[french ministry] so it goes [émilie]

It had been a while since Simon Ainsworth had last been to France. He believed the last time had been had been in the late seventies - he was in his early twenties and rather wild, he supposed. If he remembered correctly (and Simon's memory had never failed him), he and his friends had a 3 day bender before returning back to Inverness in Scotland. They'd staggered through streets and slept on strangers couches, gotten kicked out of bars and clubs, and shouted stupid words in shoddy French at the top of their lungs. Simon had kissed a few women, although he hadn't done much else due to the fact that he was completely drunk and generally fell asleep as soon as his body lay horizontal in any way.

This trip, however, had meant business. Simon had meant to expand his art store to Paris for a few years, although he'd never really gotten around to getting the correct permits. Inverness had been keeping the forty-two year old quite busy as of late. The disappearance of Peter Alva had taken a toll on the Council, although Simon and his good friend Gaspard had done their best to bridge the gap.

It'd taken a while for Simon to finally be convinced to leave. It'd taken Gaspard and three of Simon's students to convince him to get out of Inverness for the time being - to go out and do something fun. They'd guilt tripped him for constantly being at the council, solving problems and generally being a presence that wasn't really 100% needed. One had even made fun of him for needing to control everything. Simon didn't need to control everything, he'd explained. He just liked to have a say in whatever happened so that he'd know the outcome was positive.

And now the Zealot stood in the lobby of the French Ministry, his eyes scanning the directory to find the name of the Official he'd needed. Francois Dumont, Pascal Cartier, Antoinette de Vos... Nothing seemed to be ringing a bell. Simon had a letter somewhere - probably deep in the confines of his never-ending tote hung over his shoulder. He wondered for a second if it was even worth it - he could turn right around and go back to Inverness and just leave all of his French permits for another day. It was either that, or spending lots of time digging through a bag that seemingly had no bottom. He supposed it might be doable, although he'd certainly need a cup of coffee in order to erase the slight irritability that plagued him.

Simon made his way over to the little coffee stand that stood in the lobby, his eyes scanning the menu for something that sounded good. "Hello!" He greeted the barista in French, shoving his hands in his pockets and looking for loose change. "Ah, uh... see..." Simon figured he might ask the barista what she liked, although when he looked at her, his breath caught in his throat. What a beautiful woman, he'd thought, letting out a bit of a chuckle and looking down at his feet before regaining his train of thought. "Um... I usually just get black coffee but I feel as though that's horribly boring. Do you have any recommendations for a drink? Or... what's your favorite?"

@Christine

Émilie Côté sighed, her ‘happy to help’ smile falling quickly from her face as she watched her latest customer walk away. She was most decidedly not happy to help, not for this particular Ministry official she knew by now to dread on sight. He wanted a double cappuccino, extra dry, extra hot, and extra cinnamon on top. And no matter what, Émilie’s first attempt at the drink was always met with disgust, always not ‘extra’ enough in some way or another. Today, it was lacking in the extra cinnamon, which was thankfully the easiest problem to fix. Or it should have been.

The top to the little shaker of cinnamon had come off in a spectacular fashion, thunking into the cappuccino and bringing the entire contents of the bottle with it. But apparently, that was too much cinnamon. After five more minutes and one more valiant attempt, the drink was deemed satisfactory and Émilie was finally free to clean up her mess. She found herself almost wanting another customer so she had an excuse not to clean, but she had no such luck.

She took her time, not too fussed with any mess that didn’t somehow involve her own clothes. Still, it took almost all her attention to take care of it and she couldn’t help but jump at a very close ‘Hello’. The woman offered an automatic “Hello,” in return, not looking up until her helpful smile was back on her lips. It turned into a real smile, however, when she didn’t recognize him. She might have been terrible with espresso, but she was good with faces and remembering orders and his was brand new. And cute. And he probably still looked cute when he got mad so it wouldn’t matter too much if she got his order wrong.

“Oh! Well,” Émilie paused to think of what to suggest. She wanted to offer her honest opinion, that she didn’t actually drink coffee anymore, but that never seemed to go over well with the customers. Something untrustworthy about a barista who didn’t drink the product, or something like that. Her other usual option was suggesting the largest and most expensive thing on the menu, but he was already being much too nice for her to do that. “I think black coffee is a lovely choice.” She had just brewed a fresh pot about ten minutes ago after someone had insisted she do so. Pouring him out a cup of it would be so simple even she wouldn’t mess it up. Probably. “Unless you want a fresh pot, because then my favorite thing is tap water.” She smiled at her own joke, stifling a small giggle.

She offered a quick shrug. “But really, if you’re looking to branch out from black coffee, there’s at least four shops within a block of this building that will do you one better. Don’t tell anyone, but,” she leaned in across the counter and lowered her voice, “I am really, really bad at making just about everything.” She smiled as she straightened back up, plucking a porcelain mug from the rack above her head. “So, black coffee?” She’d make him espresso or whatever fancy drink he wanted to try, but he’d be much better off staying boring.