Page 9 of Barging In

C lem peered out of Florence’s serving hatch.

Where was everybody? Every morning that week, she’d opened it to a patient yet eager queue.

So far today, though, she’d only had three people and one hopeful Labrador.

Thanks to the height of Florence against the towpath, it was easy enough for him to pop his head through the serving hatch to drool at the cakes on the worktop.

Deciding to take a closer look, she stepped outside. The weather was fine, and the towpath was busy enough, but everyone was heading into the wharf. Max was waving a customer off, so she caught his eye, and he wandered over.

“Is it me, or is it quiet today?”

Max scratched his beard. “Same as any other Friday. Busiest day of the week, bar Saturdays and Sundays.”

“Every day this week I’ve had a queue, but today… barely a sniff. Do you think the novelty has worn off already?” she asked, trying not to sound too concerned but failing miserably .

“I think it’s more to do with that sign.” Max nodded to an A-board beside Clem’s.

She approached it, only to find it was blocking hers. It read, Free hot drink with every cake purchased. An arrow underneath pointed to the wharf.

“What the hell?” she blurted out. “How long has that been there?”

Max shrugged. ”It’s not enough to make me go. Their cake is terrible, and the coffee isn’t much better. They have nothing on you, but some people can’t resist a bargain.”

So many thoughts rushed through Clem’s head that she struggled to organise them, but one stood out. Fight fire with fire.

“Could you redo my board, please?” she asked.

“Of course.”

Fetching her cloth and chalk pen from inside, she returned to Max and wiped the board.

“Could you put ‘Free hot drink with every cake purchased’? Don’t forget the arrow.”

Max smirked. “My pleasure.”

Once he finished, Clem moved it in front of the wharf’s sign. “That’ll show them.”

A few moments later, a loud voice echoed in the distance.

“How dare you move that sign?”

Clem turned to see a woman marching towards her along the towpath, her mousy-blonde, shoulder-length waves swaying with her stride.

Dressed with subtle precision — in navy chinos; a crisp, white shirt; and a beige jumper casually draped around her shoulders — the woman was the picture of sophistication.

Her outfit was nothing flashy yet perfectly curated.

It took Clem a second glance at her fierce eyes to realise it was her shouting.

“I haven’t touched your sign,” Clem shouted back .

She recognised the woman; she’d been sitting on a bench a little further down the towpath from Florence the previous day.

Although Clem had been busy serving customers, her eyes weren’t too distracted to notice a beautiful woman.

Not that it was her looks that had caught Clem’s attention; it was her forlorn expression.

There was something quietly arresting about her: sharp cheekbones softened by worry, eyes that looked tired, and lips that fidgeted as if caught mid-thought.

She looked as though she carried the weight of the world on her shoulders.

Now it was clear she had been checking Clem out — well, not her, but what she was selling.

A man had joined her. He’d ordered coffee and walnut cake and a slice of lemon drizzle.

She remembered him distinctly; he’d visited every day since she’d opened for a latte and a slice of coffee and walnut.

It was now her guess that they both worked at the wharf.

The angry woman, whom Clem would call Lemon Drizzle until she got a name, was picking up Clem’s sign. Was she the boss?

“Hey! Get your hands off it!” Clem shouted, striding over to grab it back.

Lemon Drizzle twisted away, but Clem caught the edge of the sign and yanked it. A handbag slipped from her opponent’s shoulder and dropped to the ground as she retaliated, gripping the other side of the A-board with both hands.

“Give it back!” Clem snapped, tugging harder.

“It’s blocking mine!” the woman barked.

“Yours was blocking mine first!” Clem bit back. “Don’t dish it out if you can’t take it!”

Max moved to intervene. “Ladies—” he began, but the furious tug of war only escalated, forcing him to jump back.

“I’m amazed you need a sign,” the other woman sniffed. “Your horrid boat is so garish it would make a mole squint.”

Seriously? Now she was coming after Florence.

“It’s bad enough I have to see it at the bottom of my garden,” the woman added.

The penny dropped, and Clem stopped pulling. “You’re her.”

The woman scowled. “What do you mean?”

“Nothing,” Clem said, far too quickly.

“No, come on. Out with it, if you have something to say. Who exactly am I?”

“My parents’ neighbour. They… erm… might have mentioned you.”

