The Daily Life Of A Foodie In The Office - Volume 1 Chapter 26 Sisterly Love

“Friends can tell when friends are sad,

so they say all you need is a friend and food.”

– Brittany Leigh Foreman

=========================

*Thud*

There was a sound of a cup being placed on Delilah’s desk as she was typing. Delilah looked up to find Aubree holding a cup of coffee with both of her hands, smiling. “Here you go, my treat,” she said.

Delilah breathed in the smell of fresh coffee and took a sip. “Thanks, I needed that.”

“How did it go?” Aubree asked.

A couple of days before, Delilah had met up with some of the officers at the Ministry of Home Affairs (MOHA). They were meeting to discuss about potential sponsors for the Kang Company’s big event, which was proposed to be at the end of the year. Delilah was one of the representatives for the Kang Company to help discuss about the proposal. Other than the MOHA, Delilah would also need to meet up with the Ministry of Finance (MOF), since they need sponsors. This was to ensure that it was a legit request for sponsorship of event, not personal.

After Delilah had met up with the MOHA officers, it drained her mentally. There were so many official doc.u.ments and tasks that she needed to do. Other than writing a letter and so forth, she would also need to meet with other government bodies.

Currently, Delilah was writing a report to be submitted to the government offices. And it was kind of tiring, especially when the people there were too rigid and strict in the format. And this was the third time she had changed the report. All because they were not satisfied with how Delilah wrote it. Informing her via the email that there were something missing and whatnot. It was making her stress more, thinking about the reports.

Other than that, there were more changes and feedbacks from both Howard and Matt. Whenever Delilah made changes, instructed by Matt, Howard would find fault in it and tell her to change it. And whenever Delilah made changes, instructed by Howard, Matt would find it unsatisfactory and tell her to change it once again. It was making her frustrated. It was hard when you have two bosses who have different opinions. Yet, whenever they meet up with each other, they would say to each other, ‘Good job’. When in fact, they were not satisfied with each other’s opinions.

Delilah sighed to herself. ‘Men, I can never understand them.’

To Aubree, she said, “Still hanging there.”

Aubree patted her on the shoulder and said, “Hang in there more.”

Minutes later, Delilah received a text message from one of her friends from high school. She was still in contact with Meena. It was just that they hardly meet each other, ever since Delilah had been busy with work and Meena was busy with her outside work activities. She was an active kick-boxer, who goes off to the gym nearly everyday after work.

She tapped on the message on her phone and read the message. Her eyes widened in shock after reading the texts, her eyes brimmed with tears. She wiped away the tears with the back of her hand, while holding her phone with another.

Meena just texted her that one of their friends from high school, Brianna, just passed away. It was really shocking and sad.

Delilah thought of the day when she last saw her with Meena. They had coincidentally met during the travel fair two years ago. Brianna was the same bubbly friend, who greeted them with big smiles and hugs. It was a shock to find out that she already had cancer when they last met. She looked healthy, back then. There were no signs of her being sick. She was too young to die. In fact, she was actually too young, back then to have a child. Before Brianna died, she was already a divorcee with two little children.

This so disheartened Delilah that she could not find words to reply back to Meena. And unfortunately, Delilah could not go to the burial nor to Brianna’s house for the prayers because she had to work overtime.

She had to stay-back because she has so many things to do that was due tomorrow.

Soon after, Delilah sent a quick reply to Meena, telling her that she could not go with her that night but instead, will join her at other nights. Delilah felt guilty about missing the prayers for her late friend. But there was nothing else she could do but mourned quietly.

After she had sent the message, she tried to continue working on her tasks but it proved to be quite difficult. She could not help but reminisce about the fun times she had with Brianna. Although, Brianna was not a close friend as Meena was to her but she was a good friend. She always had fun with her; studying, playing and joking around.

Delilah clenched her fists determinedly as she stared down at the reports that she was working on. ‘No, I must concentrate on my work’, she thought firmly to herself. There was no use mourning over regrets and sadness. All I can do is pray for her life and finish this.

She then continued her work until an hour later.

She quickly packed her things and switched off her computer.

