Work Text:
If you asked Deidara if he liked his job, it would be a hard fucking “no”. No ands, ifs, or buts about it. It was the first job he got after dropping out of art school, and though he’s fantasized about quitting a thousand times over the last year and a half, he just can't bring himself to do it. His barebones resume doesn’t make it easy, but he has tried to apply and interview at other places—no luck. Really, the unforgiving job market is the true nail in the convenient store shaped coffin. Until something really, deeply breaks him, unemployment just isn't worth it.
It’s past 10:30pm now, which means Deidara has 2 and a half more hours. Yes, they are open til 1am, which is great if you're a stoner. Or a truck driver, he would guess. The last 2 and a half hours of night shift are also brutally, mind-numbingly boring. So right now, he’s keeping himself entertained by watching Hidan struggling not to hit his vape while Itachi, their shift lead and known asthmatic, is in the room. A knife would bend trying to slice the tension.
Today's schedule was weird; Deidara doesn't usually work this late, there’s normally supposed to be the shift lead and a manager, plus Itachi and Hidan rarely work together. Someone probably has vacation or an emergency, but he didn't really pay attention. Itachi’s basically an assistant manager successor anyway—except none of their AMs are quitting or moving stores. Closing shouldn't be too bad, but still, not one of them wants to be here.
On the off chance that Hidan and Itachi happen to be working together, there is usually a third party presence to curb or negate the animosity. Deidara is not that person, he wants to see what happens; these two going at each other's throats is like a nature documentary never-before-caught-on-tape event.
Itachi is restocking junk food that hardly needs restocking. To the average onlooker, he is minding his business. Hidan, to some credit, is pretending to refill the cappuccino machine. “Some credit” is pretty generous, because he’s so obviously not doing it— everyone knows he doesn't clean or fill that fucking thing.
Hidan glances over to make sure that Itachi is preoccupied. Let’s correct that earlier statement; to the average onlooker and also Hidan, Itachi appears to be minding his business. Hidan takes this cue and reaches into his jacket pocket.
“Can you at least do it outside?” Itachi says, not really masking the irritation in his otherwise polite request.
Hidan whips around. “Oh come the fuck on , how are you even doing that?!”
“It’s called subtlety, dumbass,” Deidara snorts.
Itachi stands up, “Don't confuse him with words he doesn't understand.”
Hidan’s face twists in indignation briefly before the smugness returns, “Ooh, kitten’s got claws out tonight, huh?”
“Wow. Don’t ever say that to me again.”
Deidara cackles, “Hah! Hidan, that’s gotta be my favorite thing I’ve ever heard you say.”
“I can't do it outside,” Hidan continues to whine, “it’s fucking freezing! And you get pissed if I do it in the bathroom.”
“Because it smells and there's no ventilation.” Itachi deadpans, his eyebrows pinching together. “Can you just not do it? For once?”
“This is a gas station at 10:45 at night, dude, who fucking cares?”
“You could get fired for it, so maybe you should.”
“Fuck off, man—Deidara, are you gonna back me up?”
Deidara backs off the counter he had been leaning on and laughs again, “Dude, why should I give a shit if you can't vape? I just wanna see you girls argue because there is literally nothing else to do, hn.”
“Technically, there is stuff to do.” Itachi says.
“No there isn’t,” Deidara rolls his eyes. “You don’t even need to be fucking with the snacks over there, hn, you’re just trying not to strangle Hidan.”
“Jeez, we’re not even gonna pretend to not want to kill each other?” Hidan puts away the cappuccino machine supplies.
“You're working with the wrong douchebags if you want that kind of healthy work environment, hn.” Deidara says.
Hidan stretches his arms exaggeratedly and moves to pull himself up on the coffee station’s empty counter space. Another thing Itachi can’t stand. Deidara holds down a smirk knowing Itachi’s annoyance counter is inching closer to the ceiling. “You guys need to lighten the hell up,” Hidan grumbles.
“Hey, I’m lightened up, yeah?!” Deidara retaliates, “It’s juuuuust soooooooo fucking boooorriiiinnggg,” laying his torso across the register counter, face down and arms dangling off the side dramatically. “C’mon, Itachi,” he lifts his head up, “I know you’re going for employee of the month–” (Hidan laughs) “--but just admit there’s seriously nothing to do.”
As if God himself needs to prove Deidara wrong, the door jingles as a customer walks in. Hidan and Deidara quickly shut up and get off the counters. Itachi greets them, they ignore him, grab what they’re here for, and Deidara rings them out and tells them to have a good night. The door jingles again as they leave.
There’s a beat of silence between the three of them.
“As I was saying,” Deidara picks up, “there’s fuck all going on tonight, hn.”
Itachi sighs. For once, the stock isn’t horribly behind or egregiously messed up. The store space is about as clean as you can expect on a good day. There’s been a few people getting gas, but nobody’s come inside to pay with cash or get a receipt. They’ve even managed to get the trash out already.
“Okay, it’s been a slow evening,” he finally says, “It’s not really my job to find you guys things to do.”
Hidan clasps his hands together in fake innocence, “So that means you’ll get off our asses?”
