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preromantics · 6 months

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wip clearing 2: peter/tony post-nwh stripper!peter

continuing my 'this one isn't going to get written' clearing!

context: this really couldn't be done justice at less than like 20k words the way i had it outlined and i didn't have the attention span for that

under the cut: a mismash 1.4k of plot dump and a few more fleshed out bits. not really fic-like but dumping here anyway for the jist!

Peter needs easy cash and all the under the table jobs he’s been getting aren’t cutting it (pizza delivery, irregular odd jobs like helping people move) and he stumbles into being a stripper at a slighty-above-seedy club – the kind that pays him under the table because he just keeps what he gets during dances but the kind that also has a pretty good bouncer out front, so the clientele isn’t the worst.

Turns out everything the bite enhanced wasn’t just good for being a friendly neighborhood superhero: it makes him a pretty amazing stripper. He picks up the pole work like he did swinging from buildings; a little practice, a few face plants and awkward moments, and then it’s as easy as anything else.

Just like in this new version of his life where no one knows him, he’s anonymous at the club. Just like Spider-Man, he also tends to attract a crowd.

(“Do a flip!” someone shouts one night, with Peter at the top of the pole, arched back and hanging on by one hand, every muscle taught and the lines of his body on display. And Peter smiles, beatific, and flips backwards off the pole, two rotations in the air before he’s landing at the edge of the stage. It’s a record night, his tight lamé briefs stuffed with cash sticking to his sweat-slick hips and the curve of his ass.)

It becomes easy. Patrolling in the early evening and sometimes after his shifts, glitter and smoke under his suit but the adrenaline of a good night keeping him awake and alert. The water-stained drop ceiling above Peter’s closet in his shitty apartment ends up stuffed with cash in ziploc bags.

It’s still easy, even, when the news breaks that Mr. Stark is back. The details aren’t public knowledge, and Peter longs to know how it happens, but what matters is something is now right in the world again – even if no one knows Peter, still, he feels lighter after hearing the news.

He doesn’t seek out Mr. Stark, assuming he also has no recollection of Peter Parker, and if Peter keeps an eye out for a glint of red and gold while he’s patrolling, it’s just to see if Mr. Stark at least remembers Spider-Man. (He never sees the suit, so it doesn’t matter. In fact, even with Mr. Stark back, there are no reports on Iron Man at all anymore.)

Peter has settled into his new normal, over a year into his stripper gig, and now on stage at a much nicer, fancier club (that still agreed to keep him off payroll if he gave a bigger cut to the house). It’s a few months since Tony Stark rejoined the living, Peter’s passed his GED but hasn’t sent in any applications, the cash he’s been saving up growing each week and starting to weigh on him.

It’s early in the night, and no one notices when Peter slips into the dressing room ten minutes late to his shift. This club is less likely to hand waive lateness, Peter knows – a condition of his under the table employment here was showing up when scheduled and a bigger cut of tips to the house than the other dancers.

The clientele, location, the drinks – basically everything is better than the first place Peter started stripping at last year, though, so the extra percentage at the end of the night and ability to hand waive the background check that would flag Peter as a ghost make it worth it. He’s really trying to not be late, to cut his pre-shift patrols off earlier so he doesn’t jeopardize his quote-un-quote employment.

Some nights, though, the city just seems to want to hold on to Spider-Man from block to block.

Peter has his face close to the mirror, working with some green and yellow color correctors the way one of the girls at the old club taught him to hide the bruise blossoming on his lower jaw. By the end of the night it will be barely visible, anyway, between his healing factor and the way the club gets darker and the clientele gets tipsier, looking at Peter with glassy eyes.

He’s almost done buffing everything out with concealer over the top and already reaching for a pot of subtle glitter from his backpack when one of the new girls (Amber, maybe? Peter keeps meaning to get better at the social part of this new place) bursts into the room with a high-pitched squeal.

“Tony Stark is here!” she says, her eyes wide. Peter meets them through the mirror, hands stilling. “Like, actually him. I saw him putting a black lacy mask on at the door.”