Delilah was on her way to her car when her phone rings. She was surprised to see it was her sister who was calling her. Thinking that something must have happened or something, she answered the call.

“Hello?” Delilah answered.

“Hey, Meena just texted me. Are you okay?”

Delilah frowned as she unlocked her car. “Yeah…” she said slowly, confused. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Heard about Brianna’s.”

Delilah let out a soft laugh. “Ah, I see,” she said. “I’m okay. No worries about it. I can just go to her house some other nights,” she continued, as she got inside her car. She then leaned back against the driver’s seat, not in a rush to go home.

“Want to go out and grab some ice-cream?”

Delilah quickly sat straight and frowned. “What’s this about? What about Kael? Who is taking care of him now?”

Miya laughed. “Don’t worry about Kael. His dad is taking care of him now.”

Delilah rolled her eyes.

“Come on! I’ll treat you to some honey toast!” Miya pleaded, when there was no answer from Delilah’s.

“Why are you being so nice to me?” Delilah frowned. Suspicion leaked in her voice. Doubt can be heard from her tone when Delilah heard her sister treating her to a dessert.

“I’ve always been nice!” Miya protested. “You need a sister night out and I’m treating you to a honey toast!”

Delilah rolled her eyes again. “Fine fine. Where shall we meet?” she asked, as she switched on the ignition.

“Ahhh… about that…” Miya said slowly.

Delilah stopped, waiting for Miya to continue.

“Can you pick me up at home? I’m too lazy to drive. Hehe,” Miya giggled.

Delilah groaned. “Fine, fine. Give me a few minutes.”

After Delilah had picked up Miya from home, she then drive them to a dessert shop that specialized in desserts. One of their bestsellers were the honey toasts.

Luckily, when the two women had arrived at the shop, it was still open and there wasn’t many people inside the shop.

The shop was quite quaint with the walls painted light cream and vintage caf string lights all over the ceilings. There were soft faint music playing in the background, with sounds of light chatters and laughter inside, giving the place a homey kind of atmosphere. When Delilah and Miya walked inside the caf, they were greeted with cheery hellos from the baristas.

They chose a table, which was not far from the entrance and sat down. A waitress then came up to them, handing a menu to each of them. Both women skimmed through the menu, all the while, keep asking each other, “What will you have?”

Once the waitress had taken their orders, Miya began to coax Delilah to start talking. She said that she should not keep it all to herself. So, Delilah did. She talked about work and about her time with Brianna. She did not expect that Brianna would die so young. She did have some regrets of not meeting up with Brianna often.

Miya stood up and gave her a hug, patting her on the back.

A tear drop from a corner of Delilah’s eyes. She took a deep breath as she did not want to weep in public.

Just then, their dessert came. The two of them had ordered a honey toast with two ice lemon teas. They decided to share the honey toast since it was a large one.

The two women decided to take a break from their conversation and just enjoy their food.

Delilah picked up a small bowl filled with honey from the tray and poured it all over the honey toast, The honey dripped onto the vanilla ice-cream which was on top of the warm buttery bread cubes. There were also slices of strawberries by the side of the honey toast, sprinkled with icing sugar.

Both Delilah and Miya took a small fork and stab through one of the bread cubes. Delilah brought the cube to her mouth and ate it. The bread cube felt soft and fluffy in her mouth. The sweetness from the honey and icing sugar combined with the buttery toast, it felt like heaven had just descended inside her mouth.

Delilah scooped some of the ice-cream, together with the bread cube and eat it. The smooth ice-cream melted into the bread cube, making it more softer and spongey. It tasted so delicious that the two of them concentrated on eating the toast, rather than talking. They even ate the loaf shell of the toast, which was crunchy and sweet.

Just as Delilah was about to take the last piece of the bread cube, Miya had pushed Delilah’s fork away with her own fork. “This is mine!” she said, stabbing on the last piece.

Delilah rolled her eyes and let her sister take the last piece. She smiled, watching her sister eats. It was good to know that a sister can be your best friend too. They DEE-finitely know when you need someone to cheer you up.