Crumbs of a Plot: Day 3

Saturday 3^rd November

“Late, late, late.” Tasha muttered as she darted through the door of Crumbs, looking rather like she’d fallen out of bed, into her clothes and out the door. She knew there was no one who was expecting her at the cafe, but she had set herself a time to be at the cafe every day for the duration of National Novel Writing Month and she had failed to meet it for the first time. Considering that it was only the third of the month, it was not a good start.

The bakery was a lot more crowded than usual, but that was to be expected on the weekend. People who would not normally invade the place because they worked too far away during the week came by to pick out cakes or meet up with friends or just window shop. This meant that to add to her tardiness, she then had to wait twice as long in the queue before she was served. By the time the lady behind the counter finally got to her, Tasha was twitchy, wanting to get on with her story.

“Got somewhere to go?” The woman joked, “I’m sure you could go without one of our cakes for twenty-four hours.”

“Don’t scare that one off Jen.” Morgan chuckled from where she was stretching to get a cake down for someone off of the racking, “She’s one of our writers. We’ve got a few this year.”

“Oh, you’re one of the one who invade our tables every November?” Jen asked, amused, “I thought we had an extra girl this year.”

“My first year invading anywhere.” Tasha smiled at the pair, chilling out slightly now she was close to settling down and getting on with it. She glanced around at the tables and paused as she saw that the other girl wasn’t the only one who had a laptop in front of them. There were three or four other writers settled into the cafe, some sharing tables others on their own getting things written or staring into the abyss as they tried to work out how to word the next part of their epic novel.

“It’s the same every year,” Jen chuckled, “Nano hits and suddenly we get invaded by the crazies who require peace and quiet and can’t find it anywhere else. Not that we mind, it’s good for business and the Wrimos are a lot quieter than the students we get in here around Christmas and Easter.”

“That’s because we understand the value of somewhere to hide.” Tasha chuckled slightly, “Now if you’ll excuse me.” She paid for her food and drink and collapsed at her table, nodding to a couple of the other Wrimos as she passed.

It didn’t take long for her to get her laptop out and start it booting back up again, cussing as she routed around in hr backpack for her powerlead. She had noticed that, rather helpfully, there was a power point next to her table, though she had to be careful to avoid pulling out the power lead of the writer a table over who had already claimed one of the sockets on the double power point.

Once her laptop stopped complaining about a lack of charge and started actually doing what it was supposed to be doing, Tasha took a moment to savour her purchases, a nice warm hot chcoclate to chase away the cold November chill and a tasty, tasty cake that brightened her day slightly.

She was halfway through the next page when she realised that her hot chocolate, which had been emptied before she had got well into writing, had mysteriously appeared to have refilled itself. She glanced around, well aware that they did not do free refills so someone had to have bought it for her.

No one seemed to be looking her way and it was not until Tasha looked up at the counter and Morgan pointed at the girl who had been there the day before that Tasha realised that it was her that had bought the refill for her. Tasha blinked at the girl, surprised, then nodded gratefully at her, welcoming the added warmth. The table she liked was perfectly located but it was right next to the window and a little chilly. The hot chocolate was a welcome treat.

Making a mental note to get the girl something the next time she went up to the counter and to actually get her name when she handed whatever she bought over, Tasha quickly tapped out another one hundred words only to realise the girl had left before she had finished. She grumbled in frustration at the fact, guessing that unlike her the other girl actually had somewhere to be this afternoon, while she was busy trying to catch up from oversleeping. 

Tomorrow she was determined to at least get the other girl’s name and, if possible, a proper look at her.