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“Oh come on, Carrots, can’t you just give me an itty bitty clue about our destination?” Nick lifted his aviators, eyes wide and pleading, usually smirking grin contrite… mostly.
“Oh Nick, Nick, Nick. You know the rules.” For a too-brief moment, Nick was bathed in the warm glow of Judy’s violet eyes. She grinned, mischievously, “ When you get your license, then you get to decide where we go for refreshments.” Judy’s eyes twinkled with mirth as she shook a finger in admonishment at her partner. She hopped up into the driver’s seat, then leaned awkwardly to close the door of the oversized cruiser. “Besides, I promise you you’re going to like this place. There’s ice cream in it for you.”
“Augh, you know I need coffee in the mornings, Fluff! You’re busting my chops here.” Nick worked his dog-tired body up into the passenger seat, wishing his shift could start a few hours — or days — later.
“And coffee,” Judy continued. “Ice cream and coffee. My treat.” Judy started the engine, then glared at Nick until he put on his seatbelt.
“You said the magic words, Carrots.” Nick leaned back in the padded seat, crossing his paws behind his head. “Drive on.” He gestured in a half-waving motion, stifling a yawn.
Judy wrinkled her nose, then shook her head in a silent chuckle. “It’s almost as if you would turn down a reason to take it easy on our morning patrol.”
Nick closed his eyes as he shrugged himself into a more comfortable position. “Me? Slack off? How dare you.”
“Just don’t start snoring and I won’t have to brake-check you again.”
***
The ZPD cruiser pulled into an empty parking spot. A few moments later both doors opened and then slammed shut almost in unison.
“Finnigan’s Fancies?” Nick lifted his aviators, read the paw-painted sign over the quaint stone corner-store, then glanced down at Judy with one brow raised. “Yet a certain bunny has decreed we shall be dining on coffee and ice cream, but not pastries?”
“I don’t think you’ve quite earned pastries. Come on Slick.”
Nick watched for a moment as the bunny marched triumphantly past him, then folded his paws across his chest before following Judy into the store. “I could earn pastries, you know, if I wanted.”
The bell above the door was an actual tiny brass bell. The shop in general could’ve been old enough to still use gas lamps, but it was clean, warm and dry inside. The colours were faded pastel, and the shop in general held an old-style charm that immediately took Nick back to that nebulous time long ago, strung between Ma and Pa, when things had been simpler.
The shop would’ve suited him back then, too, seeing as it was a little on the small side. In fact, the countertop was low enough to the ground to have been just about perfect for--
“Nick, you asshole!”
—Finnick . Nick’s jaw almost hit the floor as he watched the diminutive fennec appear from the back room.
“Nick! You… you total asshole!”
“Ha-haa,” said Judy, nervously, mouth wide in a forced grin, teeth bared in a rictus grimace and arms raised, “surprise!”
Nick huffed, then chuckled. Then guffawed. Then he sat down, laughing like an idiot. Finnick leaned over the counter and punched his friend in the shoulder, then sighed.
“You asshole,” Finnick said, yet again. He turned, picked up a paper cup, then poured the larger fox out a generous measure of hot coffee. “Look what you did to me!” The diminutive canid held his equally diminutive forepaws wide in a grouchy display of displeasure as the fennec showed off his custom-embroidered apron with the shop’s logo on.
“You… you’re working here?”
“Oh no. No, no, no. It’s far worse than that.” Finnick took a deep breath. “I own the place.”
“Wait, what?” Nick almost choked on his first raw sip and had to beat himself in his chest with one fist.
Judy sat down, slowly and silently, as if she were afraid any noise would break the spell. She watched Nick reach for the sugar and pour in just a little too much, like always. She had to consciously breathe to avoid passing out.
“I said I own the place.”
“Okay, short stuff, spill the beans for Daddy. Last I saw you, you were rolling around town in that elephant suit, when you weren’t rolling around in that van.” Nick stirred his pre-tasted coffee slowly and deliberately, before taking another — much more cautious — sip.
“Yeah, well. Thanks to you, you asshole,” Finnick punctuated the last word by poking a digit at the larger fox, “I had to give that up. It’s too hard to get the jumbopop to Tundratown without it melting on the way, and have you tried pushing a pawpsicle stand through Savannah Square without the pawpsicles melting on the way back?”
“So what’d you do, buddy?”
“I set up a lemonade stand, of course. Sat my ass down in that elephant suit in the middle of Savannah Square and started selling lemonade. Made a freakin’ mint, too, and I didn’t even have to wear the diaper. Or bum around town, freezing my ass off as we waited for the damn things to solidify. I made so much, I had to hide it, invest it. So I bought a spot in a storehouse. Which just happened to have a walk-in freezer. So I started selling pawpsicles again as well as lemonade. Only it turns out you can have those things delivered wholesale for a lot less than Jumbeaux was selling ‘em for.”
Nick coughed, almost spitting up his coffee a second time. “You? Buying wholesale?”
“Oh it gets far worse, you--”
“Asshole?”
“Traitor.”
“Go on, tell me how you really feel.”
“I’ll show you when I bite your face off. Refill?”
“Sure.”
“Asshole. Anyway, there I was, sweating my ass off in that square, and I thought hey, why don’t I just get myself some proper shade? So I rented myself this little shop. And wouldn’t you know it, before I realized, I’d gone legit. Did you know how easy it was for a pred like me to get a real business license these days? None of your laminated fake shit from the Marches, it’s a whole new freakin’ world since you busted that sheep deal. I even pay less for a real accountant than one of your crooked buddies, Nick.”
The tiny fox flattened his ears out, shaking his tinier fist in rage. “Do you realize how much you’ve ruined me? You’ve taken me legit, Nick. I’m legit! It’s awful. I pay taxes, for frith's sake! I have regulars. A bunch of them are even cops . I’m running a cop bar, Nick!” at this, Finnick leaped up onto the counter and grabbed Nick’s shirt like he was a drowning sailor in a sea of granite. “A cop bar!” he cried desperately, hauling himself into the air by Nick’s lapels.
Judy covered her mouth, attempting and failing to hide her snorting laughter. She pretended she was coughing, holding up one digit as she turned away, biting her tongue to hide the mirth.
“Oh you traitor to all that you stand for,” replied Nick gently, a grin playing on his muzzle as he gently patted the fennec on the head between the ears. “Going legit, getting a real job. What is the world coming to.” He rolled his eyes.
“It’s even worse than that, Nick.” Finnick dropped like a stone then hopped off the counter to land behind the bar before he stormed out of the room and disappeared into the back. When he returned through the bead curtain, he was carrying a plastic box covered in ice, gently steaming in the morning sun. He pried off the top, took a scoop from beneath the counter and scooped out a ball of white-and-blue speckled substance into a larger, flatter paper cup.
“When that bunny came back to find your sorry ass sulking under that bridge in literal squalor, I said she owed me, remember, toots? I said she owed me good. She said she’d send blueberries. And do you know what happened?”
“Oh do tell.”
“She sent me blueberries, Nick. She. Sent. Me. Blueberries . And I made them into ice-cream. And it’s super fucking popular. You flat-footed bitch ass motherfucker.”
***
The door dinged behind them as the pair walked out into the crisp Zootopia morning. There was silence as they clambered back into the cruiser, punctuated only by the roar of the engine and, eventually, the slurp of Nick finishing his morning coffee.
“Tomorrow,” he said, eventually, “tomorrow I want to try the pastries.”
Judy smiled.