Only Fools

Chapter Four

"Why are we here so early? This place is literally empty," I whine. My head is still pounding from last night and all I want to do is be home in my bed, away from this diner with its loud and annoying funky music.

"I'm getting paid for being here, so it doesn't matter either way to me," Ivy says with a shrug. I groan and lay my head down on the table.

"If it helps, I could probably get you a free meal," Ivy offers warily.

"I need a menu for that then," I tell her, not even moving my head from where it lays.

I hear the menu slap down onto the table and I slowly lift my head up and pull it towards me.

"Ok...." I say as I flip it open to the page filled with breakfast options.

"Ok. What's on this um 'Farmer's Omelette'?" I ask her, pointing to something randomly on the page.

"You could just read the ingredients from the menu,"

"I would like to test the extent of your knowledge given that you've been working here for a while now,"

"Aspen...."

I don't respond to her, but instead cover the menu with my hands and look up at her expectantly. She lets out a sigh as she shakes her head at me.

"Um, cheese, onions, ham....."

"Ham? Ok. No. Next one,"

"We could take out the ham?"

"You would do that for me?" I say, placing my hands over my heart as if touched "by how much she cares".

"I would do that for any customer," Ivy says with an eye roll.

"What? So I'm just 'any customer' now?" I retort back.

"You're going to be a customer without a meal in a minute," Ivy quips.

"Ok. Fine. Does it have any egg in it? I'm really not too fond of egg,"

"Aspen, it's an omelette. So yes, it has egg,"

"Ok. You didn't have to get sassy with me. I may have to speak to your superiors about that," I say as I glance back down at the menu.

"Aspen...."

"Ok. Fine. What does the 'Plain Omelette' have on it?"

"Aspen, it's an omelette," Ivy says, clearly annoyed, though I'm pretty sure the annoyance began as soon as I opened the menu. She knows me well enough to realize that I wouldn't make this easy on her.

"And?"

"They're all going to have egg,"

"So. Can't you just take that out?"

"No, we cannot,"

"But you could take the ham out. That's a bit suspicious to me,"

Ivy doesn't even respond, but instead glares at me. I let out a sigh and I can see her slightly relax as I look back down at the menu.

"Ok. Geez. Let me see. Does the 'Spinach Omelette' have spinach in it?" I question as I point to the order on the menu.

"Yes, it does,"

"Ok. That's a dealbreaker then,"

"It's called a spinach omelette. What did you expect?"

"Well, I didn't expect the 'Farmer's Omelette' to have farmers in it. Was I supposed to expect that too?"

"Let's just get off of the omelette page,"

"Ok. Kind of pushy, but if you insist,"

I glance at the menu page for about a second, but it doesn't matter much as I knew what I wanted even before I picked the menu up.