Chapter Text
Saturday, October 11th
“—and your total comes to…$70.87. Will that be cash or card?”
The customer currently ordering just stares at the total displayed on the register. Pomni internally groans, already knowing what he was about to say.
“Bullshit! That’s way too expensive!” spits out Human Baby. That was not what he was called, obviously. It was the name that the Spudsy’s crew members came up with. At first Pomni thought everyone was being rather cruel about the regular's appearance, but as soon as Human Baby walked in on her third shift—she couldn’t help but agree.
“Sir, I don’t control the prices,” sighs Pomni. Even if she did, the sheer amount of large cheese pizzas Human Baby orders will always end up being expensive. Today, he ordered six of them. Six! What did he even expect?
Human Baby sniffs and shakes his head, “Y’all are a bit too overpriced for me—good thing I’m starving.”
Clearly.
“Are you paying with cash or card?”
Pomni resists the urge to snort when Human Baby pulls out his Pokémon themed wallet. If there’s one thing you need to know about him, it’s that Human Baby loves Pokémon. Hell, he was wearing Pokémon merch head to toe. She doesn’t watch anime, but Pomni always hears her shift manager Gangle complaining about how expensive merch is. Human Baby must be loaded with money.
He pays with his card, not before rolling his eyes at Pomni. She gives Human Baby his order number, telling him that she’ll call him up when his order is ready. As soon as he was out of sight, Pomni visibly slumped.
It’s been officially five weeks since Pomni attended an interview at Spudsy’s. Four weeks since she got hired. Three weeks since her first shift. After around 90 hours of part time work, she can confidently say she hates working at Spudsy’s.
Pomni normally wouldn’t choose to work at a fast food chain but Spudsy's was her last hope. Between drowning in student debt and her boyfriend wanting to move into another apartment, money was something Pomni desperately needed.
The hiring process was quick and Pomni got hired on the spot, which was a red flag that she chose to ignore. She thought the horror stories on r/Spudsy were just exaggerating—it couldn’t be that bad, right?
Wrong.
As Pomni rings up another ungrateful customer, she thinks back to her first shift—the training shift—and tries to pinpoint all the red flags she missed.
——
Thursday, September 18th
With a wide smile on her face, Pomni parks her car in the Spudsy’s Establishment parking lot. It wasn’t a far drive to Spudsy’s from her apartment, taking her five minutes or so. Pomni could’ve left at the last minute and still be there to clock in at time, but she wanted to show up to her first shift a little earlier.
When she stepped out of her car, her phone dings a few times. It was Gummigoo, who texted her a few words of encouragement.
Gummigoo: Good luck on your first shift, love!
Gummigoo: You’ll knock their socks off :)
Gummigoo: Also, I was apartment hunting earlier and I think I found the best one yet! I’ll send you the link.
Opening the link, it shows Pomni many photos of a one bed and bath apartment. It was spacious, clean, and rent was reasonable for its location downtown. It was perfect and definitely what they were looking for, but Pomni’s heart just sank further and further every time she swiped through the photos.
Pomni loves her boyfriend, she really does. Gummigoo was everything she ever looked for in a man. He is handsome, gentlemanly, and has an accent that used to make her swoon. Pomni should feel lucky to be dating such an amazing man, but all she felt with him was sheer and utter boredom.
Pomni gives Gummigoo’s text a thumbs up, not bothering to reply. She has a job to do and can think about how to break up with him after work.
Her first shift is the graveyard shift—with Spudsy’s being a 24/7 establishment. Pomni is an insomniac, so she prefers working late hours. Tonight is also her first of three training shifts, which are thankfully paid. Even though it was technically just a part-time job, she couldn’t help but feel excited. It will be her first job, and Pomni is very proud of herself.
Pomni giddily enters Spudsy’s through a back door which reads EMPLOYEES ONLY! Still having around ten minutes before her shift starts, Pomni decides to head to the locker room to change into her uniform shirt and visor. Spudsy’s isn’t huge, so luckily for her she finds the locker room rather quickly.
The faint music playing in the background helps calm Pomni’s jittery nerves down—the song being a jazz version of Creep. Whoever’s in charge of the music has good taste.
“I don’t care if it hurts”
“I wanna have control”
“I want a perfect body”
“Oh my god—-“
Okay, that’s not part of the song.
The closer she gets to the locker room, the more weird noises she hears. From what she could hear, there was someone already in the locker room. The sound of rustling and soft groans makes Pomni’s ears perk up. What the hell. There’s no way someone was actually…pleasuring themselves, right? Pomni should turn her back and just change in the washroom, but she ends up twisting the doorknob, curiosity getting the best of her.
Turns out there isn’t just someone—but somebodies.
