Chapter Text
Hux watched the woman enter the store as the bell rang to announce her presence. He was immediately annoyed by her, from the moment her foot stepped through the door. She had a specific look about her, the kind one came to notice with ease the longer one worked in retail. Knock-off brand clothes, clearly made to look expensive without the burden of actually being so. A snooty air about her in the way she carried herself, as though the employees of the establishment were beneath her. Her cheap perfume clouded the store in an instant, giving the perfect punctuation to the plastic diamonds dripping from her ears.
The only thing worse than a rich snob, in Hux's opinion, was a fake rich snob. He knew the moment she walked through the doors that the first words out of her mouth would be some form of banal and idiotic request that betrayed her incompetence with subjects upon which he himself was an expert. He braced himself for the impact. And, in 3... 2... 1...
“Where are your Champagnes?”
His lips twitched into an indulgent smile. It was possible his instincts about her were wrong. Not likely, but possible. With a gracious sweep of his hand, he motioned for her to follow. “Just right this way, Miss...” Her high heels clicked on the surface of the floor beneath them as she walked. Awkwardly, as though she had never worn heels before in her life. Too many of these almost high class girls tottered around on heels without bothering to actually learn how to walk in them. He motioned to the shelves where some of the best Champagnes were kept, row upon row of french wine with price tags upwards from 80$ to well into the hundreds. He watched with equal parts smug vindication and derisive annoyance as her brows narrowed and her nose crinkled.
“Oh, no no... You don't have anything cheaper?” Ah, and there it was. The smile he forced upon his lips did not reach his eyes as he turned abruptly. “Oh, I'm sorry.” He spoke with a tinge of arrogant condescension as he sought to drive home the woman's ignorance to her. “I thought you were looking for Champagne. Our sparkling wine section is over here.” He gestured with a hand to a shelf next to the Champagnes, the more complete sparkling wine section. It wasn't that the woman had wanted cheaper fare that annoyed him... heavens knew on his salary he couldn't always afford the good stuff himself. No, it was the fact that she didn't know what she was asking for, and trying to pass herself off as sophisticated that lodged itself under his skin like a splinter. Perhaps an insignificant annoyance, but impossible to ignore nonetheless.
“Aren't those the same thing?” Her voice held a touch of indignation now herself, easily picking up on the retail worker's smug arrogance. He allowed another smile to cross his lips before he shook his head. “All Champagnes are sparklings but not all sparklings are Champagne.” He recited the verse by wrote. “Champagne is a type of sparkling wine, originating in France, in the region of Champagne. You can't call other sparkling wines Champagne. Much in the same manor that you cannot call a whisky Scotch unless it is made in Scotland.”
She listened to his lecture for a moment with a bored expression before her eyes turned back to the shelves, passing over the bottles of cheaper sparkling wines. “I was looking for one I had before... it was really good. Do you have it?”
Here he had to very steadfastly resist the urge to sigh and pinch the bridge of his nose. His lips pursed into a tight line. “Can you tell me anything about it? Who makes it, where it is from, what the bottle looks like? A flavor profile?” He forced the questions out through his teeth, though he dreaded the answer he knew was coming. “No.... well, it had a picture on the label. I would recognize it if I saw it. It was really good.”
He threw his hands up in defeat, shaking his head, holding himself back from laughing in her face. “Well! A picture on the label! I'm sure I know just the one!” The ginger dropped the smile from his face, replacing his expression with one of bored irritation. “This is the sparkling section. Please browse to your hearts content. Good day.” And with that he turned around and walked away, muttering under his breath about the injustice of having to deal with people who overuse perfumes and don't know what they want.
Kylo scanned the items on the counter, each one placed just a little too far from him to be within easy reach. He sighed as he leaned over the counter so far his front half extended over the other end. The couple where too engrossed in their own conversation to notice that they had done this. It wasn't that people were purposefully antagonistic, he knew. It was really more that people generally spent so much time caught up in their own little worlds that they didn't bother to think about those around them. Kylo, for all intents and purposes, was nothing more that a robot behind that counter as far as they were concerned. He sighed again, the last item scanned through.
“Your total is 56.85$. May I please see your ID?” The couple stopped their conversation only for the second required for the man to pull his ID out of his wallet, setting it on the counter. They continued to yap away as though he were not there as Kylo looked it over, pushed it back towards him, and then turned to the girl. “And yours? I need your ID as well, please.”
She glanced at him briefly, shrugged and waved him aside, as though his interruption of whatever they were talking about as a grave inconvenience. “Oh, I'm not buying anything.”
Oh. Great.
He raised his voice, only a fraction, enough to cut through their incessant nattering at one another. “I need ID from both of you.” That, at least, managed to stop the endless flow of chatter. The couple stopped, looking at him with blank expressions for a moment before the man spoke up. “Dude, I'm the one buying it.”
