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Your name is Jack Frost. You are a mischievous ice spirit who makes snow days. You are snow balls and fun times. You are the best with kids, even if you’re less famous than the rest. You can do this.
This was the mantra repeating through Jackson Overland’s head as he prepared for his first in-character shift at Manny’s. He’d been working there for a while, but only as lowly kitchen/wait/cleaning staff. He was a man of many skills. But oh god, could preteens get food (and worse) stains in the weirdest places.
Jack slipped in the employees’ entrance and to their impromptu locker slash staff room. He was lucky really. His costume was pretty basic. Blue hoodie with some embroidered frost, period style deer skin pants. A nice mix of old and modern. Though he’d put a lot of work into his gnarled shepherd’s crook.
But nothing like Tooth’s feathered leotard and make-up. Or Aster’s fursuit. Jack didn’t subscribe to all that but he could appreciate the work Aster put into it. Plus as much as he liked baiting the Aussie, Jack had to respect someone that assured about their identity. Powers that be know Jack was still working himself out.
You are Jack Frost he reminded himself one last time before heading out to front of house, at least for the rest of the night.
“Yah late,” was Aster’s heart-warming welcome.
Jack’s eye flicked to the clock over the bar. Well not a bar bar, this was a family restaurant. It was still over two hours until opening.
“No, you just have ridiculous ideas of how early we need to start set up.”
Despite Jack’s words, he didn’t hesitate to help the six foot one Australian in resetting tables and chairs. He didn’t like work, but he was mature enough to understand short term pain for the kids’ fun later.
“Remember yah on probation yah larrikin,” grumbled Aster, “Manny might think yar up for this. But I’m watching yah.”
Jack clasped his hands in front of him and plastered his most angelic smile on his face. The picture of innocence, he said, “I’ll be on my best behaviour, promise.”
Aster raised a sceptical brow, and drawled, “Right. Now tonight we’ve got a little girl’s sixth birthday party. Apparently she’s a fan of the Easter Bunny, so ah’m booked all night for that. Yar floating, but don’t think ah won’t notice you if you get up to something.”
Jamie was taking a moment to centre himself. He’d locked himself in his room, stuck in some headphones and dived into a book. He just needed a few minutes to recharge.
Jamie loved his sister dearly and he was happy making her birthday the best thing ever. But he was a little tired after doing that all day since six am. In just a little while they’d be heading off to Manny’s for her actual birthday party. And he’d promised to play chaperone to a dozen midgets. Well, his mom and a couple of other moms would be there but Jamie just knew he was the only one to be dragged off by a horde of little girls.
Was it too late to stop being a good big brother?
“Jamie! Time to go!”
The dutiful son closed his book – no need to bookmark it when he’d read this issue of Paranormal Monthly before – and headed down stairs. It was only practise that prevented him falling down the stairs and breaking something, since Sophie had decided it was piggyback time. While Jamie was descending.
“We’re going to see the Easter Bunny! Hop, hop!”
“Are you asking me to hop? ‘Cause I think I’ll fall over if I do. You’re getting heavy sis.”
“Hey!”
“Jamie, don’t tease your sister,” scolded their mother, waiting besides the door, “And Sophie I’ve told you not to jump on the stairs. Or on your brother.”
It wasn’t too difficult to bundle Sophie in the car for once. The birthday girl was eager to go. A couple of stops to pick up more little girls and they arrived at Manny’s. Jamie grinned at the place, nostalgia flooding him. He’d had some awesome parties here himself.
Jamie lost Sophie immediately on entry to the restaurant. Well, he found her quickly enough. She’d plastered herself to the side of the actor playing the Easter Bunny. Jamie had to give the guy points for his costume. It was definitely personalised – Jamie didn’t think he’d seen a buff Easter Bunny before.
“Eh, he’s okay I guess, for a kangaroo.”
Jamie flinched and snapped his head sideways. Leaning casually on a staff of some sort was another teen. Judging by the prop and outfit, he must be another of the cast. White hair, blue eyes, decidedly kissable face, fern-like white on his hoodie? Jamie had a suspicion as to his character.
“Jack Frost?”