Itachi scowls at him, “All I’m doing is trusting you to not start any fires or blow anything up.” He walks over to the register and past Deidara to look at his phone. Itachi Uchiha might be the only person Deidara knows who doesn’t keep his phone in his pocket on the clock. Even Kakuzu doesn’t do that, and he’s a major hard ass. Deidara leans gently on the smokes rack against the wall while in front of him, Itachi crouches behind the counter to dig through his bag. He doesn’t really have a reason to, but he tries to read over Itachi’s shoulder before he stands up. He can’t even discern what his wallpaper is.
“Don’t do that.” Itachi says to him suddenly.
“What,” Deidara asks, “lean on this thing?”
“No, don’t look over my shoulder.”
“Wh–” he sputters “I did not! Hn! You’re so paranoid.”
Itachi shakes his head slightly and opens his phone with the screen out of Deidara’s line of sight. He types, maybe responding to a text. When Deidara looks away from him, Hidan is back on the coffee counter and also on his phone. Young people these days, huh? Itachi’s phone apparently doesn't have much going on because after typing whatever he does, he turns it off and puts it back, wordlessly leaving to go… Do something. Heading over to the fridges. What, checking the expiration date on water, are we? Deidara laughs internally at his own lame joke.
From the sounds and look of it, Hidan has started watching videos on his phone. Deidara sighs; normally Hidan’s kinda fun to work with, albeit annoying, but Itachi is totally killing the vibe. It’s more fun to see Hidan and Kakuzu antagonize each other. Or hell, Deidara wishes Konan or Sasori were working, they at least find stuff to talk about. He’s about to accept this as a sign to pull out his own phone, mindlessly scroll twitter or something… Then a terrible idea strikes him.
Deidara pulls out his phone and pretends to open it, mimes scrolling through it for authenticity. He steps forward, appearing to want to lean on the counter, but clumsily drops his phone on the ground when he gets close to it.
“Ah, shit!” He says loudly. Hidan doesn’t seem interested. Itachi looks over to make sure nothing is on fire or blowing up. “I just dropped my phone,” Deidara tells him with a lazy wave, “nothing’s exploded.” (“yet,” he mutters.)
Itachi is satisfied and returns to whatever he’s busying himself with. Deidara crouches down to pick up his phone, using the shelf under the counter to push himself back up, as well as discreetly place his phone on the shelf beside Itachi’s bag. He feels around as quickly and unnoticeably as he can until he makes contact with Itachi’s phone, which he grabs and stuffs into his back pocket.
“Hey, Hidan.”
“Hmm.”
“I gotta piss so can you watch the register, yeah?”
“Mm.” Hidan lazily slides off the coffee counter to saunter over to the register. Deidara passes by him to make his way to the restrooms.
Even if Hidan notices–and he probably won't–he knows he won’t snitch because he doesn’t care enough to. It’s the perfect crime. He steps into the restroom, shuts the door behind him, and pulls out Itachi’s phone immediately. He just stares at it for a few moments while the impulsivity starts clearing up.
…Why did he do that? That’s like, ‘what if I told the customer they can’t have their receipt’ level of stupid impulse that you shouldn’t give into. His heart rate speeds up a little bit at the idea of consequences. Would Itachi get him fired over this?
And then after that train of thought, Deidara decides he’s super bored and doesn’t like Itachi, and all he’s doing is a dumb prank anyway. Itachi’s not really the type to go out of his way to get someone in trouble or else Hidan wouldn’t still be here. Haha.
He turns the phone on and snoops at his lockscreen notifications. Texts from family, though he has the contents hidden. Who cares? His wallpaper is a cat. Probably his? He didn’t know he had any pets, much less a cat. It… is very cute. But a little disappointing. He swipes the camera on and turns it to the front lens. The bathroom lighting isn’t flattering, especially not after he’s been here for 5 hours—but that’s not the point. He holds the phone out and tests a few angles. He takes some stupid ones, flipping off the camera and making faces. He snickers to himself about it, and vaguely thinks about how screwed he is if Itachi needs his phone before he’s done fucking around on it.
He holds the camera out again, puts a little more effort into getting a good angle. He takes a few nice pictures, flips through them and deletes them as he goes. Itachi doesn’t deserve to look at these. The camera on this phone is a little better than Deidara’s, which bugs him, but might as well have fun with it. He should get back soon… In a minute. He taps back to the camera and takes another good selfie and—ohh god dammit.
Shit.
He knew he was playing with fire but this is like, a really really good one. About as hot as one can look after 70% of a night shift and in a shitty gas station bathroom. Deidara wants to hit his head on the wall a little; he didn't even bring his own phone to take a picture of a picture.
Shit!!!
He can’t delete it. Okay, obviously he can but c’mon, that’d be so wrong. Cruel, even. He’s also taking too long by now. After hemming and hawing, Deidara groans and leaves it, but takes another stupid photo making an ugly face and flipping him off again as a countermeasure.