Peter’s first thought is that he should leave. He should definitely leave, fake a stomach bug or something. There are six of them in the small dressing room, all in various states of getting ready for the night ahead, but every person stops what they’re doing, and the room becomes so loud all at once that Peter stays frozen, now staring down his own reflection.

It’s been three months since the PR whirlstorm that surrounded Mr. Stark’s resurrection.

He’s with Rhody. Peter waivers on if he’ll cut out or stay. He ends up staying. It’s masquerade night. They hand out fancy masks at the door and the dancers have masks, so it feels a little more comfortable than it should, hiding behind a mask. He doesn’t think Tony knows who he is, anyway, since no one remembers Peter Parker – why would Mr. Stark be any different. He ends up doing a back room with a nice co-worker named Amber. It’s all above board at this club (for the most part) and the back rooms have their own pole, good lighting, and luxurious leather couches. “They requested a guy and a girl, and you’re our best guy, c’mon, Pete,” Amber says, with wide eyes that absolutely work. Peter suddenly understands why Amber gets the most private rooms. Peter loses himself to the backroom, to the touches, the music, seeing the crinkled eyes of his mentor up close again for the first time in years.

Are you going to tell me why you’re working in a strip club yet, Peter Parker? Tony whispers at the end of the dance.

Peter bolts.

When he thinks about it, he’s not even sure anything about his life will change, at this point, if one person (Tonytonytony his brain says) remembers who he is – and after a (scheduled) day off it’s time for another shift. He’s wavering on showing up for his next shift, or risk losing his job (that he likes, thank you) but ultimately shows up.

Tony is there waiting – had he come the day before, too? Asked about Peter? Sat around just watching, waiting? Had he asked someone else for a dance? – and Peter bravely faces him.

They end up in a room, again, this time with the awareness that they know each other.

“I honestly have no idea where to start, Mr. Stark.”

Tony raises an eyebrow at him. “I did pay for a private dance, so you could start with that as the warm up to the big reveal,” he says, and Peter feels his mouth part in shock.

The timing is perfect: the queued up song starts before Peter can say anything, a bass-heavy track with no lyrics, and Peter does an instinctive spin on the pole while trying to sort out the mess in his head.

“I was kidding,” Tony says, with a small amount of panic in his eyes.

Peter stops his next spin, staggering against the pole. Right. That would make so much more sense. “Oh,” he says, dumbly.

(They talk on the couch. Peter ends up spilling everything about what has happened. Tony grips him tight, petting the back of his hair in what Peter assumes is only meant to be comforting, but in a way that makes Peter too aware of the fact he’s wearing a thong and covered in glitter that’s now coating Tony’s immaculately tailored suit, too aware of how comforting this is anyway, how warm Tony is. He’s crying, and his hair is a little wet, so he thinks Tony might be, too.)

After a lot of miscommunication, the reestablishment of Peter Parker's identity, sans the public unmasking, and a professional amount of distance…

Peter kind of misses stripping. Not the money (which was good, but his reinstated trust fund from Tony's non-applicable will is better), but the physicality of it. The intimacy within the anonimity. The way it made his pulse beat harder and his body feel powerful in new ways.

Tony has a stripper pole on the private jet – the only aircraft from his old possessions that wasn't sold off. He and Peter are taking it somewhere and the pole is the elephant in the room.

So... Peter puts on a show. :)

#starker #not a fic #december wip amnesty/clearing

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fuck-customers · 4 years

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If I Sound Aggressive, That's On You Pal.

Okay! Haven't posted a long one in a while but I feel this time it's warranted and I need to add some context.

