The screeching of brooms resonated across the street even before dawn broke out in the city of Kyanot. The layers of snow, now brushed away into a heap, was being cleared off around Celeste. The faint glow of the morning sun washed over the pavement, making the fine snow shine like crystals.
A young man in a black padded jacket sneezed as a waft of cool breeze brushed past him. He held the broom firmly and shook his head before scrubbing the stubborn snow from the shop’s entrance.
“Good job, Kid”, a man in his early fifties called after him. Adjusting his yellow SpongeBob beanie Mr. Kim walked down the aisle leading to the vitrine and turned to the left to refill the cover on the trashcan.
The said kid who was now at the entrance of the café, immediately scrunched his nose and asked, “Mr. Kim what is-?” Trailing off, he looked at the now frozen Mr. Kim with a frown, “Please tell me, it’s not what I think it is?”
Mr. Kim, looked over from the farthest left corner of the café, helplessly waving a large garbage bag at him, pleading for help, which he ignored with practised innocence.
“Ah here it is!” exclaimed Mrs. Kim, holding up the freshly burnt batch of cookies from the oven. She came running from the pantry and dunked the black remnants in the bag that Mr. Kim was holding, making his gradually growing embarrassed smile turn into a grimace when the whiff of burnt flour intensified.
“C’mon, hurry up. Into the garbage tin!” she pointed her cookie tray at the bag and urged Mr. Kim to follow after her. “And hey Jason”, she called out, grabbing some tissues from the shelf nearby, “Clean the oven before you make your macarons.”
She took a moment to stare at the boy to say, “Blue suits you.” before she scurried off to the pantry again. Her blonde hair sticking out in all the directions from what was once a sleek bun, made her look like the mad scientist that she was.
“Blue?” Jason raised an eyebrow in amusement and looked at his sweater.
Ah. Well. Maybe
His teal-coloured turtle neck, now in full display, complimented the soft blush on his toned cheeks as the young man sighed. He walked in the direction opposite to the pantry to brew his daily coffee.
Pouring the steaming hot water through the filter paper, he allowed himself a tiny smile. The aroma of the coffee had now taken over the burnt smell.
Holding the coffee mug with the left hand, Jason looked out at the gradually waking street. He noticed the slight frost in the window glass and his reflection on it before running his other hand through his mahogany brown hair as he stood resting sideways against the wooden window sill.
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A hand swept over the black ornate window grill to grab the snow. With a plop, the snow was dropped into a steaming cup of coffee. “Now that’s at the perfect temperature!”
“NO master!!” an old lady squealed as she saw the boy in the kitchen in horror.
His tousled, raven hair shone with a blue tinge as the light from the window descended on him. He beamed at the woman, his onyx eyes glinting with mischief. “It was too hot earlier!” he said taking a sip.
“NO!” the old lady all but screamed as she snatched the cup away from him, “I’ll make your cold coffee master. Just don’t let your father know.”
His crumpled white pyjamas, a fit too loose on him, revealed his pale collarbones as he shrugged. Hearing the clock strike 7, he ran from the kitchen, racing his way into the room on the first floor to find some warm clothes. He pulled on a jacket and wore warm gloves before grabbing a small backpack and climbing the ladder in his room. Upon reaching the snow-laden roof, he took brisk steps to the left of the roof’s entrance towards the stone-cladded stairs that led to a small room, just enough to fit two people.
Sheltered by a roof of its own, the room had all of its four sides made of glass. He went in, pushing the glass doors aside. The wooden floor was covered in a thick blanket. He put down his bag on the floor and laid his head on a worn-out cushion. He took out a pen and a notepad from his pocket to find his writing muse for the day.
“Now what to write,” he thought, glancing around him. “Hmm... about coffees? Maybe snow? Sunrise... a tree... cats-”
“Cat?! NO! It’s a kitten on the tree!?” he blurted out looking closely at the blob of orange, dangerously high off the ground, softly mewing in the midst of dried branches.
His eyes widened at the sight. He opened the glass door, adjusted his gloves and leaned over to check on the kitten. Then, he slid to the end of the roof and held it by its corner to throw his body down to land his feet on one of the thick branches of the tree.
