Chapter Text
For Iwaizumi Hajime, being a sales assistant for a popular clothing franchise was never something he saw himself tending to. He isn’t one you’d call stylish; not a head-turner, or a trend-setter. To him, clothes were pieces of fabric woven together to keep indecency at bay. Therefore to receive a call from the shop’s manager confirming his successful entry was more than a miracle itself.
To be frank, he wasn’t hired only due to his experience, but mostly for his – quote – charming aura and strong presence - unquote. He was a walking model, to be exact. Hired to parade around wearing premeditated outfits as well as patrol the shop floor.
After seven weeks, Iwaizumi had created his own pros and cons of working in retail. The flexibility in his shifts is a major advantage, the considerate break times, easy-going co-workers, and the surprisingly high staff discount – mostly used by his mother to stock up on Christmas presents. The cons, on the other hand, he would want to decrease in as little time possible. The outfits can be itchy, sizes a little mismatched, and quite a few customers walk in acting as if they were spawns of Satan, forcing discounts on non-discounted items and leaving clothes untidy in their wake.
Rude and careless customers top all.
Some experience with customer service helped greatly. Working in a corner shop didn’t have a long list of similarities, but it did help prepare automatic responses. A variety of apologies, for example. There can never be too many, may it be as formal as ‘I regret to inform you about this item’ to ‘Sorry. All out’.
However, working in retail for that amount of time had made his thick skin thicker, enjoying miscommunications between customers (as well as their unnecessary actions) a little less than planned. His manager, Sugawara, hardly warned him for retorting back straight and solid solutions at any customers shouting back at him. Sugawara’s calm demeanour always equalled him out, anyway. If it wasn’t for how well they have bonded, Iwaizumi would probably be looking for another part time job by now.
But there sure are times he wished he had a different job.
For the third time now, he eyes a particular customer once again picking up a shirt, holding it up against his chest and simply dropping it atop a neatly folded stack of shirts. He eyes the customer with an irritated sigh, all the while picking up the same shirt and re-folding it to match the others. Iwaizumi asks himself how the hell he has such tolerance for this. He figures it’s the only thing that actually requires him to do his job, as Wednesday shifts are mostly filled with vacant stares and silly antics between the other staff.
He stops justifying himself the moment he realises he is once again folding the same shirt Annoying Customer had picked up not too long ago, that he had absentmindedly watched him, once again, pick it up, lay it against his torso, only to drop it back down again.
After finally making his mind up, he waits for the most appropriate time to confront the Annoying Customer. And it doesn’t take long, as after a few seconds the Annoying Customer is again iterating the same actions, forcing Iwaizumi to roll his eyes as a result.
He approaches him as soon as the shirt is dropped.
“Hiya there, do you need any help?”
The Annoying Customer turns around, eyes wide with a slight upturn on his lips.
“No, I’m just looking around…” his smile extends, “Thank you, though!”
Iwaizumi should have left after that reply, but the Annoying Customer continued to stare at him, with that annoying smile, and that annoying look in his eyes. He obviously can’t back down, and retaliates by crossing his arms and looking straight back at him.
When the Annoying Customer begins to look sideways, down to the right where the table of shirts are, then the opposite side, then back up at him, Iwaizumi raises his eyebrows. Just as he thought the customer was going to say something else, the customer swivels his whole body to pick up a baby blue shirt with clouds adorning the face of the shirt.
He feels out of place for a second, standing next to a browsing customer with his arms folded and a sour expression. But as soon as the Annoying Customer let the shirt fall from his hands, he had to stop him from walking away.
“Hey,” Iwaizumi takes hold of the, what once was, nicely folded shirt, “I think you should put this back in its proper form.”
Iwaizumi holds up the same shirt before extending his arm forwards – fingers clasped around the shirt – as a signal for the Annoying Customer to take it. He better start making a move and fold it, Iwaizumi thought as he waits for a response.
Finally, the customer shifts, head tilting to the right with a confused yet slightly amused expression.
“Are you my mom?”
“Huh?!” Iwaizumi blinks, eyebrows furrowing as he glares down the person before him. “Do you want a death wish?”
