9

The tea shop had a good few more customers than usual and River didn't know whether to celebrate or to worry. It was, after all, only a little shop. Every table was full, with people chatting, or working, or only sitting, staring into space. It flummoxed River as to the reason behind the influx of customers and she found herself rushed off her feet.

She considered calling Erisa, but she remembered the law student mentioning a day out with her boyfriend and she had no intention of spoiling their happiness, even if it meant some customers becoming irritated at slower than normal service. Not for the first time, she wondered whether she should have invested in one of the large boilers that most other tea and coffee shops used, but she prided herself in making her tea the proper way. It was a feature for her little shop.

In the days since her almost disastrous date/not-date with Celeste, she had seen a steady rising increase in customers, without any indication of why the shop had become so popular. Sitting in a little side street, off the main street of the town, she had relied upon passing footfall, finding the right amount of custom to keep the place ticking over. She never had much call for advertising.

In a short lull in trade, she took a moment to perform an internet search for tables and chairs she could add outside, though the thin pavement would only allow one, perhaps two, sets outside before it became a hazard. She also made a quick look at her suppliers' websites, deciding that she may have to increase her order for disposable cups for those customers happy to drink on the go.

"I would like a mug of that new Truro tea, please." The voice of the next customer caused River to slam the lid of her netbook closed, almost sending it flying from the counter.

She managed to catch it, almost dropped it again and ended up cradling it to her chest with both hands. She still hadn't acknowledged the customer and, as she placed the netbook back on the counter, pushing it beneath the wide shelf to ensure it didn't try to throw itself to the floor again, she glanced up with a weary, cheery smile.

"Celeste!" Nervous hands knocked into used cups and mugs waiting for her to wash them, sending them rolling and rocking along the counter. She dived forward, surrounding them all with her arms before they, too, made attempts to launch themselves at the floor.

"You're busy. Good." As River tried to bring order to the chaos on the counter, Celeste looked around at the full tables. "I'm glad it worked."

"Well, I always knew 'Leaves' would gain attention, one day." She began moving the empty cups, saucers and mugs to the washing up area. "I haven't seen you in a few days. I expect you found a new job?"

Wiping her hands upon her apron, River tried to blow a stray curl of hair from in front of her eyes. When that didn't work, she blew again, before finally pushing the curl aside, tucking it under a less wayward part of her hair. She brushed her hands on her apron again, shifting from foot to foot, smiling like an idiot at Celeste.

"No. No job, yet. I'm busy doing other things, right now." Raising her eyebrows, Celeste pointed towards the menu, where the new 'Truro' tea had a four out five star rating from River. "The tea?"

River made a nervous laugh, holding up a finger before spinning around towards the line of overworked kettles. She refilled several, placing them all on the gas hobs. As they began their journey to boiling, she prepared a tea pot for the 'Truro' tea, tipping in a heaped spoon of leaves. With her back to Celeste, River could pretend she hadn't almost made a fool of herself. Again.

Still waiting for the water to boil, she turned back around to see Celeste leaning an elbow on the counter as she watched the other customers. In that moment, River saw a different side to the woman, a confident, intense side that almost looked as though she were assessing the people in the shop.

"So, you look well. Are you well? No side-effects from our trip to deepest, darkest Cornwall? No dodgy diseases? I'm sorry. That's unnecessarily cruel. They're all lovely down there." Pressing her hands flat against the counter, all the better to stop them doing something unexpected, River tried to make herself smile in a more natural, not-at-all-nervous fashion. "I've been busy. So busy. Like someone's been grabbing people from the main street and throwing them into the shop. 'Oi! Get yer tea ere!'."

"I expect it's all the reviews I've been making. Online reviews can be a good way of outreaching to new demographics." Celeste pointed behind River, where all the kettles hard started to whistle as they came to a boil. "I've made a concerted effort to reach all the main online review sites, using several profiles, and a few more esoteric ones, too. I know, it's not really ethical, but it happens all the time. The tea?"

River gaped at Celeste for a little longer before the whistling from the kettles reached an annoying screech. Spinning around, she almost grabbed the handle of the first kettle without an insulating cloth. Glad she didn't burn herself, she used a cloth, moving all the kettles from the gas hobs and using one for Celeste's tea pot.

She tried to process what Celeste had said. That she had caused this uptick in customers by merely placing reviews of 'Leaves' on various sites. Her first reaction was that she had never considered review sites in the first place. The second thought concerned the legality of using fake profiles to add even more reviews. As soon as Erisa came for her next shift, River would have to consult her law student friend.

Stirring the tea leaves in the pot, River frowned. She had never asked Celeste for this help, hadn't even considered asking her for help, but she had helped, anyway. It felt a little strange that Celeste would do such a thing and River wondered if Celeste had become bored while searching for her next job. She had heard that high-level executives got like that when they had no work to do. They got antsy.

When the spoon in her hand became uncomfortably hot, she realised she had stirred the pot for too long. Dragging a mug from the dwindling clean pile, she poured the tea into it, over a strainer, before carrying it back to the counter. Placing milk, sugar and a clean spoon beside the mug, she moved her eyes back and forth, staring at the countertop, hesitating to say anything else. She had to say something.

"Then, if the extra customers are from people seeing your reviews, it's not because people like my tea, is it?" She looked at the customers in the shop. None of them were her regulars. "I don't know how to feel about that. I mean, I like having more custom, who wouldn't? But, I don't know. It feels ... dishonest?"

"It's not dishonest." Celeste looked about to continue, but stopped, thought for a second and then leaned in towards River. "Well, maybe a little bit, but it's my dishonesty, not yours. I just thought that you deserved a little boost. This lovely shop deserves its due recognition. Don't you think?"

River couldn't answer that. She, of course, thought 'Leaves' was the best little tea shop in town. If she allowed herself a little ego trip, she'd consider it the best in the county. Given enough time, enough alcohol and an enormous boost to her fragile ego and she'd say it was the best tea shop in the entire country. But only in whispers, between friends.

Right now, stone cold sober, she had trouble praising herself or her little tea shop. It felt more than a little like boasting to even consider 'Leaves' the best tea shop on the side-street. Even though it was the only tea shop on this side-street. But, in the corners of her mind, she did think it deserved recognition. She deserved it. A little.

As Celeste sipped her mug of tea, and River could tell she had brewed it for too long by the little smack of Celeste's lips, another pair of customers entered the shop, looking around with appraising eyes. They stood before the menu board and perused the list of teas together. River put one of the kettles back on the boil, ready for their order. All the time, Celeste still had that look on her face, assessing everything.

Without even groaning at the customers' choice of two varieties of fruit-flavoured teas, River prepared their mugs, took their money and then poured the boiling hot water into the mugs. The fruity smells rose from each mug as the tiny tea bags began to infuse. Even with those inferior tea choices, River still loved to see the tea escape from the confines of the bags, colouring the water with lazy swirls, mixing and spreading. The customers appeared more than happy as they carried their mugs to a now-empty table.

River still hadn't answered Celeste, even as she took the opportunity to slip around the counter, carrying a plastic washing-up bowl and filling it with cups, mugs, saucers and spoons, wiping the tables as she moved along, thanking people for their custom. The bowl full, she put it in the washing up area and turned back to Celeste, ready to answer.

But Celeste had gone, the mug of 'Truro' tea only half drunk.