Chapter 5
Iwalk along the main strip of town with a boba tea in my hand.
The fruity flavour coats my mouth. I wanted to get something to drink before I head to the bookstore.
The heat on my skin makes me feel like everything will be okay, almost like a comforting blanket - even if starting a new job makes me feel sick.
This is what I wanted though. Sometimes for good things to happen I need to be uncomfortable first. Everything will be fine, I hope.
As I walk further down the street, I see the ice cream shop Mum and I used to go to often. We’d eat ice cream and chat about anything and everything. I wish I could do that with her again. When I walk closer to the shop, I notice there’s wooden boards on the windows and a for sale sign.
“When did you shut?” I say to myself as I pull out my phone. I type in the name of the shop and look up when it closed. What I read horrifies me.
Tragedy Strikes Perrancombe After Beloved Ice Cream Shop Forced To Close After Owner’s Death
The Cornish Whip Ice cream shop that has served Perrancombe’s finest Ice cream for over Forty years, has unfortunately been forced to close.
An altercation between the notorious Bronze Family and the owner broke out this morning, which took a deadly turn, with the owner succumbing to his injuries in a local hospital.
The news article was published just a few months ago.
Reading it makes my blood boil to the point I want to throw my phone across the street.
How do they keep getting away with this?
How have the police not tracked them down yet?
The more I hear about the Bronze Family the more I want to throw them in jail myself.
I walk into the bookstore with a plastered-on smile. I’ve spent all morning getting ready, making sure I look nice for my first day. I’ve almost forgotten about my emotional hurricane of a morning. Almost.
“Good morning, you ready for this?” Teddy asks. He sips on a coffee while cradling a pile of books with one arm.
“Yeah, I think so. I’m feeling pretty good about this,” I tell him, my heartbeat speeding up. I tense up, but I remind myself that this is my first day and I’m just learning. I’m going to make mistakes and that will be okay. I just have to chill out.
“Oh good, hey listen I want you to meet someone,” he says, looking around the vicinity. “Where is he?” He mutters under his breath. He places the pile of books onto a random table before a boy appears in front of us.
“Hey, you must be the new guy Teddy Bear was telling me about,” the boy tells me, reaching for a handshake. I shake the boy’s hand before I speak.
“Yep, that’s me,” I say with a smile. I hope my palms weren’t too sweaty for him.
“Noah, this is Elijah. Elijah, this is Noah,” Teddy says, pointing between us.
“Or Eli if you prefer,” Elijah says, a smile appearing on his face. He has ‘surfer boy’ blonde hair and way too many rings on his fingers.
“Is that a bring me the horizon tank top?” I ask Elijah, pointing at it. He looks down at it and smiles widely.
“Yeah man, I love Bring Me,” he says, pulling it out straight so I can see the design.
“It’s the soundtrack to us cleaning at the end of the shift so you can look forward to that,” Teddy says while sipping on his coffee.
“I actually just learned how to play Drown on the guitar, I’ll show you at some point,” Elijah says, and my eyes go wide.
“You play guitar?”
“Yeah man, my mum made me do lessons when I was really young. I used to complain about having to practice, but now I’m kinda glad I learned,” he says, smiling brightly. I wish I played an instrument. I begged my Mum to get me guitar lessons when I was younger, but we could never afford it.
“If you like Bring me the horizon, you should listen to a band called Static Heart. Their new single came out last week and I can’t stop listening to it,” he beams.
“Is that your boyfriend?” I ask Teddy as Elijah heads off to do his own tasks. It’s incredibly nosy but I’m trying to fill the silence. Teddy scrunches up his face at me.
“Oh no. Definitely not,” he laughs as he starts showing me around the shop. “He’s been my best friend for years now, may as well be my brother at this point.”
“Oh, I have a best friend like that,” I say, thinking about Kai.
He said he was off to Newquay to pick up some art supplies today.
He’s going to bring back some new records for us to listen to as well.
I offered him money for them but he said it was his welcome home present.
He’ll be heading out round about now, but he also mentioned stopping by the surf shop to see Harry first. I’ll see him later on back at the house to tell him all about my first day.
There’s seating areas and a lot of bookshelves housing every genre of LGBT literature you could think of.
There’s also some non-fiction books and comic books in the back.
There’s a massive selection, I wish this was here when I was younger.
Fifteen year old me would have lived here day and night if he could.
“So we sort everything by Author, so all your Adam Silvera’s are in one place, T.J Klune books are all together. You know what I mean?” Teddy asks, placing a few books into their respective places on the shelves.
“Okay, but what about age range? Are they separated?” I ask, not knowing if it’s a stupid question but I want to understand as much as I can so I can get it right.
“You’re a question asker. That’s always a good thing,” he says, smiling at me.