“In those arms? Sure!”
Although taken back, he continues to scowl at him. Whether it was an insult, a compliment, or a really shitty way of flirting, Iwaizumi doesn’t care. This Annoying Customer better follow. And that smile better crumble, too.
“Don’t do it again.”
With those simple words, he walks off, the baby blue shirt still in hand.
Much to Iwaizumi’s dislike, he walks off to another area with the reply still recurring in his mind. His arms? Of course, it doesn’t help that he feels somewhat conscious of them, today more than any other. It shouldn’t exactly be his fault that most of the shirts provided are too tight around the sleeves, stretching to an extent where the fabric feels like a cobra around his arm without the need of even flexing. Matsukawa’s constant jokes about them aren’t helpful either.
As soon as Iwaizumi has become fully aware he's been standing in a corner, clutching onto the same baby blue shirt in the past five minutes, he groans.
In the midst of hoping the Annoying Customer is well-kept out of his radar, Iwaizumi forms slow steps towards the same area.
He thinks nothing will probably annoy him more than seeing that same customer again. He can probably handle little kids whizzing past him as if they were in a play area. Or changing room blunders in which ten different types of clothing are left haphazardly on the floor. Or even high pitched cackles from teenage girls as they review all the silly pictures they have taken on their smartphones.
But he also thinks how nothing ever happens the way he wishes.
As he folds the blue shirt properly, neatly, as it is always folded, he spots a body hopping from one section to the next like an indecisive bee amongst a bed of flowers. The spotlight lighting helps accentuate the Annoying Customer’s actions. Like how his arms lift a shirt up to investigate its design, the weird flicks on the tips of his hair, the turn of his head when he leaves the shirt still unfolded-
He has some nerve to skip around with an innocent smile around the shop! Even after being scolded about it!
Iwaizumi marches to his direction, steps heavy to create awareness for his presence. He refrains from directly approaching the Annoying Customer, maintaining to - once again - trail behind him as folds the same damn shirt, eyes acting as weapons as he glares at him.
He gives up not long after the Annoying Customer lets another shirt go like an unsatisfied fisherman dropping a krill.
“Excuse me, can you be more considerate?” Iwaizumi calls out as soon as he knows he’s within a good hearing range, “I don’t want to have to keep tending to you.”
The Annoying Customer doesn’t seem to pay him much attention, and this irks Iwaizumi, makes him grit his teeth as he watches the other reach out for another shirt with that same smile.
“Then stop tending to me.”
He wants to see this customer go down, and he wants to see it now. Some cheek he has (although Iwaizumi also knows he’s pushing this a little over the line, but it’s done. He wants to win this.)
“I can’t have you messing up every single thing displayed,” he says, motioning towards the last shirt he looked at. A pink one, he realises, decorated with a green collar and folded alongside a pair of high-rise denim shorts. Before he confirms to himself that they are standing in the women section, the Annoying Customer replies, all cheery and brazen as he shrugs.
“It’s your job to clean it though?”
Iwaizumi begins to seethe. If there is one thing Iwaizumi finds incredibly annoying, it’s being told something obvious. Does he think he started this job without reading his responsibilities?
“I swear to god-”
“Iwaizumi, are you busy?” a familiar voice from behind him breaks his retort. A touch on his shoulder follows after, and he turns around to find Sugawara with a soft smile and a few articles of clothing folded over his forearm, “I kind of need your help at the back.”
“I- Yeah, I’ll go as soon as I fold this,” he answers, returning somewhat the same smile at his manager. His manager nods, looks at the Annoying Customer, grins whilst apologising to him, and walks away.
He manages to fold the shirt in less time than one can imagine, feeling the Annoying Customer watching him as he does so. Whether he was learning how to fold the shirt or mocking him, Iwaizumi still doesn’t care (though he really wishes it wasn’t the latter). He has other – real - problems to tend to now.
Iwaizumi turns towards the Annoying Customer, warning evident in his eyes, “If you unfold a shirt and then leave it one more time I'm going to stuff it down your throat.”
He follows Sugawara fast enough to avoid seeing the Annoying Customer's reaction.