It is hard to be incognito when someone has eight arms.

Mahadevi (she still thought of herself as such, even though she had a mortal name) was grateful for the winter in New York. She wrapped herself in a bulky yet stylish coat, pressing six of her arms as close to her body as possible; she looked a lot less graceful than she would have liked, but not out of the ordinary. Someone as fabulous as her had to try really hard to look ordinary... so she opted for "celebrity incognito" instead, with large dark glasses and an expensive hand-woven scarf wound around her head. That should do it, she concluded, glancing into a mirror. For heaven's sake, she wasn't even wearing make-up.

Walking into the small shop she lingered in the doorway for a moment; it was hard for her to decide whether it was supposed to be a café or a bookstore. What did people do in these situations when there were no servants around to place an order and hand in a request?...

"Um... Good day?"

Being employed was more tiring than being a student. He thought he was doing well about not slacking off, though. He had to avoid lazing about; he wasn't nearly good enough at his job to afford it, and he definitely couldn't afford to lose this job. So he got up as early as he had to, and trekked over here on whatever days they told him to, and looked forward to his first paycheck as if it were a vague dream of salvation.

At least no spectacularly upset people had come into the mixed-use store on any of his shifts so far. If the majority of his customers felt anything, it was neither negative nor powerful enough to claw into his own head and torment him. His coworkers were fairly accommodating even if it was hard to tell what was inexperience, what was asocial awkwardness, and what was emotional overstimulation.

He could be honest to himself. It was all emotional overstimulation.

Customer! No more time for introspection, just painfully awkward attempts at customer service.

Her confusion was rather more literally palpable than to most people as Yun approached, an obvious employee with his neat appearance and barely-worn, hand-scrawled name tag (which was more occupied by 'trainee' than by 'Yun'). "Welcome," he said quietly. "What has you confused?"

>>"Welcome. What has you confused?"

The question did not make her any less confused. Were waiters supposed to ask questions like that? Was her confusion that obvious? What was the normal answer?...

"I'm..." she paused, looking around for an idea "Do you serve hot beverages?"

That was normal, right? People buying a vaguely questionable hot beverage from someone they had just met?

"I would like to purchase a hot beverage." she pushed on, mustering some of her usual confidence. "And also a book."

Confusion level increasing. Great, what had he done? Now he was confused and it was definitely a double dose. Let's see. He had-

A question he could answer! His own relief pushed the confusion back a bit and he caught his breath. Okay. ""We do. Coffee, tea, hot chocolate. Variations on each of them too. Mostly on the coffee and tea, anyway. I think we only have one kind of hot chocolate, but-" Stop talking. Breathe.

"The books are in the back. You can browse while I prepare your drink, if you like. Is there anything in particular you were looking for?" Besides an answer to whatever had her confused. Confused people were so confusing...

>>"We do. Coffee, tea, hot chocolate. Variations on each of them too. Mostly on the coffee and tea, anyway. I think we only have one kind of hot chocolate, but-"

"I would like green tea, please."

That was at the same time the least confident and the least elaborate order for tea that the goddess had ever done in her life. She was sure it was enough to defuse the situation, though. One of her arms twitched under the coat.

>>"The books are in the back. You can browse while I prepare your drink, if you like. Is there anything in particular you were looking for?"

"I am looking for... Well. I'll take a look."

She needed to figure out what she needed to know before she could find out how to go about knowing it...

Green tea. He could manage green tea. He knew how to make tea. There was nothing confusing about making tea. "Do you want anything in your tea?" He started edging towards the counter so he could start on the tea. He felt like he was about to forget, or think that he had forgotten, how to make tea. It was just tea. Tea was easy to make. He didn't even have to judge water temperature because the kettle thing did that for him.

If he didn't have to help her find a book, he could focus on the tea. Okay. No more need to be confused. He needed to just sit by the kettle and clear his head. Distance would probably help. It usually did, and more than anything else.

