eyes a mystery between hazel and copper -- Liza had often described her as Model Material. She felt confident most days, but had insecurities just like anyone else. She thought her forehead was too big and her fingers were freakishly long. Yes, she knew she was overthinking it, but when was she not? 

Do I look like a manager? Professional enough? Yes. Maybe. Ah, fuck it, this is fine, she thought and stepped outside. 

"Couldn't help but notice this," she said, walking towards them. Tara smiled warmly.

"She has-" Tara began but Mona shook her head.

"I'll take it over from here. You can go home early!" 

"It's 4.26 P.M," Tara pointed at the clock to their left. "The shop's only open for another 10 minutes."

"If you wanna work so bad," Mona sighed, "then at least promise me we can get ice cream after."

"You got it, boss." Tara gave her a fake salute and was off to help another customer. 

"I bought this necklace. It's broken, and now I want an exchange, for Lucien's sake!" The lady started before Mona could ask. 

Lucien was a man in the urban fairytale, one Mona wasn't too educated in. She just knew it was a presumed scary story with a villain resembling the devil. The story's been around as long as the town was, so people use "Lucien" in their everyday conversations. Most of the time, that is. He went by a lot of names, but Lucien just happened to be the most popular.

"That doesn't sound like a big deal. If you bought it within the last few weeks, give us a copy of your receipt and we'll see what we can do." She said pleasantly.

"I - okay, I bought this four years back." 

Mona blinked. "That's even before I started working here!"

"I still demand an exchange!"

"Rules are rules, ma'am." Mona shrugged. "The damage inflicted isn't the company's fault. Things break over time, especially when it's over four years."

"But-"

"I'm sorry we can't be of more help, now if you'll excuse me, I see a frustrated fennec fox coming our way." 

The lady turned to see Dennis walking over to them. Mona shrugged and waved her off. Even though she wasn't pleased to see him, she appreciated how she had the excuse to stop the lady from arguing more.

"Thought the place would have been closed by now." Dennis started slowly. He looked the same as ever but in a horrible grey jacket and a bouquet of daisies in his hands.

"It will soon. And what is that monstrosity?" She winced.

"Flowers. I felt bad for, you know-" he raised them to her face but she shook her head.

"I would prefer candies."

Dennis scoffed. He was relieved because he knew he was forgiven. "Well, I don't have them. Would you take cash?"

"I don't see why not."

"How much?"

"Your entire wallet." Mona smiled.

He gulped, thought about it for a second, then gave up. 

"No, no, no. Don't think I didn't just hear you call me a fox!"

"You looked frustrated!" Mona retorted. "There's not a lot of animals starting with the letter F!"

"What are you talking about-"

"Would you rather be called a frustrated flamingo?" She shrugged. "My bad, frustrated ferret would be more appropriate?"

"Alright, you made your point, you can stop."

"Frustrated frog-"

"Okay, I said stop!" Dennis whined, glaring. "Now, look it's obvious we were both very surprised by Liz's death."

"Everyone was." Mona snapped. "The only difference between us and them is that we should have seen it coming. We didn't."

Dennis saw the walls shattering just for a second. He looked around the shop just for the sake of not looking at her. But he decided to get it over with.

"It's not our fault, Mona." He offered her the flowers again.

"You're right." She reluctantly took them with a grateful smile. "It's just mine."

"Wow, okay should have seen it coming." Dennis clapped his hands. "What if we had coffee tomorrow? My treat."

"You'll get me candies too?" Mona smiled.

"As much as you want, as long as it's not too much." He started walking backwards with a huge grin on his face. It was obvious he was busy.

Mona rolled her eyes.

"See you around, Dennis." She waved and he nodded, leaving her in the middle of diamonds, pearls, and everything shiny.

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