He jams the phone back into his pocket and leaves the bathroom. To his chagrin, there are now a total of 2 customers in the store, moseying around (holy fucking shit, go to bed?), but by some blessing Itachi is nowhere near the front. Deidara goes over to push Hidan off the register.
“Fuck, it took you long enough! That toilet better still work.” Hidan sneers at him.
“Quit whining, I wasn’t gone that long, hn.” Deidara says, nonchalantly returning Itachi’s phone and taking his own. “God forbid you have to stand behind the register and do the exact same thing you were doing 5 feet away.”
Hidan’s eyes are in working condition, however, and widen when he sees Deidara make the switch. His opens his mouth and shuts it, pointing at Itachi’s phone in disbelief.
Deidara sticks his tongue out. “Don't worry, I didn’t do anything illegal.” He whispers.
“Without me?!” Hidan whispers back.
“Oh, yeah, because Itachi wouldn’t take note of both of us going to the bathroom at the same time, hn.”
Before Hidan can quip anything else, one of the two late night customers strides up to the counter. He clears out and Deidara apathetically runs through the customer service motions. The time is still 8 minutes short of 11. Why does time move so damn slow at night?
“Hidan,” Itachi calls over, “Can you start sweeping that side?”
Hidan rolls his head dramatically, but heads over to the broom anyway. “I thought you said it wasn't your job to keep us busy!”
“It’s also not my job to do yours on top of mine either.” Itachi gives him a condescending look, one Deidara's been on the other side of before, a moment that basically sealed his dislike for Itachi.
He’s at least a little more tolerable when that scathing look is targeting someone else.
The second customer comes up and graciously makes no small talk. While scanning a bag of shredded cheese, Deidara idly wonders how badly Itachi would murder him if he texts him for the first time outside of the work group chat to say, ‘ hey i took a banger selfie on ur phone can u please send it to me no questions asked tysm<3 ’.
…Probably pretty fucking badly.
Two hours and 10 minutes to go.
The phone falls out of Itachi’s hands with a painful knock against the bridge of his nose. Wincing, he fumbles the thing back into his hands and double checks that nothing got accidentally bumped, pressed, or sent on the way down. Luckily, it seems to be fine.
What isn't fine is the several pictures of Deidara he discovered on the camera roll when he was looking for a photo he took of the schedule. The timestamp and familiar background tell him right off the bat this was during the shift he just got off from. All Itachi wanted to do was go the hell to sleep, and all he wanted to do before that was take a quick look at the next work day after tomorrow (today, more accurately).
He could just turn off the phone and deal with it when he wakes up, but the implications of it all are giving him a second wind. What is Deidara's fucking problem? He knew to expect some level of shenanigans to happen after Tobi clocked out, but he must have kept too close an eye on Hidan and not enough on Deidara. In the middle of the rage is a sting of disappointment—betrayal, almost. He didn’t really feel two ways about him, and he was pretty damn aware that Deidara didn't like him. Par for the course, really. He couldn't say though that he wasn't a little hurt to have such an unspoken trust broken without a thought. That hurt gets buried by fury again when he sees the single decent selfie out of all the ugly faces and rude gestures.
He taps open his messages and scrolls to Deidara’s contact info. Funny that this will be their first conversation outside of a work group chat.
‘Are you fucking kidding me?’
He jabs out the message and hits send. That alone kind of drains him of any energy he had left, so he's about to leave it there. Then he sees that blonde son of a bitch typing.
‘ ohh’
'oops. lol’
“Go to hell.” Itachi tiredly growls at his screen as if he could hear him.
‘ What is wrong with you.’
‘idk i was bored’
‘So you stole my phone??’
‘it sounds bad when u say it like that :/’
‘I wonder why. I’m so tired right now I don't even know what to say.’
‘r u disappointed in me :(‘
‘Stfu. Anyone else would probably kill you, and if you ever do that again I will.’
‘I can't believe you're making me carry my phone on me. I’ve never had a problem leaving it until now.’
‘booo w/e i wont do it again i promise it was just a one time prank u have my word okay???’
‘waaaait itachi before u delete them’
' assuming you havent already’
‘can you … plz send me the good one lol’
‘I was about to let you off with a warning. You really want to push your luck?’
‘nooo dude cmon’
‘i just didnt expect ur phone camera to be so good’
Itachi squints at his screen.
‘Give me one good reason.’
‘is me being hot not enoigh’
‘I’m deleting all of them.’
‘NOOOOO’
‘I’m going to sleep now thanks for the migraine Deidara.’
He kind of does have a headache now, what with the exhaustion and twangs of pain from where the phone hit him. Fueled by annoyance alone, he powers through and starts hitting delete on every single one of them. The light from the screen is making his tired eyes feel dry, and somewhere in the back of his mind he knows it’s not helping his already deteriorating eyesight. Sleepiness slows him down and he eventually gets to the only one Deidara isn’t making a face in. The good one. Itachi’s eyelids get heavy and he stares at the curve of his idiot coworker’s neck. It’s really not a bad picture, his sleep deprived brain observes. Hm.
He opens his eyes with a bit of a start, realizing he started falling asleep. He shuts off the phone and rolls over. He’ll get the rest in the morning.