1 A Regular Cup of Joe

The cafe was a peaceful bright pink. It made him nauseous but he didn't tell his boss that. Ms. Mari was a pink pheasant. Yao believed she was addicted to the color. Technically she dyed her feathers pink and he started thinking, he never saw a pheasant with gray feathers. Maybe they didn't age.

Ms. Mari often bought her eight-year-old adopted daughter, Akikah. He questioned if a pheasant could even raise a chipmunk. But it wasn't any of his damn business, as his boss once told him. 'You come to work to serve tea! Not hand out a gossip column!' she shouted at him once.

And Yao believed, he would make a pretty good newspaper salesman. If he remembered correctly, The Dirty Business newspaper in Hohoku was open. He compared working at the newspaper to being a busser. 8 yen an hour compared to 13 an hour. The difference was obvious, however, the owner really put on the sign, he wanted to see a college degree.

Which didn't make any goddamn sense.

Hohoku wasn't a big village, a couple of eight hundred or less. He didn't know the exact number. Then again, he didn't really go anywhere in the village. The cafe, The Tangy Sushi Roll restaurant, and that was two stores away from the Knock, Knock cafe. Plus, The Dirty Business was the only local newspaper stand. Thinking about it now, it makes sense to try and earn 13 an hour. Then it struck him, Otsubo Kogoro was a greedy ass hole duck.

Yao was a busser. As the guest came into the cafe, he told them their seats. and as usual. Old Lady Kosaka, a rat, waltzed in. She already knew the menu by heart and the menu wasn't that difficult to remember. Ten items, just ten.

Ricotta and fish pizza:

Deep pan pizza topped with ricotta and fish

Roast pheasant: Roast pheasant flour meat with all the trimmings

Pheasant and squash gyoza: thin pastry cases stuffed with pheasant flour meat with fresh squash

Tamarind and mango soup

Fresh tamarind and mango combined into chunky soup

onion | tamarind | mango

Ricotta and sausage dumplings

Thin pastry cases stuffed with ricotta and spicy sausage

Nutmeg scones with chilli jam

Fluffy, all-butter scones served with chilli jam and fresh clotted cream

Sweetcorn and chorizo spaghetti

Spagetti topped with a blend of baby sweetcorn and Spanish chorizo

Pancetta and pesto pasta

Fresh egg pasta in a sauce made from smoked pancetta and basil pesto

Squash and tofu parcels

Thin filo pastry cases stuffed with fresh squash and smoked tofu

Hazelnut and mango vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan pancake

Crispy vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan vegan pancake filled with hazelnut and dried mango

flour | coconut butter | soya milk | hazelnut | mango

And then there were the drinks

Cherry Blossom Surge (coffee)

Water (tea)

Cranberry Knight (juice)

If Yao was the owner, he would pick better food. The pheasant was not real pheasant and didn't taste worth a damn, told Panda Genjiro. Although, Fox Yahiro and her husband Sun loved the pheasant and squash gyoza. He said they had weird fucking taste buds. Ms. Mari heard it and she yelled at him, 'If you wanna keep working here, your going to turn into a liar!' which meant she was aware her fucking food sucked.

Old Lady Kosaka took her regular seat by the window to the left. She sat in the booths alone. To her left outside was a peaceful pond. He wondered if it was the dropping of the bamboo outside the window. He found the pouring fountain annoying. Once he threw a few coins in it, of course, Ms. Mari beat him with newspaper collected from The Dirty Business and promptly yelled at him. 'You are a good for nothing cat! I don't know why I hired you!'

His co-workers were a pair of fox twins and a lazy sloth, Meng and Cao plus Jae. He didn't tell Ms. Mari that Jae snuck a few peanuts from the peanut bowl next to the door. Because he did it too. Sometimes they traded peanuts, 'I'll give you three peanuts for a bag of Rang!'

'I got the gold pack. It comes with Musty Cheerleader!'

