Work Text:
Evan Fong was tired.
It wasn’t immediately obvious. There were no bags under his eyes; his skin too tan to notice, and his blinking and response time was naturally measured and slow, always giving the illusion of being only half present in a conversation.
He fidgeted on the regular; clicked pens and bounced his foot to the improvised rhythms in his head, tapped them out on whatever surface coated the floor, so that wasn’t an indicator of his fatigue either. That was normal.
Evan had resting bitch face too, rarely smiled, and always looked perpetually grumpy. He twitched his lips for teachers and customers and his parents, but that was the extent of effort he felt obliged to give.
He was a highschool student, a senior; no one bat an eye when he drank an energy drink straight, in one solid, drawn out gulp. Neither did he, completely unfazed by the powdery, chalky taste. He recycled the can respectfully.
Yes, Evan Fong was tired, even though he himself could barely tell the difference any more. He was weighed down by the textbook in his backpack and the mental pressure of half-finished assignments tucked away on his laptop. He was tired of classes and voices and people. He was tired of the same music on his phone in an endless playlist. He had too much work on his plate, but he was tired of writing and summarizing and giving his claim and evidence and reasoning.
Evan Fong was tired, and yet he still said ‘yes’ when his brother offered to get him a job.
He never had any concept of when enough was enough.
Evan leaned heavily against the counter, eyes closed and ears absorbing the gentle whirring of industrials fans and the hum of electronics around him. His eyes flickered open at the sound of sliding doors separating with a ‘whoosh’ of air, gaze tracking the brunet who rushed in out of the cold, and quickly disappeared into the bowels of the store.
Evan groaned tiredly and let his head drop down beside the cash register once more.
Surprisingly enough, the dark-haired male hadn’t hated working retail, as he’d expected to. He found he actually enjoyed working at the local craft store. It was always an adventure to see the interesting people that came in, alongside the even more interesting materials they would purchase. Evan hadn’t even known pipcleaners shapped like anal beads had existed until an exhuasted, stressed young woman had bought them as project supplies for her girl-scouts.
Evan wisely kept his inappropriate jokes to himself, and rang her up with as straight of a face as he could manage.
Throughout the school year he’d been working afternoon to evening shifts; only four hours, from three to seven. His brother picked him up from school and dropped him off, because despite how much his parents nagged, Evan really didn’t want to learn to drive. Now though, with winter break settled in, his manager had switched him to a six-hour evening shift. Five to eleven. Closing time.
Evan’s sleep schedule hadn't adjusted yet, and for once he actually felt the effects of his terrible habits. He stood up straight and stretched with a yawn, gaze drifting to the pencil and textbook that lay abandoned beside him where they’d been resting, untouched for close to twenty minutes.
He only had an hour left, and then he’d catch the bus home.
Evan resisted the urge to chuck his writing utensil across the room.
The young man resorted to doodling to pass the time, scribbling absently in the margins of his notebook with the various colored pens scattered across his work space. He was a shit artist, and his cartoon characters looked nothing like the shows they came from. They weren’t stick figures, however, and someone could theoretically identify who they were supposed to be, so he considered them a success.
He was well into a picasso-style rendition of Homer Simpson when a shadow fell across his pad of paper, and he looked up with a jolt; startled.
A middle aged woman with long, just edging on greying blonde hair frowned down at him, wrinkles of exhaustion crinkling what might’ve been a pretty face, earlier that day. Evan hurriedly swept his drawing to the side to clear space for the woman’s basket, though not before he caught the disgusted look she quickly spared for his ‘chef-d'oeuvre’.
Ahhh, une autre chienne. He loved middle aged crisis’ that thought themselves prodigies, and frowned upon anyone too broke to take classes.
Evan took great pleasure in grinning quite widely at the woman as she impatiently waited for him to unload her basket, which he did at a leisurely pace of about one object every two seconds.
“Christ, they’ll hire anyone these days,” She snarled, sweeping the basket over with her arm and allowing her collection of brushes and twenty-dollar-a-pop paints spill out over the counter. “You used to need decorum and skill to get a job, even one as pitiful as this.”
Evan winced internally at the sharp words, then completely forgot all about them when the woman tried to reach across the counter and snatch the scanner from his hands.
“What the-”
“Let me do it, you’re worthless,” she admonished, and Evan gaped at her in shock, grip loosening just enough that the lady snatched his scanner gun away with shocking speed.
