Just a silly humor/ romance that's been stuck in my head.Of Shakes, Pranks and Enclosed Spaces (1/3)
Part I
"Welcome to the Milkshake Barn. We do ice cream, malts, shakes, burgers, hotdogs, corndogs, fries, onion rings"-deep breath- "fried chicken, mac-n-cheese, coleslaw, ribs, basic bar-b-q, specialties, parties and kosher. What may I get you?"
"...Yeah. We'll take a few milkshakes."
"How would you like your milkshakes?"
"I don't know. What's better? I'm sure you have experience. Do you like it shaken or stirred?"
Muffled laughter erupted from the other side of the counter.
Tawny rolled her eyes and adjusted her white 'Milkshake Barn' hat. She couldn't really complain, she had heard lamer but better proposed pick-ups from midgets (Which was a highly disappointing combination). It was pathetic- if she was given a quarter for every time she heard that tired line, she'd be rich, or at least rich enough so that she wouldn't have to work in this low-rate sight for sore eyes.
"Nice try," she muttered. They were like, ten years old. (She retracted the midget comment. It wouldn't do to insult highly volatile people, albeit silently.) They must've been trying some of those smooth pick-up lines they'd heard from somewhere. Unfortunately, they weren't old enough to know that not many original lines were left in the world.
Ignoring their disappointed groans, and one gripe of, "Nice going jerkwad," she waited patiently for them to choose.
"We'll take two strawberry shakes and one super-thick mocha fudge. With extra whipped cream."
'Right,' she thought. Like the world needed more hyper children. Tapping the buttons on the register with ease she told them the amount, "5.49."
A ten-dollar bill was passed over the counter, and she handed them correct change. She thought about giving them a slip of paper with her number on it -just for kicks-, but it wouldn't do to encourage them.
Unfortunately as she made sure the change was safely across, she noticed the hand that was jiggling loose change over the small plastic cup labeled TIPS.
The kid seemed to ponder something and turned to her, "If you go out with me, I won't do this."
He had to be on crack, "In your dreams, brat. And for the final time, I don't date little snots like you. You've been coming here for a month now, and my answer isn't going to change."
Shrugging he let the change loose, "Suit yourself."
The change clinked and clashed as it reached the bottom of the cup, and seemingly the entire room went silent. Even the talking stopped. It was sadly humiliating. She was going to be the first one of the day to make a fool of herself. Again.
'Darn it.'
People weren't supposed to look! That made everything even worse. Sucking in a deep breath, she rolled her eyes again at the positively wicked smile on the boy's face.
In a gruff, Fat Albert kind of voice, she spoke clearly enough so that she wouldn't have to repeat herself, "Thanks for the tip, I love me some tips, they are simply bovine. " a little less graciously she added, "Mooooooo." With that spoken, she hurriedly, she left to make their orders, awaiting the sound that made her ears burn.
Laughter exploded in pure boyish frenzy that soon became an all-too-common hysteria that she was used to. A few costumers in other lines chuckled. Who wouldn't? To see people humiliate themselves and get cheap food while doing so? Even people from two towns away stopped by to marvel.
But again, she couldn't really complain over her situation. All the sympathy needed to go to their faithful mascot- Bessy the Cow- who had to stand outside in the sweltering summer heat to attract new and diverse costumers. The poor cow was almost run over three times (apparently by the same guy in a truck) while standing alone on the sidewalk carrying her sign: Try the Milkshake Barn for your next pit stop. It's so bovine; it'll make you want to mooo! Every so often, in a metallic voice (thanks to a handy wearable voice-alterer) Bessy would scare pedestrians as she talked, switching from 'Moo!' to 'Try the Mmmmmilkshake Barn! Our mmmoooshakes are always creamy and fresh. Stop by our pasture for a great bovine treat!' Bessy the Bovine wasn?t always lonely, though. In fact, she had lots of company. Take those kids for instance... they spent a whole afternoon with her, circling her merrily as they covered her in pink toilet paper and silly string. A few neighborhood dogs even stopped by to relieve themselves on Bessy'?s useful legs. And then there were the radical vegetarians from Greenwich Village who stood by Bessy for three hours carrying picket signs that advocated the 'Sweet Nectar of the Mistreated Bovines.' Or milk as the normal people in the world referred to it as. That little demonstration was stopped when an unsuspecting teenager walked by eating a Milkshake Barn cheeseburger deluxe. The vegetarians flipped out, some of them attacked and chased the poor kid all the way up to interstate I9, while the rest brought their van and attempted to take Bessy for ransom in order to protest the false advertising of Milkshake Barn. The police came by to take care of that messy situation, and Bessy- bound and bagged, not gagged apparently- was rescued.