“WHOA”, he squeaked, as the snow made him skid.
He four-legged his way to the ball of fur curiously judging him.
“Hello”, he said, holding the kitten in his hands with a large smile on his face, “Aren’t you pretty?”
The Doe-eyed kitten mewed again. She had uncannily large eyes for a kitten, he noted.
As he was finding his way down to the ground, he heard someone shout, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?”
His foot gave away on one of the dried branches of the tree and he fell with a THUD.
“IAN”, the same high pitched voice screamed.
The kitten mewled loudly and ran away, while he brushed off the leaves and dirt from his clothes.
“Mum! She ran away”, Ian whined as he looked in the direction that the kitten went.
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After spending thirty minutes hearing his mother fuss over and berate him, the way to his room seemed dull.
Ahh, fun is over. Now we meet Mr. Snarly.
Crossing the pristine white marble floor, he reached the bottom of a large staircase and hopped two steps at a time to reach his room. The wooden double doors swung open as he pushed them to enter. Picking out his clothes, he went to shower. He dressed up in a buttoned-down shirt and well-fitted trousers.
As he made his way to the basement, his steps faltered at the voice of his Uncle speaking. He looked up to see his Uncle on a television show. Blank confusion overtook him as he inched his way to the sofa, his smile completely wiped away.
The camera panned to show copies of a certain green book being displayed behind the place where his Uncle sat and his heart dropped.
“What is this about?” he asked, masking his anger as he saw his Uncle being congratulated.
“Oh, you’ll see”, his mother answered in a gleeful tone when she heard him. Turning around, she asked him to join her.
His nose flared with each breath he took -deep and controlled. His mother grabbed the remote from the side table and increased the volume when his Uncle was about to speak.
“Thank you Mr. Dominique, I have been working on this book for the last 5 years. When I was editing this one, I discovered that it had perfectly captured my experiences in real life too,” He laughed, “So if you want to know about my personal life, you might uncover it if you read this book.”
Loud laughter and applause was heard from the audience and he could see a number of people with mikes, crowding around his Uncle.
The sudden chill he felt overshadowed his mother’s proud gushing.
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His eyes burned red in frustration, that he had no outlet to even vent the anger that was bubbling inside him. It was a pity. He was like an elephant on a leash playing dumb in the pretentious whirlwind of a circus that his family was. Playing to their whims and wishes as if his thoughts and sufferings were meant for the wind to scatter- quiet and unknown to the world around.
He clenched his fist until his nails left a distinct bruise on his palm. Ian murmured in irritation that he was getting late for his tuition and he stormed away.
————————————————————
Slipping his padded jacket back on, Jason took his cycle out of the parking lot and pedalled his way to his university dorm. The ten-minute ride from Celeste café to the university that was usually lined with lush trees in the summer had dried up and now had branches sticking out unceremoniously.
Traces of snow still lingered across the pavement but cars and buses were bustling around him. Daring past the cold winds, Jason reached the university. He trudged his way to his bunker bed in his dorm and laid down, closing his eyes for some time.
Dion University’s Culinary school was conducting their monthly social volunteering where the students were assigned to make delicious eats for the non-profit organizations in and around the city. This month, it was for orphaned and abandoned children of the city.
Ten minutes later, he picked up his bag to make his way to the baking class. Jason wrapped the scarf tighter around his neck, as he walked through the football stadium towards the culinary block. He ran into a red-haired boy whom he recognized as one of his schoolmates.
“You’re late”, Brik said, looking at his wrist and walking past Jason before he could answer.
Jason groaned after him, mumbling when he noticed that Brik wasn’t even wearing a watch. Sighing, he fastened his pace to his class only to find upon entering, that he was in fact 10 minutes early.
The one day I didn’t wear a watch... I just had to run into Brik, didn’t I?
They were a class of 20 students and had therefore decided to break into groups of four. Two groups had decided to travel to an orphanage the east of the city, while the other two had planned for the much closer orphanage in the western part of the city.