“Hey- holy shi- you can’t do that-” He blurted after a split second of stunned silence, reaching out and snagging the stretched cord of the scanner to try and pull it back. “What the fuck is your problem? I’m sorry I was slow, jesus fucking christ-”
His hand brushed her fingers as he tried to pull his tool back, and next thing Evan knew he was rearing back, facing burning and ear ringing and the woman had just slapped him-
“DON’T TOUCH ME YOU LITTLE RAT-”
Despite the counter between them, the woman towered over Evan, and he stared unseeingly at her monstrous fury and all of a sudden he was five year old again, his grandmother standing over him with a red hot pan and screaming at him, and threatening-
“Get the fuck away form him you psycho, can’t you see your giving him a panic attack? The fuck lady- get the fuck out! Leave!”
A second voice, a man yelled and Evan wanted to curl up and hide because someone else had witnessed this and he was so goddamn embarrassed and why wouldn’t people stop shouting?
More yells, objects slammed to the floor, and Evan was shaking horribly, curled up with his knees to his chest behind the counter as footsteps stormed away. He need to get ahold of himself, he was a fucking senior-
“Hey,” a voice breathed, soft and gentle, and all of a sudden the air was very quiet. “Hey. She’s gone. She left.”
Slow, methodical footsteps moved a little closer, and then fabric slipped against plastic before soft soled shoes touched down lightly at his side. Evan couldn’t make himself uncurl, was trying desperately not to cry from the overstress of the sudden radical confrontation that had just occured.
More shuffling of shoes, and a ‘woosh’ of air beside him as the man sat down at his side behind the counter.
“You’re safe,” he repeated, firmly, like he was confident of the words. “It’s only us in the store, I think. I’m John. I’m not going to leave you unless you ask me to, alright?”
John. Evan had a friend named Jonathan back in middle school. This voice was different, though. Unfamiliar.
He managed to nod his head minutely, and he thought he heard the man sigh softly in what might’ve been relief.
“I hate cunts like her, you know?” John continued, and though the words were vulgar, his tone was light and casual, as though having the calmest of conversations. “Maybe If she had less of a stick up her ass she wouldn’t need to keep coming in for more paints every week because she wasted them all on failed paintings. Good supplies don’t make you better.”
His one-sided conversation was cocky and blunt and nerdy, and Evan felt more than heard the small snort escape his own nose, a hint of laughter that had his shaking subsiding.
Slowly, Evan raised his head and blinked at the harsh ceiling lights that suddenly flooded his shadow-adjusted vision. His arms and hands were stiff when he unclenched them and uncurled, and the figure in his peripheral vision made no effort to move as Evan silently pulled himself together; wiping his eyes and slowly stretching out his legs.
Evan did a double take when he finally looked at ‘John’ beside him, who just so happened to be the brunet he’d seen enter the store before. The student- because this was obviously someone Evan’s age, watched him back with a calm, measured gaze; his legs crossed meditation style and his chin resting against his fist; elbow propped up on his knee. John’s eyes were a striking, a beautiful blue-grey, and his outfit was a peculiar collage of white and black and random sparays of colors; a t-shirt over another long sleeved shirt beneath, paired with jeans and formal boots.
“You good?” John whispered after a moment, a hint of a smirk turning his lips, and Evan realized with a jolt he’d been staring.
“Y-yeah,” He coughed, throat clogging with the remnants of almost cries from before. Evan stood up hurriedly, brushing non-existent dirt off his legs and suddenly flushed with embarrassment that he’d had a panic attack while on the clock in front of a random stranger.
”Je suis- I mean- I’m sorry, I didn’t- do I need to ring you up?” Evan fumbled, gesturing towards the counter awkwardly as John too rose to his feet, seemingly restraining a laugh.
“No rush,” he responded easily, then frowned at the counter. “Do you mind…?”
“Go ahead,” Evan stepped back, but John was already clamoring over the counter once again, and Evan flinch back at the sudden, revealing view of tightly jean-framed ass. He jerked his head away and stared stubbornly at the uninteresting piles of mason jars a couple aisles away until John was situated and had turned back to face him, hoisting up his own basket of craft supplies.
“Wow- that’s a lot of stuff…” Evan mumbled as John began to unpack his basket onto the counter, and John hummed distracted agreement, settling multiple packs of marbles and paint beside rolls of paper. “What are you doing with them?”
John paused and glanced at him curiously for a moment before returning to his unloading, quiet, but expression considering. After a moment he pulled out a small tray, about the size of a pie tin and presented it.