Apparently the poor cow never recovered from that ordeal, and was out on mental health for a week. Now, the person in the suit (who never quit) stands closer to the actual building, as signs replaced her need to stand by the street.
In fact, Tawny thought as she started the milkshake machine, she had never seen the person who was Bessy. She quickly shrugged it off as 'Bessy's' attempt to keep pride and dignity, a difficult feat at the Milkshake Barn.
Within moments, she returned to the counter, handing the milkshakes over to the rotten kids as they shuffled in their pockets for more change. They groaned collectively as they realized they only had one value-less Chuck-E-Cheese token between them and walked out.
Sighing, Tawny waited for the next costumer. Her line was empty, and there were just a few people in the store, but they didn't bother coming to her register, which was all right with her. Her shift was almost anyway, so she would be able to leave just before afternoon rush hour, the beginning of Milkshake Barn's busy hours. Idly, she watched the seconds go by on the large cow clock hanging over the doors.
Shaking her head, she straightened as the bells on the doors jingled loudly, signaling the arrival of more costumers. Her eyes fell upon the familiar young man walking towards her. The brunette pulled off his sunglasses and began to glance upwards at the overhead menu.
It took her a while to recognize the hair, the eyes, the face structure. Soon, his eyes shifted to hers and widened.
"Tawny?"
"Hello, Jonson."
She'd always called him by his last name, it was habit since elementary. Andy Jonson was her biggest rival, and just about everybody in town knew it. It started out as child's play when they were in second grade- stealing toys, pulling hair, pushing, shoving. By the time they were eleven, it had elevated to dangerous means; gluing one another to chairs (something she still hasn't forgiven him for), throwing spitballs, feigning notes written by the other, telling lies, spreading rumors, tripping, insulting... It just got worse when they entered high school, because in high school, you could pit a whole group of people against the other. Thus began group pranks and the fight for the best prank of the summer. But half a year ago she started easing on her payback- or in her words- she began maturing. She didn't really care about it anymore, so she just stopped. Well... she didn't stop insulting him, but she did stop playing pranks. School had let out just a month earlier, and not having seen Jonson for that long, she actually forgot about the summer prank that they had been competing for three years running. Frankly, she didn't really care- just as long a Jonson didn't do anything to make her retaliate violently, they were A-okay.
Jonson smirked- an aggravatingly smug smirk-, "I didn't know you worked here."
She could spot his fib a mile away. He probably had been asking about her and tracked her down here.
Tawny never batted an eyelash, "I didn't know you had a life. Surprises are everywhere, I guess."
The tiny, infuriating smile never left his face, "Good to see you haven't lost your humor."
Her mouth opened to give a flippant response, but she felt the burning gaze of her manager at her back. Somebody probably complained about her yelling at those stuck-up brats. Gritting her teeth, she schooled her face into a mask of indifference.
"What can I get you, sir?"
Jonson's smirk only widened, "An extra-thick mocha fudge swirl. Lots of milk."
