Work Text:
Working at Sisheng cafè has always been an absolute joy for Mo Ran since he first started when he was a teenager — now he is nearing 25 and he couldn't be happier to work beside his childhood friend and his cousin…even if the latter can be quite annoying.
Unlike Xue Meng and Shi Mei, Mo Ran works full-time here, surrounded by the smell of coffee beans from dawn till dusk, the sound of chatter and moving chairs mixed with the jazz background music…it's very calming. It might not be the best job in the world and of course the paycheck can't be satisfying enough for other people but to Mo Ran, this is great. It's quiet, no unnecessary drama—just him in an aesthetically pleasing place.
So yes, Mo Ran loves his job. A lot. But these last few weeks…he's started to get a little bored, especially when he's on the shift alone.
But thankfully this phase doesn't last long as something catches Mo Ran's interest.
A recent customer has been getting the very same boba tea for the last five days. Mo Ran knows it's the same person because of the name they leave for the order — Chu Wanning.
It is not unusual for people to order other things besides coffee in this cafè, they order sweet things too like boba tea but that's the thing. This is a coffee shop which specializes in very aromatic coffees but this person comes here to get…boba tea — something they can get in any boba house.
However, Mo Ran doesn't pay it any mind. It can be some random highschool girl who happens to pass by this road to go home and likes the idea of getting tea on the afternoons after school.
So a month passes by like this. Mo Ran has no idea what the girl even looks like — this cafe has a few advanced features such as ordering through the ipads on the table. These ipads could be used for anything the customer liked, very similar to an internet cafè. Orders were made through these ipads almost like text messaging.
So this Chu Wanning girl comes everyday to order with the ipad. Mo Ran receives the orders and when he is done, he only sends the same friendly message back “your order is done princess.” and like this Chu Wanning wordlessly gets the order on time.
Mo Ran usually can’t see most of his customers as the chilling area where people sit to drink and chat, is placed right behind the counter, which is where Mo Ran stays to prepare everything. Also as his ipad basically glitches with the flux of the orders coming at the same time, Mo Ran has no time to lose — he has to move his hands to get things ready. There is no time for him to remember who ordered what, he just does the orders and leaves them be…and there are quite a few orders of boba tea everyday, so there is no way Mo Ran can know who exactly is a regular here just for the boba tea.
Mo Ran might be stupid to uselessly obsess over a stranger like this— most likely a teenage girl, which would make this even more weird to obsess over with — but Mo Ran has never seen anyone in his life who never gets tired of the same thing every single day! Even the flavor of the tea doesn’t change.
By now Mo Ran doesn’t even need to receive the text order to know that Chu Wanning craves for Sunset Mango boba tea every afternoon. This girl even comes at the exact same time everyday, which Mo Ran knows because of the order that dings on his ipad at 5:15pm sharp.
So this person that orders the same thing for four weeks in a row at the same time has caught Mo Ran’s attention. Not in a bad way. Mo Ran is just genuinely curious to see if his instincts were right and this is indeed a highschool girl passing by every day.
Like this Mo Ran makes a little plan.
He waits for Chu Wanning’s order to pop in and when the seconds tick away to exactly 5:15pm, the ipad dings . Mo Ran smiles as he proceeds to prepare any other order possible, except for the Sunrise Mango. Like this, minutes pass and from 5:15pm, the vintage clock on the wall shows that it’s 5:45pm and there still is no boba tea in sight. Mo Ran grins — talk about bad customer service at its finest.
Mo Ran doesn’t need to be this irresponsible, he doesn't mean to act childish, but he can't help but be curious of this person who seems to crave sugar to an alarming amount. So he waits for the teen girl to come and ask about her overwhelmingly sweet tea. Except — except she doesn't come at all.
Mo Ran starts to contemplate whether to start making the drink now and not drag it any longer but a soft cough stops him from filling the pink plastic cup with bubbles. He lifts his eyes to look at the stranger, an eyebrow raised up.
"Excuse me," the stranger starts with a smooth tone, to which Mo Ran only replies with a "yes how can I help?"
The stranger is tall, his stare intimidating and his dark eyes seem to silently judge Mo Ran as if he shouldn't even have dared to ask.
"..."
If not for the jazz music and the chatter as well as the occasional clink of the delicate cups…this awkward silence hanging in the air would have almost choked Mo Ran. And he's usually not affected by weird customer behavior, he usually ignores it but this man's aura seems to have something magnetic , something that demands attention.