>>"Do you want anything in your tea?"

She paused on her way to the book shelves. Did she? What did her servants put into the tea to make it taste like... tea should taste like? And would a mundane little shop like this even have the necessary ingredients?

"Honey." she said the first thing that came to her mind "And cinnamon."

That should be good.

The goddess moved to the bookshelves and started reading some of the titles. She reached out for a few, reminding herself in the last minute that she could only use two hands. The rest of her arms twitched again on reflex under her coat. It was harder to keep them still than she'd expected.

Now, where were the books on how mortals live?...

Honey was reasonably normal. Not everyone liked granulated sugar. Cinnamon, though, was something Yun had never heard of as an additive to green tea. Chai had cinnamon in it, but green tea? Some people had odd tastes. However unexpected, though, Yun was content to let people like their own things. He even knew roughly where a container of cinnamon was to be found, and went to dig it out while the confused woman wandered to the books.

With every step that grew between them, the external confusion faded. Some of it remained, of course, since they weren't really that far apart, and he certainly had his own share of confusion now, but it was less overwhelming. He had survived without finding an excuse to sneak into the back to burrow into his blanket! That was good, especially since he would have had to leave the front of the store largely unsupervised. With the luck of the newbie, that would have been when everyone arrived and left and the place would explode with angry, impatient customers and unpaid bills.

Stress reduction. The electric kettle clicked and he set the green tea to steeping, then mixed in some honey and cinnamon until the honey had dissolved. He threw a bit more cinnamon on top while he was at it, and then carried it over to where he could still see the woman. And her twitching coat.

Eh, if she had a dog or something under there, it was clearly marvellously well-behaved and unlikely to cause a problem. He wasn't going to open that sort of confrontation. "Here's your tea," he said politely. "I hope I put the right amounts of everything in for you."

>>"Here's your tea. I hope I put the right amounts of everything in for you."

She hoped so too. The tea smelled... vaguely familiar, but not quite right. Was it supposed to be green tea, or some other kind of tea?
How did she not know what her favorite tea was?

She was holding a book in one hand, and reached out with the other. Her arms twitched again on instinct to help out with the task, and she blushed, holding them pressed against her body.

"Thank you." she hesitated, then decided to take a seat at a nearby table. She still felt awkward as an everyday person, and she also felt awkward about feeling awkward.

"I am looking to read a book about how people live."

Yun blinked. Was she embarrassed about accepting the cup from him? The timing seemed weird, but what else could it be? He hesitated himself as she moved to an empty table close by, and was about to try to decide to return to his counter when she spoke again.

"How... people live?" Yun's confusion and awkwardness were all his own now. "Like, biologically or, uh, culturally - um, or I guess emotionally or something? We don't have much of a science-y section but the self-help section's a bit bigger, and the travel section is mostly vacation ideas?" He was probably completely misinterpreting what she wanted, but he was so confuuuuuused. He couldn't think of any more ways to take 'how people live' than those three, but he felt like he should do a better job of understanding.

And he couldn't even play the 'I'm not a mind-reader' card, could he? That just added to the awkwardness. There was so much he wasn't getting but needed in order to handle this situation properly. It was just awkward awkward AWKWARD.

>>"How... people live? Like, biologically or, uh, culturally - um, or I guess emotionally or something? We don't have much of a science-y section but the self-help section's a bit bigger, and the travel section is mostly vacation ideas?"

Wow, this mort... this young man was not helpful at all. Mahadevi sipped some tea, trying to win time to consider her options, and burned her tongue. She had never been handed tea before that was not heated to just the right temperature. What did they pay these bookstore servants for?...

"Culturally" she concluded, making an annoyed face at the cup "How people live in this country. I am... I come from India, and I did not have a lot of experience living here. I was hoping there is a book that reveals how people are supposed to live in the United States."

Was there such a manual, or all the people living in the country were just kind of winging it? She wouldn't have been surprised if they did. Clearly their skills with tea were lacking.