Diligence 4 - Filigree

As she walked, Filigree debated what she should have for lunch today. There were a few cafés with food around the Heavenly Embassy, which was a blessing for the tourists, residents, and volunteers alike. Even if Primrose harped on about how cooking for oneself was better for the mind and spirit, she knew perfectly well he didn’t like doing it for lunch as much as she didn’t.

Just before she actually left the offices, Primrose caught her and dropped a thick bag of coffee beans into her arms. “Take this to Beanny, I don’t have time,” he said curtly.

“Got it,” she replied. “Can you get the door for me, though?” There was no way she could get that thing open on her own…

Primrose sighed, and moved to open it, holding it for her. “I’ll see you after lunch,” he said.

“See you then,” she called back.

Paradise Café hadn’t really been her intent, as they didn’t really serve food. Still… she could probably ask one of the other cafés to bring her food there. Beanny wasn’t really territorial, and since Filigree’s lunch break was being interrupted by delivering to her, she’d likely be fine with it. She could get a drink there to go with it all.

So she made a stop at one of the ones nearby. “Could I get an arugula salad sandwich?” she asked the clerk. “And… a croissant. Also, could you deliver them to Paradise Café for me? I have to deliver this thing there and…”

“Don’t have enough hands to carry it all, yeah,” the clerk said, shaking their head.

Filigree certainly proved that trying to pay - but she managed it eventually. “Thank you,” she called as she headed off to Beanny’s shop. Her arms ached already, she really wasn’t much for working out. (Thank goodness Primrose’s concept of diligence didn’t involve lots of physical strength…)

The bell rang overhead as she pushed the door open with her shoulder and stepped inside. Peaceful music played in the café, and Beanny was standing at the far end of the shop, taking an order from a bun seated at one of the tables.

“Oh, Filigree? I thought Prim was going to deliver that!” Beanny hurried over to meet Filigree in the middle of the shop, taking the bag of coffee beans from her. “And making you do it during lunch no less…” She tsk’ed, going to deposit the bag of beans in the back. “I’d guess you have to dash so you have time to eat?”

“I’m having one of the other cafés bring my food here, I didn’t have enough hands so…”

“Smart,” Beanny commented, chuckling. “Well I’ll make you some coffee to go with it, I suppose. Can’t go wrong with a warm drink - what did you get? I’ll make something to complement it.”

“I got an arugula salad sandwich and a croissant.” It wasn’t anything too exciting - just some nice crisp greens, some zesty dressing, and bread, of course.

“Got it,” Beanny said. “I think an angora au lait will pair nice with that croissant for you.”

Filigree watched curiously as Beanny worked, though her attention was drawn away for a few moments by the delivery of her food. She thanked the clerk for it before they raced back to work, grateful they had been willing to help her.

Then Beanny was back, depositing a pretty pink mug and saucer in front of her, and settling into the chair across from her. “Did he say why he was having you deliver?”

“No, he just said he didn’t have time,” Filigree said, shrugging.

Beanny sighed. “Of course he didn’t… He takes too much on and doesn’t give himself time to live.” She watched intently as Filigree took a sip of her coffee.

“Oh, it’s sweet,” she said. Whenever she’d had other coffees, they’d been… pretty bitter, really.

“It’s part of the flavor the beans get from being grown in the Embassy,” Beanny said, smiling. “He groused about it a lot when I started it… but I make sure I give back, and it helps in its own way.”

“I don’t think I’ve seen the coffee garden,” Filigree mused. “…he’s had me helping in one of the ambrosia greenhouses.”

The cherubun chuckled softly. “I maintain the garden with the coffee beans myself, generally, and one of the storerooms there holds my harvests. I usually try to bring enough over each day to handle customers, but there’s been a bit of a rush today, so I’d asked him…” She shrugged. “Whatever works.”

“He’s said the work of gardening is about testing diligence,” Filigree said. Recalling her conversation with Dove when she had delivered tea leaves, she was curious what Beanny would think.

“He’s still on that?” Beanny snorted. “Work is work, I don’t think there’s any test to it. It helps us out that succubuns can work in the gardens and greenhouses, of course - there’s not enough of us who want to work with the embassy to let that be something only cherubuns could handle anyways. Might be more if Primrose wasn’t the one running it… but it’s the only way he could let himself fall, I guess.”

Filigree felt confused as she tried dipping her croissant in the sweet angora au lait. “You… think he’s a bad fit for it?”

“No, no,” Beanny said, waving a hand. “He’s perfectly fine at the work, and his focus on helping is important. Some cherubuns who fall just don’t like how preachy he can be, so they don’t want to deal with him. Same reason a lot of succubuns don’t, though ironically, I think sometimes succubuns tolerate him better just because they’ve got no background in it.”

The croissant tasted good in the coffee, so Filigree was happy on that front at least. “Do you not really… subscribe to the whole virtues thing?”

“I don’t think I’d put it like that,” she said after a long moment. “I think the virtues are as real as the vices, but I don’t think I’d say I put any of them above each other. They’re all just parts of living. I don’t think anyone’s lesser for engaging with a vice, nor are they better for following a virtue. They’re just living in the ways they find best. Don’t let him get to you.”

“…I don’t think he’s really getting to me,” Filigree said, bemused. “If he bothered me that much, I can’t imagine I’d keep volunteering. I just… want to understand, is all.”

“I see… Well, I think if I had to define diligence, I guess I’d define it more as ‘care’ than I would endurance, which is what I think Prim considers it.” Beanny pressed a finger to her chin considering. “I don’t agree with the rigid ideas of the virtues that Melangel raised us with - it’s why a lot of us left, after all - but I think they’re still worthwhile. Just don’t let Primrose get you to thinking his definition is all there is to it.”

“That’s fair,” Filigree said. She’d gotten similar enough answers from Beanny the first time she had visited the café while confused about the garden of virtues, so it tracked.

The conversation moved on to other things easily enough, before Beanny had to go take more orders as a flock of new customers arrived.

Soon enough, Filigree was done with her lunch and heading back to the embassy to resume reading over a particularly lengthy contract for a wanna-be movie star. She didn’t think Beanny and Prim’s definitions of diligence were quite as different as they thought, honestly, but maybe she just didn’t understand the ins and outs of it. She wondered if she would ever understand… It did occur to her as she walked back to the Embassy, that maybe there was a reason Primrose had her making these deliveries he normally made himself. It could also play a role in ‘testing’ her diligence - would she care enough to ask? Would she accept just what he said, or would she verify?

That was a form of it she was plenty familiar with, and she smiled to think it, suddenly feeling like she was on much more familiar ground in spite of everything. Maybe at the end of it she would actually understand diligence - and maybe something further about the cherubuns themselves.

Until then - and really, even if it never materialized, and even if it did, she had work to do.