Falling To The Sun | B. Swan + E. Cullen

quarante-cinq

The smell of fresh bread and chocolate chip cookies made her stomach growl and Roman ducked her head to hide the warmth that flooded her cheeks. 

"You know you don't have to stay and help, right?" Tessa comments, the humour in her voice palpable as she carries out another tray of macarons to place in the display case in one hand while she holds two pink bakery boxes in the other. "It's sort of my job to do all of this, you know?"  

"Yeah, I know," she says, jumping to take the boxes from her hands to add to the table with the rest of the order. "But I don't see how it's fair to make you do all this work when you're supposed to be at the wedding enjoying it all tomorrow." 

Somehow, despite Alice's misgivings about having a full dessert table at the wedding, she and Leah had convinced the girl otherwise. They had gotten her to hire the Sweet Lounge rather easily after they got her to agree. 

Her true mistake was letting Roman place the order because even she would admit that she had gone a little bit overboard and then tried to hide that fact by paying for it herself. She was found out anyway, of course, Alice and Edward knew everything, and then somehow Emmett learned what happened and he swore to never let her hear the end of it. 

At the time she had countered that all the leftovers and the extra could just go to the pack since they wouldn't go to waste. He still laughed. 

Though she supposed it was a miracle nonetheless to get Leah to interact with the Cullen's at all. She still firmly hated them all, despised them with her entire being, but she put up with them for Roman's sake and she couldn't be more thankful. 

So that was how she ended up hiding out here the days that led up to the wedding, helping out Tessa and her parents the best way that she knew how -- the same way that Bella was hiding out in her home to avoid the people in tone from staring at her. 

Which, to be fair, they really were staring at her because of that ridiculous car that Edward had gotten her after her truck died. The only reason Roman got out of it was because someone would always give her a lift when she needed it. She had straight out refused, claiming that she needed her usual bike rides for her cardio. 

She might be turning into a vampire that wouldn't need things like that anymore, but she still wanted to make sure that she was in shape to the time leading up. She also had far too much excess energy that would build up if she didn't get a bike ride in.

Tessa laughs as she fills the display. "It's literally part of the job, Ro, you don't need to worry about any of that." 

"Ah, but who will keep you company?" 

"I can spend some time in the bakery on my own, you know, it's not that big a deal," she says, shrugging as she places the tray back on the counter. "Besides, my parents will be home soon. Papa says that he's going to be starting on the bread tonight so that it's ready to be baked fresh tomorrow for the wedding. He'll be able to keep me company." 

"There has to be something that I can do to help, Tes." 

Tessa eyes her closely, planting her elbow on the counter. "You're just bored with Alice doing all the work." 

"No, that's not it," she's quick to defend herself. "I'm just... she told me to take this last week to relax and distress, and rest, right? But I'm just so antsy and nervous. What if something goes wrong?" 

Her friend sighs before turning to grab at the fresh French roast coffee and poured to mugs for both of them. She could see the steam twist and curl from where she sat, the heat visibly rising. Tessa fixed it how she liked, remembering her order from all the times that she had ordered in the past, and pushed it to the end of the counter.