5 Chapter 5: Vivian

Vivian smiled blissfully, standing at the kitchen counter, gripping a knife in hand.

Emma sat at the counter, her head propped up with her hand, "The way you're smiling and holding the knife concerns me, Vivi. Are you going to murder me?"

Vivian giggled, "It just feels good to hold one again after such a long time."

"Ahh, I still can't believe he would do something like that." Emma spun around on the bar stool in their new apartment.

They moved in a month ago, both deciding that they'd rather stay in the city than go home to their families. Vivian didn't see much career potential in going back to the countryside and Emma just didn't want to go home. So they found an apartment together.

"Anyways, how's work?" Emma asked as Vivian cooked breakfast. That was their deal. Vivian would cook their meals and Emma would pay for her rent. It wasn't exactly fair for Emma, but she insisted. Besides, Vivian was not going to pass down that good of a deal.

"It's good." Vivian said. "It's tiring but I learn a lot more than in a classroom."

Emma nodded, accepting the plate Vivian handed over to her, "That's good to hear."

"How about you?" Vivian sat down with her own plate, stomach rumbling in hunger.

"It's alright." Emma shrugged, poking at her plate, "My parents have been pushing more now for me to go back."

Vivian glanced over at her, "I don't know if it's any consolation to you now, but in my life, you did end up joining the company and made it thrive."

She bit her lip, "I really don't think I'm ready for all the responsibilities. It's not just my family's livelihoods, it's the thousands of employees and their families that work under my parents as well."

"Doesn't worrying about these kinds of things show that you have good leadership potential?" Vivian pointed her chopstick at Emma.

It was frustrating knowing that Emma was more than what she was capable of, but Vivian won't push her to a path she wasn't willing to take. She just wished that her friend would see the abilities she had, turn her optimism on herself for once.

"Well, it takes more than good leadership to head a company."

"And that's why your parents want you to go back so they can guide you now before they get too old."

Emma wrinkled her nose, "Your mind is older than your looks. This feels like arguing with my parents."

"Time traveler, remember?" Vivian tapped her head, "But don't let what I say sway your decisions, I'm just giving you another perspective." she dropped her plate in the sink and glanced at the clock, "Gotta go to work now or I'll be late. See ya later."

"Bye." Emma waved as Vivian shut the door to their apartment.

Vivian hopped on the bus heading towards downtown, shifting her focus from Emma to her upcoming shift. She wasn't lying when she said work was good, but the people were a different matter.

Making her way off the bus, she weaved her way through the early morning commuters and clocked in at the restaurant. Changing into her work clothes in the bathroom, she shoved her clothes into a locker and shut the door.

She had done apprenticeships before, but that was years and years ago for her brain. Vivian was relieved that her body remembered the motions, and her theoretical knowledge was slowly resurfacing.

It had been about a month since she started working as a junior cook in the kitchen. Vivian didn't have enough experience yet to get a higher position but this way, she could learn more about each specific role in the kitchen.

It was interesting to her, learning the ins and outs of each position and seeing how they worked together to keep a restaurant running. She learned more about the management side of things, and Vivian discovered there was more to a restaurant than just cooking. That may be a problem later since her concentration in school was mostly culinary.

"What's up with you?" her coworker, Tony, nudged her with his elbow, "Is it your time of month?" he asked, guffawing like it was the funniest joke in both of her lives.

Vivian smiled politely, "No, I was just thinking, which is probably something that doesn't go on in your head very much. Especially when your mouth is open."

Another worker, folding dumplings on the stainless steel table, bit her lip that was tugging up into a smile, but flashed Vivian a warning look.

"You bitc—" he gritted before the head chef walked by.

"Hey, what's going on here?" he asked, looking between Tony and Vivian.

"She insulted me, man." he said, before Vivian could respond.

"He asked a highly inappropriate question, sir." Vivian straightened and looked the head chef squarely in the eye, "This has not been the first incident and I can attest that he has been acting this way ever since I was hired."

Tony and the head chef exchanged a glance. The head chef sighed, "I want to see the two of you in my office. Tony first."

Vivian knew she was wrong for retorting to Tony's question, but after a month of listening to his provocation, she snapped. It infuriated her to hear him looking down on women pursuing a culinary career that didn't involve doing menial tasks, like prep work.

"You're probably going to be fired after this, you know?" the woman across from Vivian leaned over and whispered. "This isn't the first time. I've seen many ambitious young women like you pass through here. Like a revolving door."

"How do you deal with all of them?" Vivian was baffled that anybody could stomach these talks.

She pointed to her ears, a clear tube coiling around her ear. "I turn down the volume when I see their mouths move." she wrapped another dumpling, placing it on a tray filled with identical ones. "I wish I could stand up to them like you, but I can't risk losing this job. My granddaughter has no one else to take care of her."

Vivian nodded, "I don't fault you for your choice." Her own grandmother often took up arduous tasks to give Vivian a full life

"Head chef wants to see you in the office now." Tony came back, smirking.

Vivian nodded at him and turned back to the woman, "But I've made mine."

The afternoon sun was bearing down on the silent bus station, and Vivian could see heat waves coming off the asphalt. She fanned herself with the termination papers handed to her by the head chef. Well, more like wrestled from the head chef. He tried to bar her in his office until she signed but unlike Vivian, who had nothing to do for the rest of the day, he still had a kitchen to run. It only took her ten minutes of sitting there silently before he broke and surrendered the paperwork.

The warm air wafting in her face wasn't doing much to cool her down so she crumpled up the paper and stuffed it in her bag. Vivian had no reason to sign the thing. It didn't benefit her and only helped to cover their asses in case she tried to sue them.