Our store moved recently, due to corporate building an entirely new store literally a five minute walk away from the old one, that's been around for about forty years, give or take. About six months into my working at the old store, after observing whoever made the closing announcements and finding that sometimes people forgot to do the proper ones at the right time, ending up with more customers still in the store by closing, I took it upon myself to do the closing announcements, which worked for everyone because a) I was always on time, and b) I had a script that I had down to a science, and it goes a little something like this:

{{Attention Darc's shoppers! The time is now 8:45, the store will be closing in fifteen minutes. We ask that you begin to make your final selections and bring them up to the registers at this time, as they will be shutting down shortly. For your shopping convenience, the store will be open again tomorrow at 7:00am, but for now it is 8:45, the store will be closing in fifteen minutes. We thank you for shopping at Darc's on [Street Name], we hope you have a good night!}}

As time went on and I stayed at the store -- not out of loyalty, but because no where else will hire me despite nearly three years of applications, and thanks to Corona, I won't be hired anywhere else pretty much ever -- I was given the leniency to do the announcements as early as thirty minutes before closing, and then do them by fifteen, ten, and five minutes to closing. I'd even throw in the "three minute warning" announcement before locking the door and then the closing announcement to finish it off.

Due to this, we'd normally be successful in getting the last customers out of the store right before or right after we closed officially (not counting the holidays or the stubborn assholes who wanted to try and get "one last thing" but I digress).

HOWEVER; since we moved to this new location, the managers have said we need to stick to the fifteen, ten, five minute interval announcements. During my shifts, I normally take over, but we still have remaining customers ten minutes after close and it's really fucking annoying. And since Corona finally hit my state, corporate has issued a state wide hour change that means we close by 7:00pm instead of 9:00pm, which, somehow, is confusing to everyone else, despite all the signs we have plastered everywhere, from the walls to the doors to the cash registers themselves. But customers are stupid hapless creatures, I suppose I must give them a tiny bit of leniency.

Recently, because people have been keeping us ten to fifteen minutes after close ringing them out, especially now, I decided to do the closing announcements twenty minutes before close, and doing them in five minute intervals, thinking perhaps if I gave them extra warning, perhaps we would have everyone out by 7:00pm -- no dice.

Instead, what happened was, someone called my manager to COMPLAIN, that my announcements sounded AGGRESSIVE, and "if we really have twenty minutes until you close, why do I have to make my final selections now??? That's Not Fair!" (I'm imagining this complaint in a super whiny Karen voice because who else would complain about this, God Forbid you remember us employees are human beings RISKING OUR LIVES just so you can get some garlic bread, you smelly ass cunt.)

And honestly? I've had a lot of people say I sound very polite and professional when I make the announcements, though I do tend to sound a lot firmer when we're actually closed, because no one has any fucking excuse to show up at a grocery store five minutes until closing, like what the fuck is wrong with y'all. I even had like a dozen people in the last year alone tell me I should work at Lazer Quest because I sounded like a good announcer. So now I'm insulted on top of pissed that some whiny pissbaby felt insulted at being reminded that we close at a certain time and we want everyone out by that time so we can go home at a reasonable hour.

Anyway, I'm now not allowed to make the closing announcements for a few shifts just to appease the bastard who complained, which means we run a risk of people not making the announcements at all due to being on the phone, or missing the time, and then people are gonna be even more angry when SOMEONE finally makes the final announcement because "We didn't give anyone a warning".

I hate this grocery store. I hate my managers. I hate corporate. I hate customers. I hate retail. I wanna burn this place to the ground, preferably with me in it, and then maybe I can be sent to a paradise where retail doesn't exist, and all the asshole customers are being pitchforked up the ass.

#tw #trigger warning #submissions #fuck customers #cashier problems #fuck retail #fuck managers #submission

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theteej · 3 years

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“You need to take serious time for yourself, do self-care, or something,” my best friend Mark said to me, uncomfortably earnestly.

“I’m serious. You haven’t been letting anything in, and you just have to sit and stop running. Go process, or feel, or just let it sink in that you did things and you surprisingly don’t suck.”

Fuck, he’s right.