'Musty? forget it, five peanuts.'

'I don't think you want her that bad...'

'Ok! Ok! 10 peanuts!'

'Make it double...' Yao folded his arms while holding the deck of cards in his hands. A terrible card game with only 25 cards available. It was just to waste time.

Jae swept the floor, the twins handed out the food with Fu. Fu and Jae, the only two people he could call friends. Surely not the twins.

Another customer came through, he directed them to their seat and another. He wondered why he bothered if all the customers were regulars. Probably to look as if he was doing something. The next customer was a monkey with two kids. "Good evening, Yao." she greeted in her foghorn voice. Yao flinched his ears against his head. "Good morning, Ms. Do-hee"

"I'm coming by to tell you I won't be around."

His ears perked, "Why is that?"

"I'm dying." she carried her purpose against her stomach. She opened it and went through to give Yao a piece of paper. "Can you give that to Hata for me?"

He looked at the paper but didn't read it. "Yeah, sure, what's up?"

"Things." she smiled and pushed one of the kids forward. "You remember my sons, Jin and Imada?"

Yao gaze lowered at the two twin monkeys, one brown and the other with a colorful nose and no tail. He didn't know which one was which. "Uh... yeah."

"Well, I'll be off." he raised a brow. "You don't want your regular?"

She stopped in the doorway, she turned around. "I don't need anything."

"She just needs somewhere to sit her ass down," said the monkey with a colorful nose. Ms. Do-Hee snorted, "Fuck you kid." she left the cafe, a few patrons in the cafe looked ahead. Old Lady Kosaka squinted and faced the window again, "She's doing it again."

"That old monkey isn't right," said a turtle in the middle of the room. "Yao, you should check on her."

Kosaka turned to the turtle. "It wouldn't matter. Remember when she adopted and lost the dog? I can't even remember the poor baby's name."

To Yao, it wasn't any of his business. He left the podium and headed to the backroom. The café attends watched him travel. Yo the left of the corridor, a door. He knocked, "Akikah, where's your mother?"

Akikah shrugged, she looked down the hall at Yao. Fu, a brown rabbit with a white stomach stood behind her. "She might be in the bathroom. She said she had constipation."

Yao knocked a little bit harder and read the note.

Dear Hata

I just don't want them anymore, plus I found out I have cancer.

Can you take care of the little shits?

Yao's eyes grew, "Damn," he considered going out and looking for her. Yao parted from the door and stopped beside the girls. Akikah jumped up, "What does the letter say?" she asked.

"I know she's doing it again!" yelled Kosaka near the window. "She always does this!"

"What is she doing?" Fu paced to Kosaka. Her eyes got big with surprise. "You don't know? Well, That monkey was Chae Do-Hee. You see, Chae can't have kids so every once in a while, she gets lonely. She goes to the orphanage next to the convenience store. What's her name—uh, she's a bear, Ms. Barthwal. And Prema told me she banned her from adopting."

"She adopts and feels like she doesn't want to do it anymore?" chimed Yao walking towards the table. "Children aren't trash. You don't just buy and return or throw away."

Kosaka's face soften, "I understand. I would never. My kids are grown adults, minus the fucking fact my goddamn good for nothing son doesn't call. But fuck him."

Fu blinked rapidly, "Ms. Kosaka, it's your son."

"Fuck 'em." The fox twins came over and dropped off her tea. "Here you go," they said unison. "One cup of tea—"

"I asked for water!"

"It is…" the twins lamented. They walked away, whispering under their breaths, "It says so on the menu you read a hundred times."

He kept his anger hidden, but Fu knew some of the ques. Yao made low purrs, he was irritated as the motor stared running.

He took it personal. He looked at the boys, "Who is who?"

"I'm—I'm Imada!" announced the small brown money. The oldest one, blinked, "I'm Jin…" Yao didn't think the child was friendly. Jin put his hands in pocket, "So, where's our new mom?"

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