Sweet afternoons

Chapter eight

"Lena, we need three more batches of gingerbread cookies," Nate's voice carried through the bakery, finding its way back to me in the dreary kitchen.

With a heavy sigh, I abandoned my previous task and rushed to make the mixture as quickly as I could. Then I hurriedly tried to find the cookie cutters that desperately needed replacing.

They were fraying and snapping, some were bent out of shape so much that I no longer knew what they were supposed to be. The bakery may have been fairly popular, but our profits never left us with huge bonuses. Sometimes it was barely enough to cover our costs.

"Yeah, we also need the money to replace all this equipment, the future doesn't look too bright for either of us," I joked, trying to lighten the atmosphere. We'd both been extremely stressed lately so I thought it was best that I didn't act too serious and kept the 'big bad boss' attitude on the down low. Not that my 'boss' attitude was very intimidating.

The past few weeks had been absolutely crazy for us. More and more people had chosen to visit the bakery, and we had soon become swamped with new customers. Most places would happily welcome the flood of extra profit, but 'Sweet Afternoons' was only a small bakery, it wasn't catered to suit too many people at once.

It seemed strange and sudden how the atmosphere of the bakery changed, in an instant it became almost crowded with rowdies carrying cameras and posh looking business people who at the beginning looked very uncomfortable being in the bakery.

I found this more humorous than offensive.

The regulars didn't seem fazed by this shift of atmosphere which was very surprising. Especially considering how easy it was to tell that the staff, including myself, found this change a little more than just off putting.

"These posh pecker heads are giving me the creeps Lena!" Nate ran into the kitchen, stopping when his face was angrily close to my own. "What the hell happened to make us an attraction for the circus of upmarket lunatics?"

I shook my head at him, showing that I was just as unsure as He was. Nate's face was red with frustration and I quickly saw signs of his increasing panic. I place my hands on his arms comfortingly, hoping to calm him down somewhat. He'd never been the best with crowds of people, for a good reason, but he could put up with people he was familiar with. The situation had become too much for him to handle and to be honest I was afraid of him having a panic attack.

"It's nothing we can't handle Nate, how about you take the kitchen for now and I'll man the counter?" His teeth were grinding together painfully and his fists were clenched tightly, I could vaguely see his shoulders were shaking and his breathing was quite irregular. These were the same signs I had seen last time, when Nate had broken in my arms in the centre of town.

That was the day I found out that Nate had enochlophobia; a fear of large crowds of people. The bakery was the perfect place to work for someone with this phobia, because it was only small and never had too many customers at once. In addition, most of our customers were regular so Nate could get more comfortable with them and begin to get less anxious around them.

I had always tried to keep the bakery a good environment for Nate to work full time without his anxiety becoming too much. I guess that finally I had failed to protect him.

My fear grew as Nate's breathing sped up and I did the only thing I thought I could. I hugged him. Holding him tightly I whispered into his ears "I'm here for you, it's just you and me Nate, we'll get through this," I kept chanting similar words to the younger boy, squeezing him tightly and rubbing his back. It wasn't too long before his arms encircled themselves around me and I felt his body relax into mine.