Chapter Text
Saturday: 4:15 PM
“Child, you aren’t a lotto ticket. What are you doing behind the counter?”
“Not a child, bitch. Though it's a fascinating question, innit?”
Wilbur stared questioningly at the sassy child who was in one second running into the store, the next jumping and crouching behind the lottery ticket display case.
The child opened his mouth to answer the question but instead cupped his hands over his mouth the moment a ding came from the shop’s front. Wilbur also noticed and snapped his head up.
A couple walked in. He made eye contact with a woman around her late 30’s, with cherry red high heels that looked as if it were squashing her feet, and holding a baby in a pastel blue blanket that was probably ten times smaller than her. She looked like a sumo wrestler who's covering up the fact that they've retired with heavy foundation and matching lipstick with her heels.
He almost didn't notice the lanky stale beanstalk of a man behind her, if it wasn't for his loud heaving. You can tell he ran because of the sweat puddles on his thin dirty white tank top, and his shaking legs bending slightly looking like they were about to give up.
“Ar- are you… do you work here?”
The beanstalk sputtered, still gasping for air.
“No, I don-”
“Doesn't matter. Have you seen a kid, ‘bout yay tall, blond? I swear I saw him book it down this street.”
The woman cut him off, when she spoke you could hear the thick city accent seeping through each word. Wilbur didn't break the intense eye contact but he could see from the corner of his eye the kid was looking at him with a worried glare, placing his palms together, begging silently.
“Uhh… I think I saw the kid run past here”
He exclaims ever so slowly. He points to a direction and watches as the couple nod at him, leaving his friend’s store, the bitter gaze never leaving that woman's face.
He didn't trust that couple, not one bit.
Once he saw that the coast was clear when the couple was nowhere to be seen, he grabbed the kid’s gloved hand and pulled him up. They stare at each other for a moment to process what just happened.
Examining the child, he matched the woman’s description, blond and slightly shorter than Wilbur. He was wearing a simple threadbare baseball shirt, with a white long sleeve underneath and brown leather gloves, covering every part of his arms. A human probably, nothing was out of the ordinary.
Wilbur broke the intense silence.
“So uh… why were they looking for yo-”
He was cut off the second time today but by the kid, jumping up and giving him a bone-crushing hug, which definitely caught him off guard.
“Fuck yeah!! Thank you, thank you, thank you Siren!”
Ah, so the kid did know him. He would have guessed it would have been a little harder to recognise a folk hero without their uniform.
Nevertheless, he hugged back anyway. When he let go the kid was already at the door before Wilbur could ask any questions.
“Wait! Kid! I never caught your name?”
The kid turned back to look at him one more time, before giving a smug smirk.
“I didn’t throw it, big man. Oh, and I'm keeping this by the way.”
He held a fancy watch in the air by the strap before bolting in the opposite direction the couple went in. His laugh echoed through Wilburs ears. It took a few seconds to realise when Wilbur grabbed at his own wrist he felt the painstaking absence of his own watch.
Of fucking course. That abominable shit goblin of a kid.
Not only did Wilbur assist a robbery, he got robbed himself. What the hell did he expect from a small bodega in the 19th district?
He ran after the kid but saw no sign of him. That was until he heard a metallic bang coming from an alleyway where they kept the store’s metal rubbish bins. Scurrying over to the alleyway, he saw that the fucker used the bin lid to leap himself onto the fire escape. How the fuck did he do that???
Despite managing to make the long jump, he was hanging onto the balcony with his hands and was steadily pulling himself up.
Wilbur took his chance to hoist himself on the bins to grab his leg, and pull him back down.
He took a hold of his ankle while the child thrashed, kicking left and right to get rid of the hero’s tight grasp. With a lucky kick, he managed to aim directly on Wilbur’s pointy nose, leaving him stumbling off the garbage bin, lying pathetically on the ground.
“YOU BASTARD CHILD.”
It would have sounded more intimidating if his hands weren't cupped over his nose, making him have a sadly accurate imitation of Squidward. An evil snicker echoed through the alleyway, taunting Wilbur once more.
“See ya, bitch!”
He watched as the child went swiftly up the stairs until he disappeared.
he cursed and groaned into his hand, made a mental note for himself to patrol in these areas tonight to try to find that bastard child.