It happened at minimum once a day, if not more. He resisted the urge to roll his eyes, though he did look around to see if there were any coworkers in the near vicinity to back him up. “It doesn't matter. I need to ID everyone who's shopping together. Minors aren't even allowed in the store. You both need to show me ID or I can't sell it to you.”
The man started to narrow his brow, his previously jovial mood quickly turning sour. The girl placed a hand on his shoulder, tsking her lips at Kylo and shaking her head. “It's fine baby I'll just go wait in the car.” Kylo felt his own annoyance rise as he spoke again, more firmly this time, louder so they could both be sure to hear him.
“I'm sorry, maybe I wasn't clear. I need to see her ID. If I don't see some ID, I am not selling this to you.” The man was becoming visibly angered now, his face going red as he shoved a credit card in Kylo's face. “Listen buddy, she's leaving, okay?? She's my girlfriend, you think I'm fucking dating a minor?”
Kylo's eyes flashed as he pushed the card back towards the customer. “That's not the fucking point! I can't legally sell anything to you if I don't see her ID, and I assume she does not have it, so you're going to have to leave!”
“Fuck you man! We drove all the way here!” Kylo felt his own hand slam down on the counter. “I don't give a shit! Go to another store!” As the couple stormed out, Kylo locked eyes with a coworker, marching away from the counter. He could feel his heart beginning to race as anger settled in his chest.
“Cover my till. I need a fucking smoke.”
“Your tits look good in that top.”
Phasma's lips pursed as she tried to keep her composure. The man behind the counter was staring openly, a blank and almost dumbfounded expression on his face. To be fair, he was certainly not the worst of the disgusting come-ons she got working here. But he was one of the weirder.
“Thanks.” She replied without any hint of friendliness in her tone. The blonde woman had long ago discovered that making even the pretense of warmth only encouraged them. Not that some of them could take the hint to back off. This one certainly never did.
“I suppose it's weird to say that. Is it weird?” The man's expression never changed from the creepy blank look of mesmerized awkwardness, his eyes never leaving her chest. “Hmm.” She made a noncommittal sound as she moved the scanning gun over the bar-code on the last of his bottles. “I just can't help it though.” He continued, his deadpan voice grating on her nerves. “They look so damn good.”
“Your total is 26.70.” She pushed the debit machine towards him without looking up at him again as she moved to bag his items. She was done taking an active part in these conversations. The man looked embarrassed as he put his card in the machine. Good. He should be.
When the receipt came up, she shoved it in the bag and passed it over to him. “Have a good day.” The words were choked out through a fake smile that hurt her cheeks to maintain. He nodded and shambled off through the doors, muttering under his breath about titties.
Kylo watched Hux as he carted the boxes around on the dolly, his foot tilting the metal cart just so so that the cases of bottles would not topple over. The colourful labels on the sides of the cardboard boxes denoted them all as cases of craft beer, breweries from across the country who did not believe in mass production. Kylo scoffed under his breath.
Hux's eyes darted up to him as he bent over to open one of the boxes, taking the large bottles out and methodically placing them on the shelves. “Yes, Kylo? What is it?” His voice said that he was in no mood to converse. Kylo liked it when he got like that. It was fun to get under his skin. Besides, his fussy interest in overpriced nonsense was a little silly anyways, in his opinion.
“The specialty beers are taking up too much shelf space. Whatever happened to normal beer?” He eyed the shelves. The craft beer market had all but exploded in recent years. Now the beers were taking up an entire section of their own, and Hux had begun to organize them by country as though they were wine. As if he could hear his thoughts, Hux huffed under his breath, a scoff of disbelief that he had to explain this to a fellow employee. “These aren't specialty beers, these are 'normal beer'. It's only in North America that we mass produce everything.” He pointed to the European section. Several small, squat bottles sat row upon row with ludicrous words that Kylo could not decipher, like Dubbel and Rauchbier.
“If you were to visit Europe, the only beers you would find would be beers brewed at local breweries, produced in small batches. We are the ones doing things backwards. And now real beer is coming back into style, and it is wonderful. It is an exciting market. Alternately...” He pointed down the room towards the cooler doors that were lined with 6 packs of Budweiser and Old Milwaukee. “The pisswater section is still in booming business if you can't handle the taste of real beer.”
Kylo rolled his eyes at the pretentious snobbery in Hux's voice. He picked up a bottle of something with a piece of artwork on the label depicting a demonic figure. It was labelled “Arrogant Bastard Ale”.
“Hey, look Hux. You didn't tell me they made a beer just for you.”
Hux's expression was near vacant as he rang items through the till. The youth in front of him looked like he had just stepped off the set of a dingy wannabe rap video for white kids, and fresh out of highschool. He was loud. Hux hated it when people were loud. The kind of young person who thought the world revolved around him and needed to be at the centre of attention the moment he walked into a room. “Dude we're going to the club tonight it's gonna be fucking awesome! So many fucking hot chicks man you know? Fuck yeah buddy that shit is the best!” He called to his friend elsewhere in the store, picking up a bottle of Ciroc vodka. “That shit get you all the pussy man chicks dig that shit!”
