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The best part about being an up-and-coming influencer, if you ask Ezreal (and people do, because he's an up-and-coming influencer, duh), is that you're both always working and never working. Mostly never working, because when you're as naturally fabulous as he is, influencing people is effortless.
Case in point: he looks good all the time, right? So obviously people flock to him to ask him where he got his cool clothes, what makeup he uses (none, he woke up like this babes), and what his skin care routine is. Companies trip over themselves to get their products in his mouth, as they should.
Well, most companies do anyway.
The company that really needs to get with the program is a little slow, which he supposes can't be helped given the management. If he was as silver and foxy as the CEO of Swain's Hot Chicken he'd probably be convinced he didn't need anybody either, even if Ezreal would be more than happy to put whatever they're serving in his mouth.
That's the real perk of being an up-and-coming influencer though – the extended lunch breaks that let him hang around in a greasy fried chicken joint admiring their sexy cashier, senior-sexy-CEO, and... well, Lulu is alright at least when he's in a hurry and has to use the drive-thru, but he's pretty there's a reason Kayn calls her deLulu. He doesn't think his order has been right a single time if she takes it... he didn't even know they had figs on the menu but she sure handed him some last Tuesday...
Anyway. Point being, he clearly needs to hang around here more, maybe with a posse who already recognizes how super cool and influential he is, until senior-sexy-CEO recognizes how useful and awesome he is and lets him ambAss his brand... or something.
He tried bringing Cait and Vi here last week, because Vi can eat like six grown men's worth of food and surely they'll appreciate someone who brings in big spenders, but Cait is on some weird vegan kick again and ordered a salad. A salad. And then she had the audacity to look skeptical when he was explaining his theory that senior-sexy-CEO Swain had the cup size of a rotisserie chicken per pectoral – like being a lesbian gives her magical boob-assessment powers or something. Anyway, apparently loyalty means nothing anymore, and she's temporarily dead to him until he needs someone tall to stand near him for his next video where he's selling softe-boi-core vibes.
Vi can still come though, he's pretty sure she broke some sort of store record smashing through those buckets of chicken, and she didn't even use a napkin – which, ew, but also he's pretty sure was strategic girlfriend-baiting on her part with the whole 'finger licking good' thing. He let it slide because it was on-brand behavior for Swain's Hot Chicken marketing, but she's on thin ice.
He's alone today though, and looking finger licking good himself if he does say so (and he does, he just did), and he’s not alone because he couldn't get anyone to come with him. It's just hard to use the full force of his wiles on someone when there are witnesses who might be compelled by the force of his raw animal magnetism and want to try a bite of his meat for themselves. Really, there's only so much of him to go around, he's a small order.
Or... his order isn't small. It's totally normal sized – big even, compared to the rest of him. It's just, he's kind of...
Forget it. Up-and-coming influencers are in high demand and short supply, that's the important part.
“Welcome to Swain's Hot Chicken, all our chicken is finger lickin'.”
Kayn's drone from the counter is a little more drone-y than usual, and he doesn't even look up from his blank stare at the back wall, like he's trying to avoid being blinded by Ezreal's sheer radiance.
“Why hello again, handsome,” Ezreal drawls as he strolls up to the counter to drop an elbow and a wink. “Fancy seeing you here.”
Kayn’s soul appears to return to his body with a twitch of his eye, turning from his out-of-body experience to face his favorite up-and-coming influencer in all his glory.
“I work here. You apparently know my schedule.”
He does, in fact, know Kayn's schedule, because he's a super sleuth and it's his job to know all kinds of things to keep up with current trends. It's also posted on the bulletin board five inches to their left, and he caught a picture of it last time he took a selfie here at the counter to post to his gazillion-ish followers that he was here.
“And you apparently know my favorite order,” Ezreal simpers, fluttering his eyelashes as Kayn taps in the number one combo he always gets (because he's number one, duh.)
“What, are you actually ordering something else today?” Kayn asks, hand pausing over the button to send it with an eyebrow raised.
“Maybe I want to add a little more meat to my usual.” He winks again, wiggling his eyebrows for good measure – which is super hard to do at the same time actually, but he's just that skilled. “Maybe something to get me all hot and bothered, or something to get me a little wet.”
“Last time you tried the spicy chicken you cried,” Kayn points out, squinting at him with a frankly insulting amount of skepticism, “And your combo already comes with a drink... but I guess you could add a slushie?”
Well he does need to be a man of mystery sometimes... an up-and-coming influencer can't be getting stale for his many fans...
“If I add a slushie will you warm me back up after?”
Kayn shrugs at him, muscles flexing under his grease-stained apron. “I don't control the thermostat.”
Oh, how coy.
“Oh, I'm sure you could be influenced to try... I'll have a grape slushie, large.”
“...Kay.” Kayn pokes a button or two before leaning back enough to yell into the other side of the kitchen. “Hey, is the grape slushie machine working?”
His answer comes in an alarming clatter of boxes and giggling, only a Swain's Hot Chicken hat visible above the counter as Lulu scurries by toward the slushie machine. She scrambles onto a conveniently placed box and pops back into sight, squinting at the machine for a minute before grabbing one of the nozzles and giving it a good yank.
The machine explodes in a cough of purple goop, which she proceeds to swipe off her face with a sleeve and lick off the fabric, before turning and giving them a thumbs up. “Yep, that tasted purple!”
Kayn sighs and turns back to Ezreal. “That'll be twelve-fifty.”
Damn – between adding the slushie and his lack of up-and-coming influencer discount, this place really cuts deep into his pockets. He really does have to speed up his agenda of doing some finger licking for one of the employees here if he wants his chicken and to pay rent.