And so that’s what I’m doing. Last week I booked an Airbnb in La Jolla, a tony coastal enclave of San Diego near where I went to undergrad. I pretended I was on vacation, but in a pandemic. I booked a small studio near the water, and planned to spend these next few days reading, reflecting, walking along the ocean, and staying otherwise indoors and trying to wrestle with this whole semester. I pulled up to the studio last night, unpacked my bags, and cried. Like cried a lot. I felt lonely and scared, but also so numb. I felt a sea of blankness all around me, and a sense of trepidation.

Honestly, I don’t know what to do about all of my stupid feelings.

Where to start?

I feel like I’ve been anxious nearly my whole life. It’s absolutely something that developed as a kid with a violent, drunken father. You learn to live in between heartbeats like that, always testing what’s about to happen, trying to think of the next thing to plan in order to stay safe. Sure, your brain says tauntingly. Things are OK right now, but what if they’re not in a few minutes? Or even worse: Things ARE terrible—what are you going to do if they stay that way forever? These are the gifts Tyrone Tallie Sr left me, along with an unoriginal legal name and a stubborn widows peak visible whenever I grow my hair out for a few weeks.

Couple that with a natural tendency to think quickly, and you have the birth of a personality that masked my calculating self-security by turning those constant permutations into clever moments for interaction or comment. Like many people, my wit is born of trauma; the ability to process things in quick time is born out of needing to feel safe, and frequently gets deployed to put others at ease. That’s one of the weirder contradictory things about being me. I am simultaneously witty and clever and in control, and I am also always quietly freaking out, or at the very least, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Which is why this has been….a damn semester. Teaching two classes fully remotely with panicked, overwhelmed students in the shadow of an ever-worsening pandemic that stretches on and on without end and feeling daily gaslighted by the endless selfishness of your fellow citizens—what a gift for the anxious. Ironically, anxiety helped to a certain extent because I didn’t have the shock of falling into a new world of uncertainty or fear that so many non-anxious folk did this year. But that’s hardly a gift, is it? Congratulations! You’re already living as if a bomb can go off at any moment, so you’re not struggling to adjust to the new horror show of life!

Teaching this semester has been…just without any context. I’ve taught online, but not in this same planned way and with everyone panicking, and the looming threat of pandemic and election. And yet we did it. We pulled ourselves together, and my students were honest about their needs and their breakdowns and I tried to model humility and grace and confusion and rage as well as they did. We didn’t fuck it up. Or, we all fucked up, and it was okay. We learned things. Students surprised me, and it was glorious. I got to be broken and I didn’t die.

It was an intense semester of overworking as well. I was on a bunch of committees, formal and informal, and we managed to get a new minor—African Studies—passed. I’ll be heading a new program on campus next year, and that’s exciting and terrifying. And on top of all of that, I couldn’t stop volunteering for stuff, or talking about things I cared about. In addition to teaching, I gave fourteen different presentations or talks this semester, an increase in expectations or agreements on my part thanks to the ubiquity of zoom. It grinds on you: the whole, get up, trudge to the back room, power up a personality for the zoom camera, and pour yourself digitally into a screen, only to feel yourself broken into little packets of light and data and scattered across the universe.

The talks went well. The student evaluations went well. Honestly, both were fucking great. And I haven’t let myself feel a goddamn thing. I let it slide off me like rain on a waxed deck, the droplets beading on the slick wood before slipping away into the darkness. I cant let it sink in, because then something good might be happening, and the very skills that have made me capable—the whip-fast reflexes, the self-deprecating humour, the rapid analysis—are also tied to the very deep-seeded anxiety. Everything has to be calculated and understood and prepared for, because at some moment a dark curtain is going to fall over the face of a man with my same name. He will smack me so hard I will go flying out of a chair and hit the wall with a soft, sickly whump, a particularly unpleasant of me at seven that I carry sewn into every cell of my skin and fiber of my being.

I can’t stop and let it sink in because I have internalized the worst calculus of overachiever life—push harder, don’t stop for the good, that’s normal. Stop only for the bad to learn from it, take in its horror, and let it never happen to you again. And so I found myself at the end of the semester holding a bag of relative joy like a party favour, looking around anxiously for bullies to come snatch it out of my hands.