In a far corner of the locker room, two employees were huddled together. Since she only opened the door slightly, Pomni couldn’t tell what they were doing, but they were rather close to each other. From the looks of it seems intimate. Pomni lets out a soft oh at the sight. A mistake. The weird noises immediately stop.
Pomni slams the door quickly—wishing the ground could somehow swallow her whole. Her shift starts in ten minutes and she needs to change and put her stuff in a locker, but she obviously can’t now. Not with them doing whatever the fuck in the room. Should she just waltz in and ignore them? No, that's stupid—what if they were having some sort of private moment? She doesn’t need to be known as the nosy newbie. So Pomni just waits outside the door, hoping and praying that they’ll step out soon.
Luck was on Pomni’s side. After a few moments the door slams open. A woman—who seems to be around Pomni’s age, if not older—-walks out. Her uniform was disheveled and her curly red hair was all over the place. She freezes in the spot when she sees Pomni.
“Hey?” Her name tag reads Ragatha with a smiley face. “Are you the new hire? I haven't seen your face before.”
Pomni nods, “Yup, that’s me.”
Ragatha looks her up and down, her eyes widening slightly as she asks, “Were you just waiting out here the entire time?”
Pomni nods again. She had no clue on what to say.
The redhead cringes, “Shit—I totally forgot I’m training you tonight.” she mutters, more to herself than anything.
Ragatha is her trainer?
Holy fucking shit.
“Sorry for taking up the locker room,” Ragatha says, “I was just…doing stuff.” She sheepishly rubs the back of her neck, the implications heavy in the air. This shift is about to be very awkward.
“You don’t have to explain to me what you were doing, it’s none of my business,” Pomni says, hoping to put Ragatha’s mind to ease. “It was just bad timing.”
She nods awkwardly, “Yeah, bad timing…” she trails off. Her voice squeaked like a mouse when she asked, “Did you see what I was doing?”
“…No?” It was the truth.
Ragatha lets out a sigh of relief. “Good to hear! Well the locker room is available now, so you can change and lock your belongings. I’ll meet you at the front register.” Ragatha smiles at Pomni, although it doesn’t reach her eyes.
Pomni nods and watches Ragatha walk away. Whatever she was doing must’ve been something that wasn’t allowed at work. Whatever. Like she said earlier, it’s none of her business. Pomni is here to work, not pry into her co-workers' lives.
Opening the door for the second time, she jumps. It totally slipped out of Pomni’s mind that Ragatha walked out the locker room alone.
The other person—a man that also seems to be around Pomni’s age, was sitting on the ground. One bandaged hand was holding his phone, the other holding what seems to be a purple vape. Nametag reading Jax, he doesn’t bother to look up from his phone when Pomni speaks up.
“Hi sorry, I’m just going to put my stuff away and change.”
“Alright,” Jax says, not moving from his spot. He continues to scroll on his phone. Maybe he didn’t hear Pomni. The volume on his phone was quite loud after all.
“I’m going to put my stuff away and change.”
Jax just gives Pomni a lazy thumbs up, still not looking up from his phone, “Mhm.” What the hell is his deal?
“Can you leave so I can change?” Pomni immediately clasps her hands against her mouth, her temper getting the best of her again. So much for making a good first impression.
Jax’s head snaps up at her tone, Pomni now being able to see his face clearly. “Huh?”
“Sorry, but I really do gotta change. My shift starts soon.”
“You’re the newbie.” Jax states, his dark eyes twinkling mischievously.
Pomni smiles awkwardly, “Shit, is it that obvious?”
Jax doesn’t answer. Instead he raises his hand to his mouth and takes a puff of his vape. He blows the smoke into an O. A trick. Pomni watches the smoke evaporate in the air, hoping he will leave soon. He doesn’t.
“Look—I don’t wanna be rude, but can you please leave so I can change into my uniform?” Pomni nearly rips out her hair when Jax just takes another hit of his vape.
“Wow. You really are a newbie.”
“What does that even mean?”
Jax barks out a laugh, “The locker room isn’t used for changing. We either come here with our uniforms already on or we change in the washrooms.”
Raising a thin brow, Pomni asks, “What is it used for then?”
“Stuff.” Jax laughs again. That’s what Ragatha said too. Weird.
“Like…?”
At that, he grins. Jax cocks his head to the side and wiggles his eyebrows. “Wouldn’t you like to know.”
Okay, Pomni officially doesn’t like him. “Can you please just leave.”
“No can do. I’m on my well deserved break.”
“Why do you even take a break here?”
“No smoke detectors.” To demonstrate his point he takes a hit of his vape, blowing the smoke up towards the ceiling. “See?”
Pomni’s glances at his vape. It was a grape flavoured Geek Bar, how gross. Jax notices—because of course he does—and smirks widely. “Wanna take a hit?”