The teen grinned and preened, before giving a ridiculous bow.
“At your service.”
The faux-chivalry was undermined by a ridiculous eyebrow wiggle. Jamie managed to keep his cool, though he’d never been pegged as gay so fast before.
“Oi, Frost!” yelled an Australian accent, apparently from the Easter Bunny, “Go look after table seventeen!”
“Catch you later, cutie,” promised Jack over his shoulder, as he sauntered away.
Jamie’s gaze paused on the guy’s arse before a shriek from the girls called him back to “duty”.
Jack’s first shift was turning into a terrific disaster. And it was totally that guy’s fault. He’d spilt two drink orders, almost dropped a dish on a kid’s head, and relied on his parkour to preserve his dignity when he tripped over his own feet. Jack’s attention – admittedly a little scattered most days – could not stay on the tables he was meant to be tending to. It kept wandering back to the brunet with the nice shoulders. Then his feet would follow and he’d end up half-way to the guy before regaining control of himself. Yet, after twenty minutes of this he metaphorically squared his shoulders and approached the teen as he kept an eye on some girls in the playground.
“You look thirsty,” said Jack as he oh-so-casually sidled up next to his distraction.
“Isn’t this where you say that gentleman at the end of the bar ordered it?” replied the brunet, but nonetheless took the drink.
Jack really shouldn’t stare so much at the guy’s lips. It was just a large soda. And it wasn’t like he was sucking on the straw in any special way.
“Well if that were case, North would be saying that line and pointing to me,” Jack replied and dared a shoulder nudge, “So you worked out my name pretty fast. Do I get yours?”
The brunet hummed consideringly while taking another draw of the soda.
“No.”
“Wait? What!”
“Names have power. Giving them away is just stupid,” the annoyance said, with a shrug, “Figuring out my name shouldn’t be hard.”
“Frostbite yah bludger, stop cracking onto the bloke,” Aster interrupted, and emphasised his order with dope slap, “Get back to work!”
“Good luck,” offered the source of Jack’s troubles, raising the paper soda cup in a mock toast.
Ever mature, Jack stuck out his tongue at the guy as Aster dragged him away. He’d find out the kid’s name and show him. Maybe Jack would get his number while he was at it.
“Jamie Bennett!”
Turning at the sound of his name, he was rewarded with a snowball to the face. To be fair, after years of responding to it, it takes conscious effort not to turn when you hear your name. Let alone when someone yells it, and you’re supervising a bunch of children.
Jamie wiped the weird textured snow off his face and was tempted to return his hand for a proper face palm. Jack was back, and had apparently decided surprise snowballs were the next step in flirting after buying someone a drink.
“Congratulations,” Jamie said dry as freezer burn, “you passed my little test.”
“I get off at ten,” offered Jack, and spun his crook as he approached, “you want to go for late night coffee?”
“Well, that was direct.”
“I’ve found it prevents confusion,” said Jack, cracking his neck, “Still, coffee?”
“Maybe I’ll say yes, if you tell me what that ‘snowball’ was made of.”
Besides the almost slick texture. Jamie noticed it hadn’t been as cold as expected, especially given he was warm and indoors. Jamie wasn’t sure but he suspected it wasn’t melting as fast as it should, either.
“A little of this, little of that,” Jack said, almost sing-song, “The recipe’s my little secret, you see. But I can assure you it’s non-toxic, non-staining, environmentally friendly, vegan, and kosher.”
Jamie rubbed a pinch between his thumb and finger, and couldn’t help grinning at the actor’s salesman pitch, “that’s impressive. Where are you hiding it?”
Jack patted his hoodie pouch and made an odd crinkling noise. His hand wandered to the opening and pulled from the top to bottom. Without a clearer look, Jamie had to assume that there was a zip or something. Jack stuck his hand in and pulled out a handful of “snow”.
“Lined the pouch with cooler bag stuff, and I have refills stashed around the place.”
Jamie could tell that Jack wanted to say more, but was once again called to task by the Easter Bunny. With overdone reluctance Jack headed over to entertain one of his tables. Jamie smiled to himself at the sight. He liked the guy, and it seemed that besides having a nice figure, he was a nice person. He certainly had a way with kids.