And then Jeopardy fucking happened.

I got to be on television. I got to talk to Alex Trebek, the same man who held my grandmother’s hand on Classic Concentration and saw that her for the beautiful, formidable queen that she was. I got to turn silly trivia knowledge into cash—and I got to do it while being me. And to my confusion—people liked me. It went well, they felt I resonated with something inside of them, and they liked it.

I do not, in my own skill set, have the tools to deal with that. I am supposed to be clever and fast, and witty, and engaging and lovable—but I do not know how to actually think of receiving goodness. I know how to process being witty and clever and delightful—I did what I was supposed to do, good job, next—but I don’t know how to actually take that positivity in.

I keep waiting for all of this to fall apart, for everyone to hate me in the reassuring ways that I distrust or marginalize or disbelieve myself. And yet, I know that’s not helpful. Hence, overachiever’s therapy: forcing oneself to prematurely trade on prize money and spend a three day love/relaxation retreat, less than fifteen miles from my own apartment.

I woke up and cried a little. I then tried to mediate or at least focus on the positives of late. Nope. Nothing came. I decided it was time for coffee. I drank some that I made in the Airbnb, but realized I needed to get outside for a walk. I changed into a bright yellow caftan and an extra-dramatic face mask, and went for a walk on the streets of La Jolla, the bougie and strange bubble by the sea.

La Jolla can double in weird ways like other parts of the world I frequent. It feels sometimes like I’m in Durban (if you’re more partial to Umhlanga Rocks or Durban North) or Wellington (if you love Mount Vic or Oriental Bay), or even Vancouver (if you feel like West Point Grey or the haughtiest parts of Kitsilano are your thing). It’s a rich place, one that I don’t belong in, but one that I can feign a few hours of enjoyment and sun.

Today I walked down palm tree lined streets in the perfect weather, the breeze pushing through my still-short hair with a strange urgency. I picked up a cold brew coffee and a freshly caught and grilled halibut sandwich that my therapist recommended (we decided to briefly be pescatarian for a day and chalked it up to the ‘medical advice.’), then I turned toward the coast. I sat for a long time looking at the waves—unsurprisingly—with a bit of anxiety.

What if I relaxed WRONG? What if I couldn’t let myself feel joy? What if I just wasted the day by…eating this sandwich and not fully appreciating the beautiful ocean waves, golden sun, or nature all around me. After a while I realized that sounded ridiculous, and just forced myself to sit.

And as the old Zulu language dance song “Unamanga” by the late Patricia Majalisa started to filter to my headphones, as I stared out at the sea and the sun, something shifted. I felt something like, I don’t know, a failure in the sealnt around myself, and some drops dripped in, slowly. Maybe, just maybe, I didn’t have to do this in a grand gesture. I could enjoy myself and the small joys I’d found in life so far.

I could be grateful and quietly glad for the little things that happened. It wasn’t about deserving it, or about it being worthy of me. I could imagine for right now, that this was a thing that I could have. I could sit and marvel that some great shit happened to me, and it was OK. Let’s not get it twisted—I didn’t have an epiphany, there were no turnbacks on the road to Emmaus. But I did find a little quietude in my soul for a second and stopped frantically Teflon-ing my heart from joy for a second.

I survived a hell semester, and did well. I got a wonderful opportunity and it went well. I could just let hat happen and also not ignore that it happened, to focus on negatives in an outsized way. I could, in this single afternoon moment, be delighted that things had gone okay. And not worry or strategize about the next disaster, which would happen on its own anyway. And…that’s all I can do right now.

Also, I’m going to work on this more, this whole letting people love me and letting it sink in. I usually avoid it because I feel like it keeps me off my game from the inevitable disaster to follow. But that’s not how I want to live. I’m going to try to think about what it means that some of you all tell me you love me, and then to show it. I need to reconcile the nonstop whirligig of my mind also turns menacingly in on itself so often, and that acknowledging the gift of calculated wit and mirth also means I have to cultivate love and joy.

