When Life Gives You Oranges by Arizona Tape

Author:Arizona Tape [Tape, Arizona]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Vampari Press

Chapter Six

The next morning, Erin was on me like a fly on honey. Blessed with having slept for more than five hours, she was buzzing with energy as she set up the stall in preparation of the day.

“And? And? How was it? Did you have fun? Did you meet someone?” she asked, bombarding me with her questions so fast, I didn’t even have time to answer all of them.

“I didn’t meet anyone,” I mumbled, trying to keep the pounding in my skull at bay. With a heavy head, I stacked oranges in a tower near the front of the booth, hoping the vibrant colour would attract a lot of people. There weren’t many clouds in the sky and the promise of sun and good weather would drive my business straight toward profit.

At least that was something to look forward to. Spending the rest of the day with a sight hangover was not. I knew I shouldn't have had that last glass of wine, I was no longer a teenager, my body and liver were weak. I couldn’t drink like I used to anymore, not even close.

A shadow fell over me and I looked up to find someone queuing.

“Sorry, we’re not open yet,” I announced before my fuzzy brain made sense of reality. “Oh. Julie?”

The chipper redhead popped a cardboard cup of tea in front of me and shot me one of her charming smiles. “Morning. Just reporting for humiliation reminder duty but I brought you tea.”

I reached for the steaming beverage, touched that she remembered not to get me the standard coffee everyone had in the morning. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. That’s my job done.” She gestured to the colourful stall on the other side of the market where a thin guy was stacking kiwis and pineapples. Julie clicked her tongue and grinned. “Well, it’s time for me to go back to mine. See you around?”

Afraid Erin would hear me, I nodded and kept my voice down. “See you around.”

Julie was barely out of earshot or Erin was already hanging on my arm.

“I thought you said you didn’t meet anyone!”

I shrugged my best friend off. “I didn’t. We’d already met before the event, technically.”

“Oh, pish posh and details. You two hit it off then?”

I looked in the direction of Julie’s juice stall and hummed. “Sort of. It doesn’t matter, she’s going to be poaching our customers all day. Well, not on purpose but you know what I mean. We’re fishing in the same pond here.”

“Aren’t we all,” Erin snorted.

“Not the lesbian pond, the fruit juice pond!”

My best friend swung her arm over my shoulder and gestured up to the sky. “Come on, it’s going to be beautifully blue today. There will be plenty of demand for fresh juice and smoothies today.”

“You better be right,” I said.

With Erin’s help, I finished setting up the stall just in time for the festival to open for the second day. As expected from the sunny weather, the first visitors didn’t keep us waiting long.

“Two orders of orange juice coming right up!” I shouted as I started the press and cut the oranges in pieces.

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