Calculating that they had a little over an hour to bake and taking into account that it was a cold, lazy weekend they were confident that they would be able to pull it off. After all, nobody would want to come in this early to a non-profit event. Especially on bad roads.
Or so he thought.
————————————————————
Jason and his team had decided to make macarons. It was a small makeshift kitchen set up with limited equipment and ingredients. About fifteen minutes into the prep, he saw that the large mixing bowl for his lemon macarons had a stain of blue in it. The swirling amalgamation of blue and yellow made his hazel eyes squint.
“Seriously?”
He turned to his team-mates in disbelief holding up an ink pen in his hand. The yellow-blue mixture dripped from the pen as he questioned them with waning patience, “Whose is this?”
“Oh?” A boy in the far corner looked over in confusion, “That’s mine!”
Jason’s eyebrows twitched in irritation as he turned to his other teammates. He knew that none of them were likely to intentionally drop a pen into the macaronage. Sadly, he had no way of knowing if someone had tried to mess with him right then. Leaving him with the only option to throw away the spoilt batter and start anew.
“Are you crazy?” Jason heard Fred shout at the confused boy in the corner, “You ruined the macaronage!”
He saw Kevin cowering in the corner taken aback by the sudden turn of events.
No issues, Jason thought to himself, clenching his jaw as he patted off the droplets from the now clean bowl. If I start now, I can easily manage to whip up the macaronage again.
However, the commotion in his periphery grew when two more of his classmates intervened.
Ignorance is certainly not bliss right now, he realised as he set the kitchen aid mixer on the table and wiped his hands. Just as he was about to get the professor to sort the issue, he heard a loud crash, freezing him on the spot.
“You’ve got to be kidding..” Jason shut his eyes, instinctively afraid to turn back.
“He did it!” He heard Fred shout from the distance. Jason finally willed himself to look at the disaster in their stall. It was a sight that sored his eyes.
A pot of chocolate filling had landed upside down on Xin’s head, while he sat in shock. Chocolate trickled down his face all the way to the floor. Xin grabbed the pot from his head, fuming in anger as he threw it on Kevin. While the pot did not land on him, it sure did spill the leftover contents of the bowl all around the kitchen.
Suppressing his laughter, Fred tried to help Xin stand up. Xin, embarrassed, pushed Fred away leading to him slipping on the spilt chocolate. He fell against the kitchen table, knocking an entire tray of macarons to the ground.
The silence that followed was resounding.
The accident had finally pulled them all back to their senses.
The three of them looked at Jason standing in the distance with guilt-ridden eyes, making him groan.
His professor came running and saw the mess. He gave them an earful.
They deserved it.
There were children eagerly waiting for the macarons after all.
Their window displayed a colourful range of macarons, all freshly baked, and finessed with flavour and aroma. The big colourful board that stood in the side, proudly announcing their speciality range of chocolate macarons, gave Jason an unwelcomed headache.
What can I do? His jaw tightened as he let out a long breath through his nose.
Upon sensing his phone vibrate, he picked it up to hear Mr. Kim ask him to cover the night shift the next day.
Bingo!
————————————————————
A full-blown smile lit up Jason’s face as he saw the children enjoying the macarons. The event was a success. Delayed, but still a success nonetheless.
Their stall, which was a mess earlier, was made squeaky clean upon their professor’s order.
“ACE!” Xin screeched at the top of his lungs. He even looked close to tears as he jumped on top of him. The patches of dried up chocolate still stubbornly sticking to Xin’s clothes, stained Jason’s turtleneck sweater.
One of the kids asked him, “Ace? Is that your name?”
“Of course! Such an apt name for our saviour today!”
“Jason!” The professor called him up from the front. Secretly grateful, he peeled himself away from Xin and dodged the equally tearful Fred to run up to the professor.
“I didn’t know you worked part-time at Celeste.” The professor patted his shoulder even though the look of criticism in his eyes was apparent.
“Yes, Sir”, said Jason, scratching his neck.
“Do thank Mr Kim for his help on my behalf, but also be careful not to depend on them too much.”
Despite finding the advice a bit strange, Jason nodded. His professor then walked off to load the remaining boxes into the truck.
