Meet Cute

“…and there’s your change. Enjoy your game!”

“Thank you!”

Jazz nodded as she watched the customer leave, a satisfied smile on their face. Retail work could be exhausting, but she had to admit, it was always nice to see someone smiling like that. As much as the novelty of working at a game store had begun to wear off on her after the first week or so, a sense of pride still filled her when she knew she had done a good job. It almost made dealing with some of the unrulier customers and busier spells entirely worth it.

Speaking of busy, the shop floor was bustling moderately. Not only was it a weekend, but the recent E3 buzz had gotten the local gamers in a bit of a frenzy, making pre-orders or catching up on series they may have been sleeping on. Add that, along with the Californian summer heat making the store a tad stuffy, and Jazz knew she needed to take what positivity she could get to keep herself sane.

Luckily, she wasn’t alone during such a busy spell either; if she had been saddled with only one other person even, she would have been in dire straits, but today it was her, her supervisor and the store manager, so things could have definitely been worse. There was no use complaining at least; she had quickly developed the knack for just getting on with things and not focusing too much on what time it was or what she could be doing instead of working.

Indeed, she was so fixated that just as she was about to call for the next customer, she only then realised that no one else was queuing up. The other customers were just mingling at this point, browsing the shelves and looking for anything that they might want to pick up. Letting a sigh flow from her lips, she wiped her brow with the neon green sweatband hugging her wrist. Again, she wasn’t about to complain, but she’d take whatever moment to breathe that she could.

“Jazz!”

Turning behind her, she saw her manager, Mark, tapping his watch. Blinking plainly for a moment, she turned to quickly check the timer on her till screen.

“Oh… Break time. Cool.”

Sighing again, she walked away from her station and towards the door to the stock room, hearing Mark’s voice call after her.

“Be back in fifteen!”

“Got it!”

Calling back after him, she stepped into the stock room and stuffed her hands into her black jeans. Wandering through to the staff room, she yanked open the fridge to pull out the bottle of Mountain Dew she had brought from home, as well as the sandwich she’d made for herself. Just as she was taking a swig from her bottle, she heard a different voice chime behind her.

“Break time, already? Doesn’t feel like it’s been that long.”

Finishing her mouthful, she casually turned to greet her supervisor, a smaller girl with short platinum blonde hair and dark lipstick. Smirking slightly, Jazz shrugged her mostly bared shoulders.

“It’s just been one of those kinds of days Maxine.”

Nodding in response, Maxine leaned on the doorway with a rather lazy look to her; it didn’t look like she was interested in doing what she should have been doing and was much keener on chatting it up with her co-worker. Still, she smiled a languid and relaxed smile, which put Jazz at ease a little herself, although a small part of her worried about her not doing her job.

“True. Still, you’re handlin’ it pretty well. You’ve only been here a few weeks and Mark’s already stopped keeping tabs on you. Took about a month for that to happen to me.”

A light chuckle escaped Jazz’s lips and she took a bite of her sandwich. Cheese and Salami, a firm favourite. Swallowing, she shrugged again.

“It’s no big deal. I just get on with things and do as I’m told.”

Quirking her brow, Maxine’s smirk widened.

“Oh and I don’t?”

Shooting nothing but a plain, unimpressed look to Maxine, the blonde eventually chuckled, shrugging to herself.

“You got me! I’m a slacker and proud of it!”

“Tell me, how did you get to be supervisor again?”

Jazz quickly took another bite before washing it down with some more Dew. The tastes didn’t mix, but fifteen minutes went by faster than you thought, especially if Maxine stopped to talk. Not that she minded, her supervisor had quickly become one of her better friends since moving to the area.

Rubbing at her neck, Maxine hummed as she seemed to ponder the query before shrugging again, still grinning with a half-lidded, chilled out gaze.

“Beats me. Doesn’t matter too much though honestly, the cash is what matters.”

Jazz certainly could relate to that. As materialistic as a reason as it was, if she didn’t have money then she wouldn’t have been able to take care of her sister. That was one reason why she had resisted complaining this whole time and why it bothered her if one of her co-workers did.