“Excuse me?”
“C'mon, don’t be like that. You won't get in trouble. We’re all nicotine addicts here. Hell, I think Caine is one too. I’ll leave if you do.”
She glares at Jax with stones in her eyes. “I’m not “geeking” with you on my first ever shift.”
Jax rolls his eyes, “Suit yourself.” He got up from the floor—and holy hell was he tall. “I would love to chat more but I’ve gotta bounce. My break is over. See ya later, newbie.”
With that he leaves, leaving Pomni all alone with her bubbling thoughts.
—-
Training went well.
It went really well.
For the first half of her shift, Ragatha gives her a quick tour around Spudsy’s, which doesn’t take too long because of how small the location is. She also introduces Pomni to her other new co-workers: Zooble, Gangle, and Kinger. Zooble and Kinger were crew members like her while Gangle was the shift manager. There were a few more employees working but she didn't catch their names, too busy taking in all the information Ragatha was dumping on her.
Jax clocked out a few hours into her shift. He didn’t talk to Pomni much, which she preferred. He was rude, egotistical, and flat out cruel to everyone. Especially towards Ragatha—which was really confusing now that she thinks about it. They were awfully close to each other when she walked in on them (literally and figuratively). Throughout her shift, Pomni has to remind herself that their relationship was none of her fucking business.
In the second half of her shift, she learned the basic mechanics of the job. New hires mostly work at the front register, which is a lot easier than it looks. Pomni’s a quick learner so she got the hang of it pretty quickly. Ragatha—impressed by how well Pomni was doing, lets her ring up a few customers. Her shift ends pretty quickly and Pomni can’t help but feel proud of herself.
r/Spudsy is wrong. This job is fun, exciting, and interesting.
Sure, she may have caught her trainer doing something suspicious, and one of her coworkers is a total jackass, but it was rather tame compared to what everyone on the subreddit was saying.
When her shift ends, Pomni heads to the locker room to get her stuff only to run into Kinger—who was also entering the locker room with a jar of pickles in his hand. Weird but okay. “Oh, hey Pomin!”
“It’s Pomni,” she says, correcting him. She didn't really get the time to talk to her co-workers, too busy with focusing on her training. Zooble and Gangle talked to her a little, but Kinger was quiet the whole shift. Even though she should be making friends, Pomni doesn’t really want to talk to an old man who wears a chain around his neck to hold his vape.
Kinger snaps his fingers with his free hand. “Ah rats! Yes, yes, now I remember. I’m not too good with names at first.”
“That's fine,” Pomni was about to leave when Kinger suddenly blocked the door with his body.
“Wait a minute!”
“Yeah?”
“Do you wanna see my trick?” Kinger asks, shaking the jar of pickles in Pomni’s face.
“I should get going—”
“Please Pomni? I’ll only take a bit of your time.”
Pomni lets out a sigh. There’s no way out of this, is there? Old people are really stubborn. “Sure. Make it quick though.”
Kinger nods ecstatically. He opens the jar and grabs a small pickle slice, throws it on the ground, steps on it, and then picks it up and eats it.
Kinger looks at Pomni, waiting for her seal of approval. “Well? Did you like it?”
Pomni just stares at him. Was everyone here a weirdo? Who the hell eats pickles in the first place?
“It was pretty cool,” she lied. Hoping that would satisfy Kinger, she tries to leave the locker room again but he just keeps on talking.
“You know Pomni, you remind me a lot of my daughter Christine. Oh what a joy she is! Or well…was. Ever since she started dating that Felix kid, all she does is talk and talk about him. She has completely forgotten about me and my wife. Christine never hangs out with us anymore, it’s devastating. I miss my little girl so much. Raising kids is hard, Pomni. Wouldn't you agree? Well you look quite young so I doubt you have any kids…but don’t let me ranting deter you from that! Kids are a blessing. But quite expensive as well! When Queenie was first pregnant with Christine, we were dirt poor. We had to eat Dollar General chips just to survive! I’m so lucky to have this job now.”
Okay yeah, everyone who works here is definitely crazy.
Pomni stays silent, hoping that Kinger would eventually shut up and let her go, but Kinger was not getting the hint. He was about to go on a tangent about how bad the Dollar General chips were when Pomni intervened.
“Look—I do appreciate you telling me to avoid the sour cream chips but I really gotta go.”
Kinger blinks, “Oh yeah, sorry. I’ll let you go. It was nice talking to you!”
Pomni gives him a tight lipped smile, “Nice talking to you too.”
And with that, she leaves the old man alone in the locker room—who she is pretty sure is performing his “trick” again to absolutely no one.
—
Saturday, October 11th
Yeah. Now that she thinks about it, there were a lot of red flags Pomni missed.