"Uh, so," Mo Ran tries again. "Is there anything I can help you sir? Anything at all?"
"My order."
"Your order? Is there something wrong with it?" Mo Ran asks secretly hoping this handsome man didn't find some sort of disgusting thing like hair in their drink.
The handsome man only gives Mo Ran a kind of look that Mo Ran's brain can only translate into "are you actually dumb?"
The man sighs through his nose as he crosses his arms. If he wasn't a man almost as tall as to reach his chin, Mo Ran would have called him cute out loud.
"My tea." He says in a clipped tone. "It's been thirty-five minutes, I can't stay here all day."
"Tea…?" Mo Ran mumbles. He seems to remember something. "Ah! Osmanthus tea, right?"
The man on the other side of the counter only frowns, his eyebrow twitching. He opens his mouth to talk but Mo Ran beats him at it by saying, "I did send you a reply on the server saying that, uh, we are out of blossoms…do you remember?"
But the man's beautiful face seems to be confused, so—no this customer doesn't remember. Mo Ran chews the side of his cheek as he starts to turn the ipad towards the man so they can see the chat together, but the man only raises a hand. "No need." He then points at the pink plastic cup Mo Ran was about to fill. "I was talking about that. Why is it taking so much?"
Wait. Ah?? Is this man really pointing at a pink cup filled with juicy bubbles, demanding for it???
"Oh ."
Realization hits Mo Ran. This must be…
" Chuuu…Wanning ?" Mo Ran squints his eyes in thought. The man only nods once then Mo Ran continues more confident this time, "ah of course why didn't you tell me before…man I don't wanna be rude but you should tell your daughter not to get so much sugar daily."
"What."
"Hm?" Mo Ran rises his head from the cup again only to see a very confused expression on the man's face — probably the most emotion he has ever shown since coming to the counter.
Mo Ran thinks he probably mistook this guy for another customer again, but he did acknowledge the name Chu Wanning. He speaks again, "you…isn't your daughter Chu Wanning?"
At that the man opens his mouth in a tiny "o" that seems to say "just what the fuck are you talking about?"
Mo Ran has had many awkward conversations before but he thinks this might top everything. "I-I uhh, look—"
"I am Chu Wanning."
"...Ah."
So that's the day when Mo Ran got to know that his instincts had in fact been very, very wrong. Because the one who was in danger of getting diabetes was not a little teen but a grown ass man who apparently had a thing for boba tea. Don't get him wrong, Mo Ran thought that this guy—dressed in a black leather jacket with a freezing cold stare who looked like he just got off a fashion runway—having an extremely sweet tooth was extremely adorable.
Mo Ran even thought that Chu Wanning wouldn't come back anymore, seeing how embarrassed he looked from having to admit that, yes he in fact likes sweet things. His face had started to colour to a nice shade of pink and when Mo Ran gave him that smile that he knows it brings out his dimples, Chu Wanning's cheeks were in a full bloom of red.
However, Chu Wanning still came to the cafè though he never ordered boba tea again — only plain coffee. Mo Ran thought it rather weird he had to change the tea for coffee just because he felt embarrassed, but he didn't bring it up — it's Chu Wanning's choice after all. But seeing as the bitterness of the coffee always makes Chu Wanning's nose scrunch up, Mo Ran felt a bit of pity having to see how this man is so self conscious of liking sweet things he actually changed his order. Mo Ran thought this person could very well go to another place but since he's a regular here, that must mean he likes the service of Sisheng. Mo Ran doesn't plan to ruin that so everyday little by little, he starts to put chocolate muffins to go with the coffee.
"What is this?" Chu Wanning asked the first time he found a muffin on the tray with his coffee.
"A muffin."
"Yes, I can see, but why is it here?" Chu Wanning's eyebrow does that little twitch Mo Ran has noticed he does when he is confused. "I never ordered it."
"I know," Mo Ran smiles and Chu Wanning looks down once, his fringe swaying, as he takes the muffin away from his tray. Mo Ran however puts a hand on his, on top of the muffin as he leans on the counter with his forearm. "Don't take it away. It's for you."
Jazz music plays in the background and it mixes with Mo Ran's sweet tone — he is, in fact, flirting with this man, as he gives him another smile that doesn't allow "no" for an answer. And it looks like it's working because firstly Chu Wanning's cheeks start to color before he takes away his hand as if burned.
