Cozy Working Shift

The visitor was none other than her beautiful mother, and Alice waved at her mother, but Jane couldn't wave back because she was carrying some boxes. It must have been the new stock that they were waiting for because they were short a few boxes for restocking a couple days of ago.

Alice moved from the register desk to help out her mother with Claudia immediately tagging along. There were more boxes than Alice had first expected, and her mother placed the boxes into the girls' hands so that she could grab her phone out of the black jacket that had the convenience store logo on the left pocket and text out a quick message.

"Thank you, girls," Jane said.

"It's no problem, Mrs. Marozi," Claudia answered over the boxes.

Alice placed the boxes in the back room where the employees took their breaks and stuffed their belongings in the little lockers. The break room was actually nice, so she wasn't complaining in the least. 

Inside, there was a large wooden rectangle table in a dark finish that was placed in the center of his room along with a plush sofa pushed to the side in the corner as a cozy place to rest for a moment. 

She didn't know if her mother needed the materials inside soon or not from the box, so she left them on the large wooden rectangle table that was in the center of the room and helped Claudia settle hers down.

They walked back out of the break room to her mother slipping her phone back into her pocket after doing some business. Alice tilted her head to the side trying to figure out if there was something wrong or not, and her mother was able to tell that Alice was trying to dig a little deeper. 

"There's nothing wrong, Alice," Jane smiled before patting Alice on the shoulder. "It's a slow day today?"

"Yes," Alice said with a head nod. "What was in those boxes?"

"Just some updated labels along with understocked items," her mother responded. "We can put the labels on over the weekend."

"That works," Alice agreed before leaning her hip against the countertop.

Jane tapped her knuckles on the countertop. "What are your plans today, Claudia?"

"Nothing much, however, I was planning on taking Alice away for a little bit," Claudia asked slowly.

Jane laughed. "You have good timing today, Claudia. Today is a great day to do so."

Alice rolled her eyes. "Okay, guys. I'm right here."

Jane went around to Alice and wrapped her arm around her daughter's waist. "This one can be let off the hook today."

Alice squeezed her mother's side. "Are you sure? Hopefully, it won't be too hard on you by yourself."

"I'll be fine," Jane reassured her. "Where are you two off to?"

Alice slid a glance over to Claudia since she didn't know either, and Claudia leaned forward to sling an arm around Alice's shoulder. "To school. There's a game that I wanted to take Alice to, but I kind of came on short notice. My apologies for that."

Jane smiled. "You two are in luck that today will be slow, so there's no problem on my end."

Alice was happy that she was able to join Claudia for a moment, but she found it odd that it was such a slow day, because most of the time, they were able to hit their average revenue without much work. However, today was more slow than usual, making her think that there must have been some external factor for the outcome.

"Do you know why it's so slow today, Mom?" Alice asked wondering if her intuition was correct.

"There's a little accident blocking the roads closest to here, so that's that. It's why the truck couldn't get through either and had to stop at a nearby neighborhood," her mother answered.

Alice's brows came together worried. "Were you able to get the rest of the materials?" 

"It'll come tomorrow again, honey. Don't fret."

Alice nodded while Jane smiled over at Claudia. "Don't be shy to ask me to come around anytime."

"Don't call her up, Mom. Her work ethic is quite inconsistent," Alice interjected.

Claudia snickered. "It is not."

Jane tweaked both of their noses in a teasing manner. "You girls get going then." 

Alice pulled back first and pulled off the red apron of her convenience store uniform that covered her grey academy crewneck that had the lettering done in a shiny red embroidery along with her white shorts.

Her outfit was very relaxed whenever she worked since she wanted to be comfortable on her home turf rather than putting more stress on herself by trying to bend over and carry items in a short skirt. 

Her white sneakers were fresh since she put a lot of care into making sure that her white items stayed clean which paired her tall white socks and white shoes together to complete the outfit. Luckily her hair was still neatly done in waves around her shoulders instead of the messy ponytail that ended her day of work.