For the moment, she allowed herself to slip back into work mode, and went through the process of making the milkshake first, squashing down the urge to add rock salt into the blender (it wouldn't have been poisonous, she assured her conscience). There was no point, her conscience said, really no point in playing a trick on Jonson, especially if he had only come for a milkshake. How was she to know if he wasn't actually being a normal 17-year-old today? Heck, she didn't know, but it was always good to be kind, right? Just to show her kind trail of thought, she added more fudge swirl than was promoted to the chocolately mixture, piled on the whipped cream and added a maraschino cherry on top. Plopping a spoon and straw next to the generously prepared drink, she pushed it over the counter before tapping the correct buttons on her register.
"That'll be 2.80"
He didn't reply, didn't question her on anything. He just dug around in his pockets, pulling out three one-dollar bills...
(She congratulated herself silently on her self-control. She took the bills from him and gave him back twenty cents.)
... and a whole pocket-ful of change.
An absolutely wicked smile (not unlike that of the kids before him) came over his features as he gestured to the tip cup containing a few nickels.
"I take it somebody tipped you?"
Damning her conscience, she shrugged absently, "What do you care? Anybody can leave tips."
Disappointment seemed to gleam in his eyes, "But anything that causes you humiliation should be left to me."
"You're sick."
"I'm unique."
A few coins dropped into the cup. She was half-tempted to tell him to take his shake and get lost, but with the manager watching her like a hawk, she couldn't do it. She was at Jonson's mercy, for however long he decided to prolong it.
"Mooooo." It was near silent.
Jonson leaned forward, "What was that? I can't hear you."
Tawny glared, "Bite me."
Clink, clink.
"I'm not doing that again."
He smirked, "As I believe, you have to respond to each separate tip you receive, which basically means that I can sit here all day and put coins in, and as long as I don't put it all in at once, you'll have to keep mooing."
"Jerk" she half-hoped that he didn't hear her, but his supersonic hearing won out. How did he know that anyway?
"What was that, Tawny?" his voice raised a bit- okay, a lot- louder, "What did you call me?"
Ears and cheeks burning as all eyes turned towards her, she said the only thing she could. "Mooooo."
A few more coins dropped in.
"Moooo."
A few more. She took a deep breath to calm her nerves.
"Mooooo."
"Awww, come on, with some enthusiasm." He had the nerve to complain while he was torturing and embarrassing her? Oooh, Jerk!
He did a heck of a job getting on her bad side. She could feel the anger flare up with her as she clenched her fists tighter.
He let the rest of the coins fall into the cup, or so she thought. With a relieved sigh, she closed her eyes, "Moooo."
Thank God her five minutes of hell was over. Now he could go away, she could go home, and then take her frustrations out on her father's punching bag in the basement.
Thinking that he had left she turned around, ready to leave when his voice floated back into her ears.
"Did you forget something Tawny?"
She paused, half afraid to turn back around to face the bane of her existence. Against her oh-so-wise conscience, she whirled around to face the costumer from hell as he leaned against the counter, sunglasses covering his eyes, and one shiny silver coin in between his finger and thumb.
"One more time," he said as he winked. The wink contained so much arrogant superiority that she had to literally hold down her right hand so that she wouldn't slap him.
He tossed the coin in casually, and it made a heavy plunk as it joined the rest of the silver money.
Maybe if she had just kept her cool, everything would have been fine. The costumers wouldn't have responded so passionately, granted, but the day -at least- would have been fine. For her and the rest of the staff.
Instead, she gave into the second urge she had been feeling and told him to get lost.
Jonson blinked and frowned. He hadn't expected that apparently, "What?"
"You heard me. Take your shake and go. Leave, scram, get out."
"No."
With a disbelieving snort and chuckle, Tawny shook her head, "You are such an idiot."
