when she had heard there would be a halloween market—or an autumn market, more like, since it's taking place a few days after halloween—jiahn knew immediately that she would be signing up to vend. not only does she keep getting requests to bring back baked goods, but she hadn't been able to do as much as she had hoped she could once the semester started.
the pop-quizzes and midterms and assignments really took a toll on her want to craft or come up with market slash vending ideas. so the last time she had tabled was literally during yeonchella when she had been helping out at the anime club's booth. which felt like a lifetime ago. so she was itching to get her own table. it had been approved relatively quickly, and she wonders vaguely if agatha had been the one to see her application again.
she makes a mental note to ask her friend if she saw her during the event.
either way though, she threw herself into finishing all her required work early so she could focus on baking the rest of the weekend. aside from stopping to submit her pumpkin and trick-or-treating a little, she mostly spent the rest of the weekend baking. especially since her newest obsession, sogum bbang, took so much longer than expected to make.
BUT. SO WORTH IT. when she had bitten into one, fresh from the oven, she had almost died, truly. ascended to heaven, or whatever. she had saved a few for herself to snack on, and to give to joon, but the rest were being packaged up to be sold. and she had even made a season flavour, adding some pumpkin. so she was absolutely ready for this market. and she had tried her best to make her own apple cider, though that had also been a lot more work than she had expected.
when sunday rolls around though, she's up nice and early to set up her table, putting up her newest rendition of her prodbyzinnia sign and making sure she had all of her business cards before she enlisted the help of a few friends to bring everything out. (who she paid with pastries, of course.) her spread looks perfect, and it gets busy the moment the market starts.
she adjusts her bow when she has a moment to breathe, taking a sip from her water bottle to soothe her throat—who knew she could yap so much about pumpkin flavoured pastries? and stardew?—before she turns and sees someone else perusing her table.
it's someone in the art club, jiahn is pretty sure, though they've never talked before.
"hi!" she greets, adjusting her overalls and smiling pleasantly. she's trying not to overshare or intrude in his decision-making but it really does look like he's overthinking some pastries. "i made everything fresh, and taste-tested them all personally," she says, wanting to reassure him that everything on her table tasted good.
pausing, she considers whether it would be worth it to upsell a little, thinking maybe he just can't decide on which one he wants. "if you buy 3 pastries, i'll throw in a fourth one for free," she says, lowering her voice conspiratorially and winking. "or, alternatively, a cup of warm, homemade, apple cider, if you would rather have that!"