💎💎💎
IT was a clear afternoon three days after her outing with Elliot. Olivia was busy in her workroom at Gordon’s Magic Appliances when a knock came on the door.
She looked and saw Rose’s light-brown hair swaying, a smile on her lips. “Olivia, you have a delivery.”
Rose handed over a heavy package, large enough that Olivia had to use both arms to take it. It was neatly wrapped in sturdy white paper with “Elliot Dicks” noted as the sender.
Is this the coffee set he was talking about the other day?
Rose helped her carefully unwrap the package and open the box. Inside was an appliance she’d never seen before, a wooden box the size of two dictionaries stacked together, and an envelope.
Rose peered into the box with curiosity. “What is it?”
“I think it’s a coffee brewing appliance. It’s nearly time for a tea break. Do you want to try some coffee with me?”
“Can I?”
“Of course. This sort of thing is more fun with two people anyway.”
“Oh, thank you. I’ll go get some treats then.”
Rose came back with a cute packet of cookies, and the two read the user manual in the envelope before trying to brew some coffee.
Rose boiled some water in a kettle and prepared the cups. As she did, Olivia measured the coffee beans and put them in a small box with a handle. She turned the handle, emitting a grinding sound and transforming the beans into a powder. Olivia tipped the coffee powder into a cone-shaped glass lined with paper—that was the “dripper,” apparently—which she then placed on top of the glass pot. Rose then slowly poured the hot water over it.
“It says to start with a small amount of water to wet it. Like this, I wonder?” ventured Rose.
“I think that looks good.”
After that, they divided the dark, steaming, aromatic liquid between two cups. The pair sat across from each other at the table and brought the cups to their lips with excitement.
Rose looked surprised. “It’s so refreshing and nice. It’s quite different from the coffee I’ve had before.”
“I guess the paper absorbs the oil and odd flavors,” Olivia replied, passing on the knowledge she’d gained from Elliot, her cheeks full of cookies. Then, she glanced at the large wooden box that came along with the coffee dripper. “I guess putting that into your coffee makes it nicer. Should we try it?”
“What is it exactly?”
They opened the box and found six bottles a little smaller than their fists, each with a powder ranging in color from white to brown.
“The manual says these three are sugar, and these three are powdered milk,” read Olivia.
“I’ve never seen powdered milk before.”
“The brown one is from cows in the south, the ivory is from cows in the north, and the white one is buffalo milk. The sugar is also different colors based on where it was produced.”
“Seems pretty incredible.”
“What do you want to try? I guess you can have just one, or it can be nice to combine milk with sugar.”
“Hmm… I think I’ll try the milk from the southern cows.”
“I’m going to try this brown sugar.”
They dissolved some in their coffee and excitedly took another sip as they looked at each other with wide eyes.
“Oh my,” Rose expressed. “That’s so nice. It made it very smooth.”
“Mine tastes like chocolate now. It’s wonderful.”
They then paired their drinks with cookies, swapped cups, and thoroughly enjoyed their coffee.
“That was wonderful,” Rose said. “Thank you for sharing.”
“And thank you for the cookies. Feel free to come again.”
And with that, they ended their teatime feeling fully content.
✦ ✦ ✦
💎💎💎
THAT night, Olivia was in her warm room, warmed by a magic heater and lit by a magic lamp. She was in a warm nightgown, grinding coffee beans and thinking she’d put herself in a good mood before bed with an aromatic cup of coffee.
She poured the hot water through the paper-lined dripper to brew her coffee, which she then poured into a cup. Olivia brought it to her lips and sighed with contentment.
“It’s so good. It’s even nice on the stronger side.”
She then took one of the small glass bottles of powdered milk from the box up on a shelf.
“I’m curious about this one. I wonder what it tastes like.”
Using a spoon, she scooped it out and stirred it into her coffee, its rich scent filling the room.
A sip put a look of rapture on her face.
“Mm. It’s like a refreshing, mature flavor.”
After that, she tried all sorts of combinations of milk and sugar, trying one after another. The coffee in the pot ran out during her experimentation, so she boiled a fresh pot of water to brew more.
It was late into the night, and the street beneath her window had grown quiet when she finished drinking her coffee with plenty of milk and sugar and let out a sigh of contentment.
“Oh, that was good.”
She stretched and stood, thinking it was about time to be getting to bed, then placed the box back up on the shelf. That’s when the envelope fell from the shelf. Out of it slid a card she hadn’t seen earlier.
“What’s this?”
She flipped it over and saw Elliot’s neat handwriting. It stated, “I hope you enjoy it. But do be careful about drinking too much late at night as you may not be able to sleep.”
She froze in place, the card in her hand.
“How much is ‘too much’…?”
She poked her belly uneasily and heard it slosh about. That was clearly too much.
But she shook her head vigorously and voiced aloud, “It’ll be fine. Just a drink won’t keep me from sleeping. There’s no way.”
After cleaning up, she climbed into bed.
However…
“I can’t sleep.”
Typically, she would have drifted to sleep within five minutes, but there were absolutely no signs of sleep taking place that day after half an hour had passed.
She’d heard counting sheep was good for when you couldn’t sleep. Perhaps she’d try that.
“Eight hundred and twenty-five…”
Sleep was still nowhere to be seen by the time she’d counted to 1,000, and morning came when she finally started to doze a little.
“I guess that goes to show everything is best in moderation…”
Her shoulders slumped. She was feeling the exact opposite of the joy she had felt last night.
After spending that day utterly exhausted, she swore two things to herself. “No drinking coffee at night” and “All things in moderation.”