Suddenly, Maxine drew in closer, a curious intent in her eyes and a rather impish grin forming onto her darkened lips. It was a look that made Jazz was used to, although she still recoiled, mostly because Maxine stepped closer than she would have liked.

“Speaking of cash, you gonna be busy next weekend?”

Before Jazz could answer though, she could see Mark peeking through from the shop floor, frowning a bit, that frustration firmly focused on Maxine.

“Hey! Maxine! Stop bothering Jazz while she’s on her break! Shouldn’t you be looking for that pre-order?”

Pre-order…?

Thinking it over, Jazz couldn’t be sure, but she could have sworn that there weren’t any new releases this week. Last week there was something, but…

Groaning quietly, Maxine pulled back and turned around to face Mark, waving him off casually.

“Right, right. I’ll get to it…”

As Mark disappeared, Maxine grumbled again before looking over her shoulder to Jazz.

“That’s our manager for ya… well, I’ll talk to you about it later.”

“Uhm… wait a minute.”

Just as Maxine was about to leave, Jazz called out to her, her brow furrowed in confusion. It wasn’t really that important, but it just seemed a little odd and she felt like she needed to ask about it. Maxine, quirked her brow in response, waiting for the question to come, obviously not too eager to get back to work.

“What pre-order? I didn’t think there was a release this week.”

Rubbing her neck, Maxine nodded back bluntly.

“There isn’t, but Kimiko couldn’t pick it up last week, so she’s coming in today instead.”

Immediately, Jazz began to think whether she knew who this ‘Kimiko’ person was. But it wasn’t exactly a common name, so she doubted she’d forget a name like that. Her co-worker could obviously see the confusion lingering in her expression and her grin slowly returned, creeping onto her face as if she had just been struck by a wicked thought.

“Wait… That’s right, you haven’t met Kimiko Madison yet, have you?”

Blinking plainly, Jazz shook her head. She didn’t necessarily like the way Maxine was smiling, or what that was implying. It was like she was the only person missing out on something that was obvious to everyone else. Not to mention that creepy smile sent a chill running through her spine. Shrugging slowly, she spoke with uncertainty.

“No…? Who’s Kimiko?”

It was as if Maxine gained a burst of energy suddenly, her smile stretching wider and her eyes lighting up. A childish giggle escaped her lips as she began to wander away, suddenly mustering the motivation to find that pre-order.

“Ohhhh man. Jasmine Maxwell, you are in for quite a treat.”

---

A while later, Jasmine was back on the shop floor and it had gone quiet after the rush from before. Not dead, but it was quiet enough for Jazz to leave her post and start putting some of the pre-owned stock onto the shelves.

All the while, she kept thinking about what Maxine had said earlier and just who this ‘Kimiko Madison’ was. Maxine hadn’t told her anything of substance about them, so she only had the name to consider. The way Maxine had talked about this person was odd to say the least, it was as if she was some sort of spectacle, the sort of person that you couldn’t miss.

After some time though, she just shrugged it off. She doubted that anything would really come of it.

Maxine’s probably just exaggerating… 

Just as she finished her stack, she returned to the counter to collect some more. As she did so though, her eyes caught a glimpse of something passing by the window. Something exceptionally and outrageously pink.

Unable to look away, her bright green gaze took a closer look. The large pink mass was a person, or to be more accurate, was part of them. And as they turned to head inside the store, Jazz got a closer look at them, although it only took her a second to realise one thing.

This… is Kimiko Madison.

The approaching woman was rather short, about the same height as Maxine. If Jazz had to guess, she’d have said that she was about 5’1’’ or less. She was also very curvy, with one of her most noticeable features being her rather pronounced cleavage. At least, it would have been one of her more noticeable features had her twin tailed hair not been bubble-gum pink, along with her eyes and her dress.

Truthfully, Jazz wasn’t quite sure where she should look as pastel pink girl approached the counter with a bubbly and friendly expression, smiling with gusto. Jazz could only blink wordlessly, her mouth gaping wide at just how exceptionally saccharine this girl looked. Then, in a bold and eager voice, the woman spoke up.