He leaves, but having forgotten the tray on the counter, he stops and takes wide strides to take it away. Mo Ran swiftly puts the muffin back on the tray.
So this is how it goes for another month or so. Everytime Chu Wanning goes to get his coffee, a sweet muffin waits on the tray to be eaten. He acts fast, doesn't really talk much to Mo Ran when he gets the order except for a quick " thankyouverymuch !" before he flees away and honestly? Watching the beautiful man be so shy around him for weeks… it has started to tickle his heart a little.
It's weird and…it's not like it has never happened before, but not this fast. Mo Ran has had many crushes before but they didn't make Mo Ran think about them all the time. Mo Ran finds himself thinking about dark phoenix eyes when he is grinding dark coffee beans. He could be making a milkshake with vanilla and all that's on his mind are soft milky hands, white face like porcelain that turns red like the cherry he puts on top of the cake right now….Hell, Mo Ran could even be at home and wrapped up in the black blanket, his mind would stray and think about that black leather jacket…
He knows it smells nice. He knows because everytime he leans on the counter just for a little teasing, he can smell the haitang smell from Chu Wanning.
So this is how he knows for sure, he has a thing for this man. He can't ignore it. But he also can't act rashly as Chu Wanning might think it's weird.
So he starts by taking small steps. Small baby steps. He starts by not notifying Chu Wanning on the ipad that his order is ready—instead Mo Ran goes all the way to his table and gives it to him with a smile. He does this for a few days and everytime it earns him a bashful look which Chu Wanning tries to hide but his ears always give him away. Mo Ran thinks it's so damn cute.
Then he starts doing something else. He leaves notes on the tray, under the coffee cup. They are simple things like "Have a good day, don't stress too much :)" or occasionally more daring ones like "Chu-gege, you look handsome with glasses ;)"
Chu Wanning thought it was weird at first...no one else was getting such notes. But as the days went by, as embarrassing as it might be, he looked forward to the messages more and more…
There was even this one note that shamefully asked for his number and there was even a drawn heart there! He had looked at Mo Ran once, pinched his eyebrows and whispered a quick "Shameless!" to which Mo Ran only responded with a laugh so loud, it caught the attention of a few other people.
Then one day—the notes stop.
Chu Wanning waits there for a while with nothing but an empty cup and a muffin wrapper waiting for a note that isn't coming. Mo Ran came to his table to leave the things there and left just as quick.
Chu Wanning feels dumb to be moody just because of a childish game of notes but he can't help it…he was curious to read what Mo Ran had to say. Just as he is about to get up and leave, Mo Ran comes his way and sits down in front of him. Chu Wanning sits too.
"So…uh, no notes today right? Hahah…" Mo Ran laughs, feeling his chest tighten at Chu Wanning's disappointed face. He adds quickly, "Well that's why I'm here. I'm your note."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that, uh," Mo Ran wipes his hands once on his black jeans. They're sweating. "I thought I'd better say this rather than write it down."
Chu Wanning only nods. He has a weird feeling about this. Then Mo Ran takes a deep breath and speaks all in one go, "Willyougooutwithmeplease?"
"What…?"
Mo Ran gulps. It's the first time he finds this so hard but he tries. Once again. "I know it might sound weird, especially since it's barely been two months since we met but…I'd like to know you better."
"...Okay?" Chu Wanning asks, obviously not getting Mo Ran's point.
"So…will you, uh, give me a chance and go on a date with me?"
Chu Wanning doesn't respond, doesn't look at him. He only stares blankly at Mo Ran's name tag. Mo Ran has a little moment of panic so he adds quickly, "You don't have to answer now I just—I've just seen you for a while now and I wanted," he lets out an awkward giggle, "I wanted to let you know I'm interested…in you."
He then smiles once more at the man who dares not look at his eyes before making his way to the counter again to let Chu Wanning breathe. Mo Ran's steps are chill but his heart is not. God, what the hell was that ?! Why is he so awkward all of a sudden…even Chu Wanning’s body language couldn't be clearer — he felt awkward too.
Now he probably lost not only a regular but also the chance at seeing the most beautiful person enter his cafè ever again. As he ruffles his hair, a ding comes from his ipad. With a sigh, he gets ready to prepare another order.
But when he opens the ipad, what greets him is a message from Chu Wanning. Mo Ran's heart nearly drops on the floor—
"Yes. Let's go on a date, Mo Ran."