“Yeah so we have YA and Adult shelves, then there’s some kid stuff in the back of the store,” he says, pointing to the respective areas.
We walk up to the counter where there’s the till as well as a beautiful aluminium coffee maker and fridge with a glass window.
There’s queer flags and rainbow magnets attached to the side of the fridge.
“I’m gonna teach you how to use the till, but do you want a coffee first?” He asks, holding an empty cup in his hand.
“Yes please,” I say politely.
“I’d like one too,” Elijah pipes up from nowhere.
“I wasn’t offering you one, go away,” Teddy retorts, but places another cup down anyway.
“Thanks, Teddy Bear,” Elijah says, the two of them laughing. The coffee starts pouring out in a massive jug, the smell seeps straight into my nose. Teddy hands me mine, while Elijah grabs his and heads off again. I take a sip of it, almost burning my tongue off. The taste is… okay.
“It’s really shit, right?” Teddy laughs, he fixes his hair before going behind the counter.
“It’s okay, don’t worry. I’m still going to drink it.”
“And that’s why the machine is still here, we’re all caffeine addicts here,” he laughs while placing his cup down. He starts tapping away on the till. It’s one of those touchscreen ones that look a little too complicated for me.
“C’mon, sit down, I’ll show you how to use the till now,” Teddy says, patting his hand down on a stool. I walk round the counter and sit down behind him.
“Okay, so we’re just going to pretend we’re buying one of these books,” he says as he picks up the barcode scanner and scans one of the books sitting on the counter.
“Move up a little bit so you can see,” he says, gesturing with his hand. I do as he asks and can see the book appearing on screen and how much the total is.
“Okay so if someone is paying with cash, what button do you think you press?” He says, looking down at me.
“Oh, so you’re making it a quiz?” I laugh and he simply nods with a grin. I think for a moment before pointing to a button on the screen that has coins on it.
“I can see why you would think that, but that’s actually to calculate the change you need to give them,” he says, before gently lifting up my hand and placing it on a button that says cash on it. The warmth against my skin gives me butterflies. I can feel myself go red as I retract me hand.
“Oh, sorry, I didn’t—”
“Oh no don’t worry about it, I’m just…” I trail off, my mind going blank. I don’t know why I retracted my hand when he was just trying to help.
“It’s fine,” I laugh nervously. I feel my palms go sweaty as I sit them on my lap.
If I like him as much as I say I do, why did I just back off like that?
Not that I think his intentions were romantic at all, he was just helping me with the till, right?
Why would I do something like that? My head hurts thinking about it.
As I try to focus my attention back on the till, a scream bellows through the streets, causing everyone in the bookshop to dart their gaze to outside. Teddy and I look at each other for a short moment before rushing out the door to see the cause of the scream.
Demi, Harry and Kai are outside the surf shop. Demi’s face is wet from tears. Kai’s sitting on the floor with his legs in a basket and his face in his hands. We run towards them.
The windows of the surf shop are smashed. Racks are on the ground. The showcases with valuable items have been smashed, their contents missing. Red paint has been sprayed all over the shop. On one wall in particular, there’s the Bronze family logo with the words ‘Told You We’d Be Back’.
“This is all your fault Kai,” his mother mutters. We all heard it though. Kai doesn’t remove his face from his hands.
“It’s no one’s fault,” Harry corrects. A painful sigh falls out his throat as he wipes his brow. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do now.”
“That’s it. We’re finished,” Demi says, throwing her hands up in the air.
“Thirty goddamn years… gone.” She laughs quietly to herself.
“The funny thing is, I knew this was coming. I knew for a fact that one day they’d come back.
Their disappearance was too good to be true.
There’s no coming back from this.” She starts walking away. No one tries to stop her.
Harry walks into the shop. He wanders around and takes it all in while quietly muttering to himself.
I look down at my best friend. I’ve never seen him look so small. He sighs before getting up.
“Are you okay, Kai?” I ask, putting a hand on his shoulder to get him to face me. Tears have welled up in his eyes.
“Fucking fantastic man,” he says sarcastically. His fake smile drops as he takes my hand off his shoulder. “I’ll get you back at the house.”
I turn to Teddy, who looks just as bewildered as I am.
“I fucking hate them,” he says before turning to me. “Just head home for the day Noah. I’ll close up the shop.”
“Are you sure? I can—”
“I’m sure, Noah. Just go home.”
“Okay, well if you’re sure,” I reply. I start heading towards the bookshop to collect my things, my heart breaking.
I’m not sure what Kai’s family are supposed to do now.
Demi worked so hard in her twenties to make this shop what it is today.
It’s not fair that one day her dreams can be shattered like that.
Although, there’s one thing I can’t wrap my head around. Why did Demi blame it on Kai?