“Koooonichiwa~! I haven’t seen you here before! You must be new!”

Jazz didn’t really know how to respond, mostly because she was still deciding how she felt about all of this. She had always believed that it was important to be an individual and that you should express your own style as much as possible and this girl was definitely the epitome of that, although she almost wondered if she was maybe taking it a step too far, if that were possible.

At the very least, Jazz appreciated how friendly and lively she was. There was an unmatched aura of likability surrounding her that was difficult to ignore, although Jazz wasn’t sure if she wanted to be sucked into it just yet. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but something about her just wasn’t quite right, despite how charming she seemed.

Not wanting to be rude though, Jazz nodded slowly in response.

“Yeah… I just moved into the area recently. My name’s Jazz.”

Kimiko nodded eagerly as she leaned forward. Jazz’s eye couldn’t help but be drawn downwards for just a moment before she caught herself doing so, a blush lightly filling her pale cheeks.

“Ohhh! Jazz! That’s a fun name! Well, I’m Kimiko! You’ll be seeing me a lot around here! Mark-kun usually sets games aside for me if I can’t pick them up at launch!”

Nodding back, Jazz rubbed at her neck awkwardly, still at a bit of a loss.

“R-right… I figured you might be Kimiko.”

Gasping, Kimiko’s eyes widened in surprise and her hand went to cover her mouth. Theatrical was probably another good word for the pinkette, Jazz thought to herself.

“Awww, are Mark-kun and Maxine-chan talking about me? I’d hope it was only good things!”

Well… I can’t say that Maxine said anything bad exactly…

Shaking her head, Jazz went to go and pick up the game Maxine had set aside. Some game called ‘Senran Kagura’ or something like that. Not a series Jazz had ever heard of, and by taking one look a the cover, it seemed as fan-service heavy as the person picking it up.  

“They didn’t say too much. It’s nice to meet you though.”

Picking up the sealed game, she placed it atop of the counter and scanned it before looking back up at her eager customer.

“It’s nice to meet you too Jazzy-chan~! You’ve got such a cool vibe about you! I love what you’ve done with your hair too!”

And Jazz’s cheeks filled up again, although her lips pursed a little uneasily in response to the compliments. It wasn’t that she didn’t appreciate them, she just wasn’t used to people she barely knew complimenting her so boldly. Averting her gaze, she tried to divert the subject away from her.

“Uh… are you paying by cash or card?”

After taking a moment to realise just what Jazz meant, Kimiko reached into her handbag to reveal her wallet. Unsheathing her card, Jazz readied the reader while giving the woman another look. She was the sort of person you couldn’t keep your eyes off of for even a second, for one reason or another. She was sure that some of the other customers would have given her a glance or two themselves by this point.

The rest of the transaction was quick and painless, leading to Kimiko stuffing the game into her handbag neatly.

“Arigato Jazzy-chan! Tell Mark-kun he’s a lifesaver as always! I was at a con last weekend so it just couldn’t be helped you know~?”

Turning to leave, the bubbly pinkette waved to Jazz with the same gorgeous smile she had worn when she had entered moments earlier. Forget the smile that she had received earlier on in the day, that smile was like a bright pink motivational sign with how it just glowed off her face.

“A-alright. Enjoy your game…”

Kimiko nodded back in response and headed out of the store, shouting out one last time.

“Sayonara~!”

Jazz was left standing for just a moment, eyes trained on Kimiko as she walked away. As the pinkette finally left her line of sight, she began to question whether or not the past minute or so actually happened or not. Kimiko had just been so much larger than life than she could have ever imagined her to be. And she really couldn’t decide how she felt about that, despite her own rebellious and individualistic nature.

But as she heard the sounds of snickering from behind her, she knew it was all real. Turning to look behind her, there stood Maxine with that devilishly mischievous grin she was a little too used to by now. Giving her a surprised look, Maxine wandered over to her and rested a hand upon her bare shoulder, shaking her head and continuing to smirk, almost smugly.

“I told you. Quite a treat, right?”

Nodding slowly, Jazz turned back to face the rest of the store.

“That was definitely… something.”

“That, was Kimiko Madison.”