Of course Cait tried to tell him it wasn't safe or sane to be eating here several times a day, but what does she know? And besides, what really matters is that the relationship between him and the chicken is consensual.
“You again?” Eh... Mostly. “I thought I banned you.”
“Ah, but that was last week's joke!” Ezreal titters as he hands over a twenty and bats his eyelashes toward the manager's office where the most-foxiest-silveriest-fox of all time comes strutting out, un-netted hair cascading over his shoulders, popped shirt buttons exposing juicy golden-brown skin just glimmering in the light that spills from the definitely-unwiped windows. “And you know how much I love your jokes Mr. Hot Chicken, sir.”
“I'm going to fry you into hot chicken,” Senior-sexy-CEO Swain growls at him, eyes narrowed as he crosses his arms – and yowza does that make his hot chicken breasts plump up... “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kick your skinny ass right out of here.”
Ezreal would like to protest that his ass isn't that skinny, but he's too giddy at the fact that Mr. Hot Chicken even noticed his ass in the first place – score one influencer point!
“Well, he does pay every time,” Kayn grunts as he counts back the change and slides it across the counter – a man coming to his defense, his knight in greasy apron! “Even if he doesn't tip...”
...okay fair, but really? Tipping, in this economy? He's an up-and-coming influencer, not a popstar.
Still, point taken, he knows how to influence a man onto his side when he sees an opening... which is why he sliiiides a whole dollar back over the counter with a wink.
“Thanks, doll. Go buy yourself something pretty.”
The twitch in Kayn's eye is back, but he does slip the dollar into his back pocket. Maybe Ezreal can put it there himself next time.
“A paying customer who clogs up my dining room taking selfies,” Swain scoffs, gesturing to the half-full dining area behind them. “I've had three complaints this week from other customers getting caught in your nonsense-”
Uh, rude and ungrateful, first of all. They should be paying Ezreal for the free publicity on his insta – and he puts random animal emojis over people he doesn't know.
“-and that's not to mention the climbing on my table you did last week-”
Well he needed to get a good angle of the tragedy of his spilled chicken fries! Just getting a shot of the floor wasn't good enough, and he certainly wasn't going to get down there on the floor with them – yuck. Who knows the last time it was cleaned, Kayn certainly hasn't been doing it... and how do all his followers know how tragic it is that his delicious chicken fries were dropped if they can't see his pouting face and the chicken fries in the perfect frame! It's not his fault that people kept trying to pass through there while he was setting up the shot – he was obviously busy!
“-and now we keep getting people coming in here asking about a secret menu, trying to order a Silver Fox Surprise, whatever the hell that is-”
Oh, heh, that. He certainly had used that hashtag the first time senior-sexy-CEO walked out to the front, causing him to walk clean into a door. And maybe it had been paired with a zoomed in shot of crisp and juicy cleavage, helpful framed with a drumstick on each side. That had been his first post to go semi-viral actually, so really he should be getting double-thanked instead of whatever these bad vibes are.
“Sooo...” Ezreal cuts off the tirade with his best smolder, licking his lips with a grin (and only partly because Kayn is now putting his order together, and seducing two men is hungry work) “Does that mean you don't want my extra special up-and-coming influencer finger licking services? I'd even give you two a discount if you want to make it a double.”
Kayn's hands stutter in their motion to dump fries into the cardboard sleeve, his face contorting from potential interest toward a perturbed grimace as he looks from Ezreal to his boss. Damn, maybe he's too shy to let on in front of the CEO, it is a little intimidating... he knew he should have offered the finger licking solo package first...
Or maybe package lickin' finger special? No, maybe that's too on the nose, subtlety is really his bread and butter here these days. And if anyone should appreciate bread-ing and butter it's these guys, geez.
But then the senior-sexy-CEO of his dreams turns to cutie cashier with a long-suffering sigh (one that sounds like dollar signs and victory, if Ezreal listens closely enough!)
“Kayn?”
“Yessir?” Kayn drawls, putting the last of the order on a tray that he slides across the counter and into Ezreal's waiting hands.
“I'll give you a raise if you add pest control to your duties.”
“On it, bossman.” Kayn snaps a salute and practically materializes through the counter, snagging the tray with one hand and Ezreal's collar with the other. “C'mon shortstack, out you go.”
“Heeey, no fair! I'm a paying customer! I gave you a dollar!”
“Yep, and he gives me ten of those an hour, soon to be more,” Kayn grunts as he bumps the door open with his hip and drags Ezreal through it. “I might not be great at math but I can figure that one out myself.”
“No fair,” Ezreal huffs again, trying not to sniffle as his finger lickin' dreams are dashed before his very eyes. “But... I do really like the chicken here.”
Kayn snorts a laugh, pulling a baggie from his apron pocket before dumping the contents of Ezreal's tray into it and pushing it into his chest. “Yeah, I can tell from the way you're here every three hours.”
“But... what am I going to eat now? I can't go to Du Couteau's Delicacies – the guy at the counter tried to stab me when I called it Da Cutie's!”
It earns him another laugh – which, like, fine, Kayn's actually kinda pleasant when he's laughing, but also rude.
“Alright, just for pissing off Talon I'll make you a deal.” Kayn pulls out a sharpie and grabs his forearm (so rough!) before scribbling a hot mess of numbers onto his skin (with no consideration of his routine!) “Text me when you want food and I'll put in a takeout order and bring it out to you.”
“That sounds like a drug deal,” Ezreal squints at the numbers on his arm skeptically, wondering if they will lead to finger licking or him being turned into the special of the day. “But I guess I'm down.”
“Good, now get out of here so I can get my raise.”
He gets... but not before taking a sidewalk selfie #justkickedout #lol #gothisnumber #fingerlickin