Olivia
The school festival had finally begun.
“Oh, wow! Look at you, girl! You look amazing!” Karen complimented my look on this maid outfit. Actually, the outfit was pretty but I thought the skirt was rather short for my taste. “I’m a hundred percent sure we will get a lot of customers.”
“You look perfect too, Karen. But why didn’t you tell me that we’re going to wear this?” To be honest, I thought our outfit would be plain white shirts, a necktie, and black slacks. I never expected the girls would be wearing a maid outfit while the guys got the tuxedos. I didn’t pay too much attention when Nina measured me and everyone had no idea how the outfit would turn out to be.
“It’s a surprise, of course!” I thought so. She was definitely the one who gave those ideas.
After I changed my clothes, I was on standby in the class to take the orders. My picture and Karen’s were outside the class on top of the table with the others so the customers could see who they were going to choose. When they started coming to my class, as I expected, lots of customers wanted to be served by Karen. I could hear her name being mentioned left and right. The power of the public figure. Since everyone literally wanted her, some of the customers had to wait first before Karen could go to them. And then…
“Excuse me, Miss? Can you be my server?” one of the customers asked me. When I turned my head to the person, I was quite surprised.
“John?” John – Blake’s secretary also his bodyguard.
“Hello, Olivia.”
“Hello to you as well. Wait, let me guess. My father asked you to come here, right?”
“Indeed, he did.” This was what Blake always did if he couldn’t come to one of my special events at school. He always asked John to take over and thanks to him… we developed a good relationship with each other.
“He wanted to know if you are okay especially when he heard that your class will be doing a maid café.”
“Correction, we didn’t do a maid café it’s a host and hostess café.”
“Well, in his mind they both are the same. He’s just scared some weirdoes will pick on you.” Hearing John said that maybe that was the real side of Blake. So protective as a father.
I led him to the empty table and he sat down. I gave him the menu list. “So, what can I get for you?”
“Let’s see.” John looked at the menu. Well, there was not a lot of them but we had thought of what kind of food and drinks that we would be serving. “What do you suggest?”
“Um, well, since you are not fond of sweets, I suggest a cup of espresso. What do you say?”
“Can’t I have a beer?” I glared death at him and he laughed at me. “I’m just kidding. I’ll take the espresso. Can you make it double?”
“Sure.”
“Thanks, Liv.” I grabbed the menu book and went back to the kitchen to deliver his order.
“Hey, Liv?” Melanie-one of my classmates approached me. “Who’s the customer you’re serving now?” Oh, boy. Here we go again.
“Um, that’s John. My father’s secretary.”
“Your father’s secretary? Seriously? Wow, he’s a hunk. Is he single?” To be honest, I had no idea about that. John never told me anything and I never asked him the detail. This would always happen. Their questions would always be the same. Asking who John was. His relationship with me. Still a single or not. Asking for her number. And so on.
“He might be single but I don’t know.”
“Can I take his order for you and I ask him myself?” she asked with such puppy eyes. I looked at John and then back to Melanie. It was not like I didn’t want to help her but I knew how John would do.
“Um, I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“Please? I’ll tell him that you’re currently having a stomachache and I’m just helping you giving his order. Please? Please?” Oh, man. I felt bad and pitied her but maybe…
“Okay.”
“Oh, my God. Thank you so much, Liv. I owe you one.” Then she took the cup and went to John. I really hoped he won’t do anything bad to her.
I watched them and I could see Melanie was giving her the best service smile to John and he was… completely uninterested with it. She was trying to talk to him and when Melanie lost her smile, I just turned away because I couldn’t see it anymore. What are you doing to her, John?
Melanie came back to me looking so white and pale. “I’m not going to ask him anything anymore.” As I thought.
“You did a good job.” She didn’t say anything and walked away from me.
Karen came to me and was looking at Melanie first before she turned to me. “What happened?”
“She’s trying to flirt with John.”
“Oh, shit. Did you tell her about his attitude before she took off?” I shook my head. “Why not? You should have told her.”