————————————————————
Ace carried a bunch of dried twigs clumsily as he strode through the deserted walkway littered with wild plants. The Greenhouse that came into his view gave him the much-needed relief from the thoughts plaguing his mind all day.
There was already too much to do and his mom was visiting him the next day. He could only imagine the string of disasters that the day would unravel, considering all the things that were happening back in his home.
He picked up another empty can and threw it in one of the bags before pausing at the door. Peeking in, he saw a black-haired boy crouching down in front of a bleak-looking plant.
He is early today, Ace thought. And he is with that plant again...
“Why don’t you ever listen?” Ace said opening the door, “This plant is unsalvageable.”
“Why don’t you understand” Another voice chimed from behind. Ace turned to see a brunette girl carrying a pot certainly bigger than herself, rolling her eyes before continuing, “He would never listen to you. In fact, he would do exactly the opposite of what you say.”
“She is right you know? Why don’t you try the opposite? Try telling him he can definitely save the plant.”
“You think I haven't?” Ace barked at the head that had popped out from behind a giant monstera plant.
Leo adjusted his glasses in disappointment before disappearing back behind the bushes leaving Ace to maul Ian into taking the trash out.
Fifteen minutes into their break, Ian’s laughter rang through the greenhouse. He put his left leg over his right knee as he sat on a wooden bench inside a massive greenhouse. “Oh, how I wish I was in your school!”
Ace stretched his arms in the air as he moved to sit beside Ian and rolled his eyes, “Yeah, you would say that. Why wouldn’t you? Go on, say more.”
“Oh come on! That was hilarious!” Leo wiped the tears off his eyes trying to compose himself.
“Hilarious, until I have to collect money from those three to pay Mr Kim for the macarons.” Ace whined, “Even though I baked them, decorated them and sold them myself.”
“You sure you can manage paying them off?” Mina asked with concern, sipping her special brew of herbal tea, “Isn’t your mom coming into town tomorrow? It would be bad if Mr Kim said something about you owing him.”
“Damn. That will be tough,” Leo commented. Seeing Ace heave a huge sigh, he proceeds to ask, “Will you be able to survive tomorrow?”
“If you don’t show up at the nursery tomorrow, can I take that as a cue to plan your funeral? I want to promote “Low-key Mind-set” by Silver strings.”
“Yeah... what more suitable occasion than my funeral to promote the stupid song,” Ace made an action to throw the bag of plant clippings at Ian’s face.
With Ian finally quiet the group settled into a peaceful silence. The Winslow Botanical Reserve was a beautiful escape for Ace, Ian and their friends to come over, and share their interest in gardening by helping in planting and pruning while also sharing their weekly adventures.
This was the only place in Kyanot that remained at least twenty percent evergreen throughout the year. So the green canopy provided a rare shelter to the group who were otherwise just adrift wanderers.
When Leo and Mina left for the storehouse in search of plant manure, Ace asked, “So how was Mr. Snarly today? Got some dressing down?”
“You bet I did.” Ian winked playfully. Yet, there was this palpable strain in his expression. He averted his gaze and picked up the day’s plant clippings to throw them in the trash.
As Ian made to stand up from the bench, he heard ruffling of leaves from his left. Turning around Ian let out a loud gasp in surprise making Ace jump.
Cruelly leaving Ace behind to recover from the mini heart attack, Ian slowly tiptoed behind one of the shrubs and shrieked, “No way! It can’t be Miss Furball...”
Ace clutched his chest in disbelief and shot Ian a fiercely judgemental stare. Why am I always around weirdo like him?
Ace peered to see Ian picking up a fluffy orange flower from the ground.
Shaking his head with a crooked smile, Ian said, “It’s obviously not her.”
He threw the flower for Ace to catch and smiled sheepishly as Ace failed at it. Just as he was about to tease Ace, he received a call.
Taking his phone out from his pocket, Ian’s footsteps came to a halt and his posture stiffened. When he continued to stare blankly at his phone, Ace inquired sceptically, “Who’s it from?”
Ian puts on a fake smile and answers, “It’s my Uncle.”