She stood up as the bus approached the station and stepped into the cool interior. Grabbing a seat by the window, Vivian started making a mental list of job searching things she would have to do. If she was going to buy a laptop, it would have to wait until after her pay got transferred over, which may take a couple days.

She got to the apartment and unlocked the door. Vivian paused when she saw an unfamiliar figure in the kitchen.

Sitting on the counter was a man eating a pint of ice cream straight out of the container. It was mint chocolate chip, her favorite. He turned, and Vivian finally recognized him.

"You better eat the whole thing, Luca." Vivian shut the door and slipped off her shoes.

Luca was her other close friend from college. Vivian met him through Emma, who had known him since she was a child.

"Vivi, you're back?" Emma stuck her head out of her room. "It's still early."

"Got fired." Vivian took a spoon from the drawer and dug out a scoop of mint ice cream.

Luca nudged the pint towards here, "You might need this more than me."

"Thanks." Vivian ate another scoop.

"So what happened?" Emma asked, "I thought you said I was going well."

"It was. The workplace culture wasn't it for me though."

"I mean, you're still young." Luca said. "You still have the luxury of time to figure out what you're looking for. Just take this as experience."

Emma nodded, "Yeah, what he said."

Vivian flopped over on the counter, "Okay, I'm taking a break for today, and then it's back to job searching tomorrow."

"Great!" Emma said, "I was just about done with work. Who wants to watch a movie?"

Vivian made some snacks while Luca picked out a stack of films for them to watch.

"Oh hell no." Vivian placed the popcorn on the table and inspected Luca's choices. "I don't want to watch a horror movie."

"It'll help you forget about whatever happened today." Luca held it up next to his face, wiggling his eyebrows at her.

"Yeah, but I won't be sleeping tonight either." Vivian snatched it out of his hand and replaced it in Emma's extensive movie collection. They were a pain to move and even worse to unpack and organize.

"Party pooper." he grumbled.

"It's my pity party." Vivian plopped down on the couch and shoved popcorn into her mouth.

Luca leaned over and took a handful, picking out the kernels. "Boo-hoo."

"Why are you here anyways?" Vivian propped herself up with pillows and looked over at Luca.

"Got nothing to do. And I wanted to see the new apartment." Luca looked around, "It's nice by the way."

"Thanks." Emma said, launching herself over the back of the couch and landing between them. "Ooh, popcorn."

Vivian handed her the bowl and scooted over to make room. "You ready?"

"Yep. Lu, go put in the movie." Emma commanded.

"Why me?" he slowly leaned to the side flopping onto the couch. "I'm a guest. You should be serving me."

Emma planted her feet on his back and pushed him off, "This is my house, so you follow my rules."

Vivian giggled, watching their interactions. She missed this. As the years passed, she had slowly lost contact with the two, so these kinds of memories became a distant dream. Now that she was thinking of it, did Marcus have any friends he hung out with? Vivian frowned. Well, he was so caught up in work, his work buddies and real life friends probably overlapped.

The only notable one she could remember was Adrian, Marcus's friend from college and later went on to work under him. He was actually Luca's younger brother, Vivian recalled.

"Hey Luca, how's your brother?" Vivian asked.

"He's fine." Luca turned from placing the disc in the tray, "Isn't he working under your boyfr—your ex?" he corrected himself when Emma threw a popcorn kernel, hitting him in the face.

"Is he?" Vivian said in a vague tone. It wasn't improbable, but she really couldn't remember.

"Yeah." Luca said, "Actually, what happened with you two anyways?" He ignored Emma's glare, "I heard about you from Adrian and he was always complaining about how Marcus was head over heels for you."

Vivian rubbed at the calluses on her hands, "...It's complicated."

"Isn't it always?" he pressed.

"Lu!" Emma interjected in a harsh tone.

"Sorry." Luca mumbled, "I was just curious."

Vivian waved her hand, "It's alright. I don't want to explain because it really is complicated and things happened that I would rather not disclose." she pulled a pillow closer to her and squashed it hard.

Luca wasn't going to be the last person to want answers. Vivian stared absentmindedly at the movie, nibbling on a cookie. It wasn't that she didn't want to tell him, but how was anyone supposed to break the news that they actually came from the future? She might have to text Marcus so they could come up with a coordinated excuse.

Emma leaned her head on Vivian's shoulder, "You good?" she whispered.

"Mm," Vivian hummed lightly, "I was thinking of talking with Marcus soon so we can come up with a reasonable explanation though."

"That's a good idea."

They focused back on the TV, slowly working through the stack of movies on the table. Eventually, Vivian was the only one left awake, eyes blinking sleepily. Luca had rolled over on the floor, and Emma was stretched out over the length of the couch, feet resting on Vivian's lap.

She maneuvered her way around the two, turning off the TV and placing bowls and snack wrappers on the table to be dealt with tomorrow. Vivian pulled out blankets from the closet and draped it over them. Yawning, Vivian was about to crawl into bed when rapid chimes from her charging phone drew her attention. She squinted at the bright screen and saw several new texts from an unknown number.

[Hey, it's Marcus.]

[I know it's late, but I got a new number]

[I think we should meet up and talk sometime soon. People have been asking me about the situation with you...and I think it would be better for our stories to match]

[If you want to, of course]

[Let me know]

[Hope I didn't wake you]

Vivian yawned, giving a longing stare to her bed. But she won't remember to respond if she didn't do it now. Plus it was something that she was planning on doing anyways.

[i was just about to sleep, and funnily enough, i was thinking about contacting you soon to talk about the same thing. does the day after tomorrow work?]

[Yes, sounds perfect]

Vivian nodded and was about to set her phone down when it buzzed again.

[Goodnight then]