“I put paper in the bottom of these, and then fill cups with paint and drop the marbles in. Then I put the paint-coated marbles in these trays and roll them around and make designs with them.”
“Oh!” Evan blurted, freezing mid-way to grabbing a package of marbles to scan and snapping his gaze up towards his customer. “I did that in elementary school art class, I think. It was fun. I found my favorite colors because of that.”
“Oh yeah?” John chuckled, and his smile was genuine and sweet and Evan’s heart skipped a beat inexplicably as the man turned to his pocket for his wallet, absentmindedly tucking a lock of stray, curl brown hair behind his ear.
“Uh- yeah…” Evan swallowed, and John met his eyes when he glanced back up, credit card in hand. “Black and gold.”
John paused for a moment, then smiled again, softly.
“Good choice. I like blue and orange, my self.”
His eyes twinkled, as if he knew Evan didn’t know the ‘ins and outs’ of visual art, but didn’t really mind.
“Your sketches?” He asked after a moment of Evan silently scanning objects, and Evan looked over to the notebook that’d been previously cast aside. He hadn’t cared what the old woman had throught, but now he felt embarrassment curl around him at the crude, poor quality drawings.
“Uh- I’m not much of an artist. Drawing, that is.”
“They’re not bad, actually,” John complimented, and Evan gave him an incredulous look.
“Okay, they’re pretty terrible,” the painter amended, and Evan laughed, surprised at how uninsulated he actually felt. “But honestly, compared to the general population, they’re pretty fucking good. They’re not stick figures.”
“That’s what I told myself too,” Evan snorted, and John let out a surprised laugh of his own, once again drawing Evan’s awe at what was probably the most genuine expression of amusement he’d heard in years.
“Sorry,” John apologized half-heartedly after he’d stifled himself, when Evan was staring once again.
”Christ, tu es belle,” Evan breathed without thinking, and John froze suddenly, red flushing his cheeks and spreading slowly to his nose and the tips of his ears. Hold up. Had he-
“You ah- wouldn’t happen to be Canadian, would you?” John chuckled softly, and Evan could feel himself beginning to blush as well; clamped a hand over his mouth in horror. “My best friend is. He does that too.”
“I didn’t- I mean-” Evan stuttered, and John smiled at him and sympathetically talked over the Canadian’s attempt at an apology.
“You could’ve just asked for my number? In English, preferably. My French is shaky.”
John’s words were as casual as could be, and Evan blinked at him before groaning loudly and burying his face in his hands. He heard John begin to laugh.
“Please tell me you don’t go to my highschool,” he mumbled into his hands, and John’s amusement obviously grew.
“I do actually. You’re Evan Fong, you were on the varsity hockey team freshman and sophomore year. You actually played with my friend. I thought you were straight…?”
“Oh just fucking kill me now,” The dark-haired man lamented, raising his head to finish scanning the objects as John continued to laugh at his suffering. “You’re Smitty’s art friend?”
“Is that what he calls me?” John asked, grinning, and Evan rolled his eyes and pulled a paper bag out from behind the counter to place John’s items into.
“He kept telling me sophomore year I should let him hook me up with you.”
“Huh- OH!” John’s eyes went wide, and Evan paused to watch him. “And you’re the closeted kid who’s name he refused to tell me! I thought he was trying to get me with Tyler!”
“Tyler Wine?” Evan blurted in shock, and really, he shouldn’t be surprised that he was gossiping about his peers’ sexualities at 10:45 on a Tuesday night with a friend of friend at work. “He has a girlfriend!”
“I think it’s a conspiracy,” John confided, an exaggerated look of devious secrecy flashing across his face as he leaned closer. “I think Kelly’s actually is with Chrissy. That’s Scott’s girlfriend- You know him, the theater kid always hanging out with Anthony Brown and Marcel Cunningham?”
“You’re crazy,” Evan laughed in amazement, and pushed the full bag across the counter as John flashed him devilishly pleased smile, winked, and slid his card into the chip reader.
A few minutes later, Evan was jolted to attention by a voice at the exit, and he looked up to see John juggling his bag into one arm, using the other to bring up to his ear in a ‘phone’ mime.
“CALL ME!” He yelled, before turning around and heading off, and something warm bubbled up in Evan’s throat when he looked down at his notebook as saw a number scrawled in messy, lopping handwriting.
Maybe he was glad bitches existed after all.