He also was doing a good job of keeping Jamie from surrendering to exhaustion. Because chaperoning a dozen little girls was a nightmare. Especially since the moms were happy chatting at the table, while he was sent to follow the kids.
Jamie considered Jack’s blunt request just earlier and concluded that he couldn’t add a date after this. He’d have to get a raincheck.
“Break time, Jamie,” came his mother’s voice, shocking him out of his musings, “have something to eat, sit for a bit, because I don’t think you’ve had a chance.”
Jamie sighed in relief.
“Maybe go after Jack this time?”
“What?”
“Don’t you what me, young man,” she scolded, “You’re very rude not telling him your name. Besides you’d be adorable together.”
“Moommmm,” groaned Jamie, stalking away from her.
“You’ve been busy tonight, almost naughty,” teased North.
Jack ignored the Santa LARPer behind the bar, and set about putting dirty glasses in the dishwasher. He really didn’t want his coworkers teasing him about his dating life. Even if he was awkwardly trying to get a date at a fractured fairy-tale themed family restaurant. And that made him sound sleezy as hell.
“Can it North,” retorted Jack, more defensively than probably required, “I’m not slacking off too much.”
“Yes, yes, Bunny has been keeping you on the wheels of your feet.”
“And since I’d hate to disappoint him, I’m going to do my job.”
With that conversation ender played, Jack headed toward back of house. Away from the not-quite-belly-laughing, Russian grandpa.
“You asked my mom what my name was?”
Jack frowned, perplexed. He was heading towards the kitchen window to pick up his next set of orders. And now Jamie was here. Far from where his sister’s party was.
“Yes, yes I did. Why are you over here?”
“Talking to you obviously. Mom gave me a break from kid wrangling.”
Training kept Jack on autopilot to collect his next delivery. He was bemused when Jamie carried the extra plate that would push Jack’s load from safe to risky.
“Why’d you talk to my mom? I thought you’d get my last name from our reservation, and my first from the girls’ yelling.”
“Well my way was direct and prevented confusion.”
Jamie chuckled at Jack’s quip – was a reference to less than half ago a quip?
“But not her embarrassing me,” grumbled Jamie. “You almost ruined your chances with that, mister. Seguing effortlessly,” and Jack had to snort at the blatant subject change, “to the topic of coffee dates, not tonight. Do you have a night off? I’d rather have the whole evening.”
“I’m free Monday through Thursday.”
Their conversation paused while Jack dropped off the plates they were holding. After which his feet navigated back to the Bennett party.
“Monday then?”
“Sounds good,” Jack agreed.
“Wait, before I got back there, and you get back to work. I wanna do something real quick.”
Curious, Jack followed Jamie to the rear of the restaurant and down to the restrooms. Raising an eyebrow, this was going where he thought it was going, was it? In the pseudo-safety of the mens’ Jack was grabbed and pulled into a kiss. It was annoyingly brief though.
“Sorry,” whispered Jamie, after the short contact. Though he made no effort to step out of Jack’s personal space, “I’ve been wanting to do that since I saw you.”
“To be fair, so have I,” said Jack, before pressing up against Jamie again.
The second kiss was much more satisfying. Jack got to actually taste Jamie this time, and nibble on the brunet's bottom lip. He seemed to like that from the way he pushed closer to Jack. Jamie countered by grazing his teeth on Jack's upper lip. Releasing his bite, Jack found his lips ensnared. While this was happening, hands were wandering. Kept by unspoken agreement out of pants - though under shirts was fair play. Jack shivered as warm hands brushed his sides, and went on the attack, gaining entrance into Jamie's mouth with his tongue. Jack could happily keep this up all night.
The rest of night passed uneventfully. The pair did stop kissing before a search party came looking, and they didn’t sneak off to kiss a second time. Instead, Jack just continued to float over for brief conversations. The Bennetts left a big tip and praise for both Jack and Bunny. A fact that probably saved Jack’s job actually. Bunny had been less than impressed with Jack’s work and reported the shift a failure. North came to his defence though, and luckily Manny was a total romantic.
And Jack got Jamie’s number too.