Hux had to physically restrain himself from letting his extreme irritation show on his face. The level of intelligence in the building always went down around this time of the evening, when the college aged kids were on their way to the bars. He considered it ironic the level of idiocy demonstrated by those who were apparently supposed to be in the pursuit of knowledge and education.
As he reached to scan the last bottle he cursed under his breath at the angry beeping sound the computer made when it could not find an item. Setting the 6 pack down on the counter, his lips pinching tight, he keyed in his code to bring up the product search function.
This always took a few moments. The idiot customer noticed. They always did. Mentally he braced himself for what he knew was coming. “Not scanning huh? Guess that means it's free!” Hux allowed himself a moment to mentally indulge in the idea of shoving the man's credit card painfully down his throat for that joke. It was on the List of insufferable jokes that No Cashier Wants to Hear Ever but for some reason every slack jawed yokel in the world thought was hilarious.
He forced a faked smile upon his lips in acknowledgement of the attempt at humour for a brief moment. He wasn't sure why every idiot suddenly thought they were a comedian when they came up to a till, but he very much wished most people would just shut the fuck up. What was so wrong with a little peace and quiet, he would like to know. Finally the item was keyed in. He made a mental note to barcode the 6 pack later.
“I'll need to see your ID.” There was not the barest hint of cordiality in his tone of voice. He knew it didn't exactly make tips to be so cold, but he was past the point of caring. The male employees never brought in the kinds of tips the women did anyways. He didn't have the assets.
The kid nodded, passing the card across the counter. Hux picked it up he inspected the photo, confirmed it was indeed the same person. Eyes travelled to the date of birth. Then the dumbass opened his mouth again, idiotic laughter rolling off his tongue. “Pretty good fake huh? Just whipped it up this morning!”
He felt a nerve twitch in his brow. His lips were tight. In an instant he set down the ID card, no longer deigning to even look at it. He had sworn to himself he would do this the next time some jackass made this joke. “Oh, it's fake is it? I'm sorry I'm afraid I cannot accept a fake ID.”
The smile on the customer's face fell in an instant, his brows knitting in confusion. Hux's heart soared just seeing it. “You're joking right? I wasn't serious man, I was just kidding!”
Hux moved the card, setting it behind the till, a smug smile resting on his lips. “I need to take ID very seriously I'm afraid. I cannot make the sale, and I'll be keeping the card to turn into the police for an inquiry. You can pick it up at the station if it's not fake.” His brow furrowed into an apologetic sort of frown, shrugging his shoulders.
“What the fuck! It was a joke, it's not actually fake!” Hux grinned wide at that, enjoying the distress he was causing the poor young, stupid, douchbag of a kid. Leaned forward over the counter, taking a great amount of pleasure thinking of the disruption this would cause to the customer's day. “Then think. Of. Some better. Jokes.”
His hand pointed towards the door as the next customer in line came up behind the dumbfounded male. “The exit is that way.”
Kylo watched the woman come up to the counter, bottle of wine in one hand and a cellphone held to her ear in the other. He repressed a resigned sigh as she placed the bottle awkwardly on the counter top, manoeuvring her purse as she kept the cellphone in place. It was clearly the top priority in this endeavour. Her voice was incessant, her conversation about hair appointments obviously of the utmost import.
“Yeah you know? I was just going to go blond again but like, that's so not really the style anymore. So like I was going to have the undersides done in lighter but, like, the tops done with a bit of a darker colour because... oh hang on I'm at the till... yeah, no. This hairdresser is good she... one sec...”
Kylo watched her root through her purse for her credit card as he scanned the bottle. His eyes were glazed over with the kind of expression only achieved through day after day of dealing with people who thought of him as an accessory to the store, and not someone to actually have a proper interaction with. “Your total is 10.99, Miss.” He had to raise his voice so that she would notice that he was speaking. She nodded at him for a quick moment, frowning as though he were interrupting her as she took cash out of her bag. He could feel his blood boiling with anger the longer the phone conversation went on.
As he took the bills from her hands and opened the till he looked at her out of the corner of his eye. “Do you want a bag?” Again, raising the volume on his words to be heard over the constant and never ending prattle. She shook her head, an expression of irritation crossing her face that made him want to throw the change at her instead of handing it to her. He opted to place it on the counter.
She stared at him for a moment after she had collected her change. He stared back. Finally she took a break from the phone, moving it away from her mouth as she shot him a look of exasperated impatience. “Um, can I have a bag please?”
The pained smile that crossed his face was all he could do to keep from smashing the bottle over the till in frustration.