“You do know that would be impossible, don’t you? Do you still remember how many girls always never believed in me when I told them how bad John’s attitude was?”
“Oh, right. Lots of women did that and they got what they deserved. No wonder he’s Blake’s secretary and bodyguard. He inherits some of your father’s nasty quality.” I giggled at her statement. “Hey, look,” she cocked her to where John was. He was waving her hand at me.
“Excuse me.” I went to him. “Need anything?”
“Yes. I want some lunch before I walk around the school and go back to the office.”
“We could prepare you some spaghetti.”
“That would be great. This time, please deliver it by yourself.”
“Come on, John. I pitied her.”
“And you didn’t pity me? You know how I hated it having girls flirting with me,” he countered.
“What did you say to her?”
“I just told her that I don’t need other students to serve me.”
“Well, that’s because I was in the toilet when she helped me.”
“Oh, really? Maybe you should lie better than that because, from my table, I could see that you were peeking on us to make sure that I didn’t do anything stupid or making a scene with a student.” I still remembered. It happened a year ago when John came to the festival, one of the students wanted to ask for his number but she was pushing him and he snapped.
He made her cry even her mother had to take the matter into her own hands. I stopped them before the situation got worse.
“You’re really lucky because she wasn’t crying when she came to me. If you still remember what happened a year ago then you will have to hold back your tongue to one of my classmates.”
“Okay, I apologize for that but I prefer if you just tell them how my attitude towards them. That will make me feel better.”
“I don’t want to say anything bad about you.”
“It’s better rather than giving them false hope. Anyways, I will be waiting for my spaghetti. I came here because of Blake’s order and I don’t want to give any bad reports to your father later,” he reminded and I walked away from him. Heading to the kitchen to deliver his order.
As he stated, John was a jerk.
He didn’t like it when women flirted with him. I still remembered that he said that he was disgusted by them. I jokingly said that he was gay and he preferred for me to say that to my classmates if one of them was trying to getting close to him.
“Here you go, my order,” Karen returned and gave the paper to the cook inside. “Hey, what’s going on?”
“Nothing. I just lectured him a bit and he’s still the same.”
“He’s must be hiding something. Whether he had a girlfriend or he just hates women,” Karen suspected.
“Well, he said that he had a trauma but he didn’t want to talk about it to me.”
“Maybe he was being cheated or worse.”
“I guess so.”
***
John
I was waiting for my food when my phone rang.
It was Blake. I picked it up and put the phone on my ear. “John? How’s Olivia?” he asked.
“She’s doing great, Boss. No one is hitting on her.”
“Good.”
“How’s the guest, sir?”
“Fine. I changed my mind, John. I want you to keep an eye on Olivia until tomorrow,” he stated. Tomorrow? Why?
“But, sir? You told me that—”
“I know what I said before, John. But I’ll be fine by myself and you should enjoy yourself while you’re in there as well. Consider it as your holiday.” I smirked at him. What kind of holiday is this?
“Watching over your daughter is not part of my holiday, sir.” And he chuckled at me.
“Just get it over with already, John. It was never your fault and it would never be. I didn’t expect that to happened and I was part… guilty as well.”
“Please, stop apologizing, sir.” I didn’t want to remember any of this.
“Even though you’re just my secretary, I care about you. You have been working for me for seven years and I can’t find anyone else to work under me anymore. I trust you and consider you as my friend and as a friend… I advised you to let go of the past and move on.”
Blake was right.
I should move on now but those memories… remained in my heart. It was not easy to let go.
“Hit on some teachers there.”
“Goodbye, Mr. Morgan,” I hurriedly parted with him and ended the call. I shook my head while smiling until Olivia returned with my spaghetti.
“Here you go.” She put the plate on the table.
“I will be here again tomorrow.” When I said that, Olivia directed her brown eyes to me.
“Really? Why?”
“It was your father’s order. He wanted me to keep an eye on you.”
“Oh. So, you’re going to be my bodyguard for two days.”
“I guess so. Why don’t you keep me company after your shift is over?”
“Sure. I’ll be done after lunch.”
“Great. I’ll be waiting for you.”