Tawny was a complex person with many different emotions, just like everybody else. But when Tawny was mad -angry, rather- she tended to lose rational thought for one common focus: either attack (violently), or payback in full later. Right now, Tawny was mad. Pissed, infuriated, angered, whatever you called it. She had been humiliated at her job before, those kids were proof of it, but never had it culminated all at once. Majority of the people she worked with also attended the same school as her. So they knew the hate relationship that she and Jonson had. They knew about all those pranks he had performed on her in the past year, and they knew that she had stopped retaliating by the beginning of the second semester. She would accept the humiliation with her head held high, no matter how embarrassing the situation. Granted, it was really hard to do so when he had locked her in the boy's locker room right before the soccer team came in to shower, but nonetheless, she didn't retaliate. They all (her classmates) knew that one day she would explode from it all. They just didn't know when, so they anticipated every showdown. So isn't it great that when it happened, half of their class had just stepped in for lunch right after their trip to Brighton Beach?
And so Tawny did the most dangerous thing she could do. She pushed her conscience aside.
"Wha-?"
"What do I have to do, Jonson? Every single time I just walk away, but you keep coming back. What? You're not satisfied? Not content with knowing that you've humiliated me in front of the entire school?" she paused, "Oh maybe you want a reaction. Is that it Jonson? You want to get a rise out of me?"
She ignored his silence and kept speaking, her voice getting louder "What do you want, huh? You want me to moo? You like hearing me sound like a stupid cow? Do you? Well fine, I just have to appease the costumer, seeing as the costumer is always right."
"Tawny, maybe you should cal-"
"What? Calm down? Nah, I don't think so. This has been building up for a while. Try this: Moo! Oh, wait that wasn't good enough was it? MOO! You like that, huh? Let good ole' Tawny make a fool out herself. MOO! MOO! Moo, darn you, moo! Moo, Moo, Moo!"
Her face was flushed and red, her chest heaving from all the yelling she had done. Throwing her cap onto the counter she gripped it as she spoke in an even, eerily calm tone, "I don't know what to do anymore. I try being civil, I tried being nice to drop you enough hints that I was ending this all. That I was tired of acting like a child for momentary satisfaction." She looked up at his blank face, which was devoid of any emotion and only served to infuriate her again, "I hate you. You are a selfish, immature, idiotic, uncaring, son-of-a pig! I've grown up, why can't you? Why can't you leave me alone? I was calm and enjoying my summer break, believing that I had put all those pranks and things behind me, and then you walk in, I try to be kind, I even made this milkshake for you, gave you generous helpings so that you would see that I could be nice. Then you, by just being your infuriating self, cause me to fly completely off my handle, I might lose my job for yelling at a costumer, but I deserve to defend myself for dealing with and entire semester of your crap, and you better believe that you deserve it, you jerk."
He just stared back at her, his sunglasses veiling his eyes, eyes that would have told her if she struck a nerve, if any of her words made him rethink his actions. He acted as though he hadn't heard a word that she had spoken. She felt the anger return at his lack of response, and she itched to give into her next urge: throw-something-at-his-face.
"Is that all you're gonna say?" he finally responded.
Grasping his untouched mocha fudge swirl with melting whipped cream; she eyed it before shaking her head no.
Standing up on her tiptoes, she poured the drink in its entirety over his head. The chocolate, fudge, and white cream oozed down his face, staining his white shirt and eventually his jeans. Catching the cherry, she placed it on his crown.
"Now I'm done. A human sundae" She stated with satisfaction. It wasn't exactly throwing something, but it worked. She felt the weight of seven months worth of frustration being lifted off her. A few kids cheered in the background and clapped.
Standing up straight, she gave him a bright smile, "Thank you for your patronage. I hope that you help yourself to one of Milkshake Barn's genuine napkins, seeing as though you are dripping on our floors. We hope that you have an unpleasant day and that the door hits you on your way out."
With that, she turned around, breezing past her dumbstruck manager, and heading out the back exit, leaving behind the loud applause and cheers of "Go, Tawny!" behind her as she marched towards her parked car.
If she were really paying attention to Jonson, though, she would have noticed the tenseness in his shoulders, the way his fists were clenched, and the determined line his mouth was set in.
Most of all, if she had glanced in the tip cup, she would have noticed that Jonson had given her fifteen dollars...
-In quarters.
End Part I