Lemon Drizzle’s skin pinked, likely remembering the altercation with them.

With her opponent’s guard down and an audience gathering, it was time to finish this.

Clem yanked at her sign. It came freely — too freely for the force she’d exerted.

Her heel skidded on the wet morning grass, and she slipped backwards.

“No, no, no—” she gasped, already falling.

She let go of the sign, which thudded to the ground and fell to the side.

Her arms flailed, windmilling as she tried to stay upright.

In a panic, she grabbed Lemon Drizzle’s arm for balance.

She shrieked as Clem’s weight dragged them both backwards.

There was a moment of horrified eye contact, then?—

SPLASH!

The cold water hit Clem like a slap to her soul.

The shock of it struck first, a blunt, icy force that sucked the air from her lungs and pricked her skin.

Her boots were heavy with water, and her clothes clung to her like seaweed, weighing her down as she kicked to find the bottom to stand up.

Once she found it, she stood, bursting through the water, coughing and blinking furiously as her sodden lashes blurred her vision.

The murky water stank with a mix of oil, rust, algae, and something unidentifiable that made her gag.

Her ears rang from the impact, and her whole body trembled from the cold.

Something splashed about nearby, reminding her she hadn’t gone in alone. Great. Falling into the canal was bad enough, but accidentally dragging someone with her? The embarrassment was worse than the cold.

Noticing that a wide-eyed Max was rushing to the bank, Clem waded towards him. The woman’s head appeared beside her, gasping, soaked, and furious. Expletives began tumbling from her shivering lips.

“Stand up,” Clem shouted at the woman.

Lemon Drizzle emerged properly, water up to her chest, and reached up for Max’s hand. He dragged her out and then lifted Clem onto the bank beside the startled, dripping woman.

Clem thought they must look like a pair of shipwreck survivors, chests heaving, hair plastered to their heads, clothes clinging in the most unflattering way.

On second glance, though, Clem realised the way the woman’s white shirt clung to her breasts wasn’t entirely unflattering.

The material was practically see-through, and her eyes took in everything it revealed.

“If you are quite finished,” the woman said, fixing her with a steely glare from a pair of blue eyes.

If Clem hadn’t been so cold, she would have felt a rush of heat from embarrassment at being caught ogling her hardened nipples.

She watched the make-up–streaked woman pick up the fallen sign with trembling fingers and place it next to her own.

Without a word, she grabbed her handbag and strode off towards the bridge, leaving a trail of water behind her.

Clem felt a sharp pang of guilt. She hadn’t even asked if the woman was okay. She also noticed her jumper was no longer around her shoulders; it was likely waterlogged and sinking to the bottom of the canal.

Beginning to shiver uncontrollably, she turned to Max. “Would you mind keeping an eye out for customers whilst I clean up? I’ll be as quick as I can.”

“You take as long as you need to get that smell off you,” he said, wrinkling his nose and desperately trying to withhold a grin. “You’ll drive away the customers otherwise.”

Stepping onto Florence’s bow, she stripped off as many wet clothes as she could, fully aware people were still lingering after the — well, to call it what it was — the fight.

She caught sight of the woman disappearing into the wharf and suddenly wondered if she should have offered her the use of her shower.

Sod her! She started it.

Throwing everything into the washing machine, Clem entered the shower and let the warm spray soothe her cold skin. She washed her hair twice with shampoo and scrubbed herself with soap, hoping it would be enough to erase the smell.

When she finally made her way to the kitchen, she discovered Max using the espresso machine.

He approached her and sniffed the air. “Better. I’d have another one later, though, just to be sure.

You’ve had a few customers, mostly asking what happened, but they all bought something.

I assumed the offer on the sign still stood, so I gave them hot drinks on the house.

” He reached into his pocket and extracted a pile of coins.

“Here. They all paid in cash except one, but I have the same card reader as you, so it wasn’t a problem. ”

Clem opened her mouth to speak only to close it again as she took the coins.

“You’re wondering how I served two espressos, one cappuccino, and one latte?” he asked.

She nodded again, tying her damp hair back into a ponytail.

“I’ve done my time as a barista and as a barman.”

“Thanks for helping me out,” Clem said with a grateful smile. “I really appreciate it. You should get back; you might have missed customers of your own.”

Max shrugged. “I ran over between making coffee and stuck a sign out asking people to pay here, so I’m good.”