meraki.

Microwavable Popcorn

It was almost 9.20am when Anna arrived at her workplace. 

She was in absolutely no rush, due to the fact that the bookshop she worked at usually opened around 9.30am - sometimes even 10.00am, if the boss was in the mood to be lazy and things weren't particularly hectic. That Thursday morning things weren't particularly hectic. They had no important orders to take care of - or at least, not urgent ones. The various packets of books students and mothers had ordered the previous month had all been delivered and paid. 

Anna was taking her sweet ass time walking down the sidewalk, watching the storefronts of the dress shops that filled Via Arno, making it one of the liveliest streets of town. Something caught her eye: a black one-shoulder dress, it barely reached the mannequin's knee; the only sleeve was see-through and reached the elbow; it had mainly caught her eyes because of the small silver and golden stars that had been applied - almost casually, it seemed - all over the fabric. She got closer to the shop window, and when her eyes landed on the price tag, she quickly decided the dress wasn't that cute anymore. She shook her head, took one step back and started walking towards the bookshop again. 

Anna had been working at Cover 2 Cover for the past 5 years. Even if - at least - for the first three years accomodation hadn't been a problem, she still had had to get food, and maybe some clothes, and also other things she would've liked to buy. She had been lucky to find a job that fit her: having been a bookworm for as long as she could've remembered, working amongst books and suchlike just seemed like the best option for her. She was also grateful her boss was absolutely fine with her only working part time. For the first year she had thought it would've been impossible, but after disovering that her photographic memory was a skill she could've used when she was preparing an exam, everything had gone pretty smoothly. 

It wasn't a tiring job: all she had to do was clean the bookcases, take orders, sometimes xerox some papers, help the clients find the specific book they needed. Zara was the one in charge of anything that would've been too complicated for Anna, and Anna couldn't complain at all about that situation. Her favorite task was helping someone find a book in the messy maze of bookcases they had: thanks to her photographic memory, she had memorized every book in every bookcase, and the small summary on their back cover. It did make her feel special. 

When she got to the bookstore's backdoor, Zara was already there, waiting for her with her arms crossed. As Anna got closer to her, she raised both of her eyebrows, trying to decipher why Zara was so annoyed to her. All she had done, up to that moment, was breathing and walking to the bookstore. 

"You're late." - Zara simply said, rolling her eyes once Anna stopped in front of her. 

"I'm.... I'm actually not." - Anna said, narrowing her eyes at Zara. - "Julius isn't even here yet." - she looked around, just to make sure his car wasn't parked where she couldn't see it straight away. - "How am I late when the shop isn't even open yet?" 

"I was here before you were, wasn't I?" - Zara retorted, tilting her head.

"Yeah, and for what? Waiting outside and doing nothing?" - Anna rolled her eyes, leaning her right shoulder on the wall, facing Zara. - "I'm so sorry you have nothing interesting to do at home that you have to come and do nothing outside the backdoor." - she shrugged, giving her a tight lipped smile. 

"I just care about my job, that's it." 

"Wasting time outside doing nothing while you wait for our boss to come and open up is absolutely useless." 

"It is not, it shows I care deeply about my job, and maybe one day he'll trust me enough to give me a key, so I can close or open the shop myself." - Zara proudly said.