So tomorrow, I’m going to go for a brief run, I’m going to drink some lovely coffee, and I’m going to walk along the ocean again. (And then I’m going to keep staying in this Airbnb so I don’t catch or spread this plague.)

What a fucking semester, y’all.

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prorevenge · 6 years

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Owner screws me over, screws up(s) his business.

To start, I won’t be saying the name of the shipping company franchise I worked for, suffice to say the title is very telling. This is a rather long story, so buckle in. You can skip the backstory and look for the revenge near the bottom. TL:DR at the end.

The Backstory

About five or six years ago I was relatively new to the workforce, having worked one minimum wage job at Mickey D’s. I had been there almost two years, but had little experience elsewhere. Well this one lady always came through early every morning to order a large Diet Coke, and would take a few minutes to talk to me. I mentioned to her that I was displeased with my bosses and the working conditions, and she invited me to come apply for a job at Not FedEx because they were always running low on employees! That should have been my first red flag.

The second red flag went completely over my head, because at this point I was 17 with no previous job experience. When I walked in for an interview, the boss (who I will call Jeph, because it sounds close enough to his name to allow him to remain anonymous) told me it would take five minutes. I wasn’t asked about my relevant experience, my goals within the company, or even told what position I was applying for. I assumed all interviews were different and went along with it, and started the next week with training. Everything went well for the first month. I basically just packed boxes, took down customer information, and sorted mail into the mailboxes we managed. The real trouble started after I was given my one month performance review.

I was deemed to be a valuable asset to Jeph’s franchise, and rightfully so. At 17 I was able to lift more and work better than the 20 and 30 something employees, and due to the work ethic my parents drilled into me I was never slacking off while at work. I was then informed that I would be swapping between Jeph’s two franchises, roughly 30 miles apart. (For context, the franchise I APPLIED TO WORK AT was roughly a mile from my house, so I could walk if I couldn’t get a ride.) Every other day I had to drive out to the location and somehow justify this with my slightly above minimum wage job. ($7.50 for those not in Texas.)

Overall my boss was a massive douche. His physical appearance could best be described as “troll like” with a shirt almost bursting, the top always undone to showcase his aging chest hair, and a face not unlike that of A&F owner Mike Jeffries. He openly cheated on his wife, bragging to coworkers about it constantly. He charged people one dollar for any amount of extra tape they needed on their package, despite the fact that we got roughly two rolls for that price in bulk. He had a special price calculator installed on the computers that charged people roughly 10% more than the package would be elsewhere. He would push employees (who he insisted didn’t work in customer service but sales) to never offer anything less than three day shipping even though we offered standard 7+ days and even cheaper options. I watched him actively lie to customers, claiming it was the price they had to pay blah blah blah, and almost yell at them to go to another store if they didn’t like it. But I digress.

Now here was the first dickish thing that my boss did to me specifically. Until this point, I was only working around 20 hours. After I graduated to working at both stores, Jeph had me sign a brand new W-2 for his second store, which was under a different company. (He owned both, naming one Blue (name for a .44 caliber bullet) and Blue (proper name for visible light)). Again, I had very little idea that this wrong because I had never had to deal with this before. He proceed to add another 20 or so hours to my schedule, bringing me up to 40 hours or more. But since I worked for two separate companies I never earned a dime of overtime or benefits of any kind.

At this point, I started accruing more and more duties, as my boss and coworkers started to trust me more and more. Buy my fourth month of employment (out of a total of eight) I was performing managerial duties such as: opening the store, counting the registers, closing the store, ordering product such as boxes and tape, and preparing shipments for transport. The work alone justified a raise, not to mention the hours I was being asked to work. However when I floated this idea by my boss, he very rudely insisted that since he had a manager for each store already, I was just doing my job and couldn’t earn a cent more.

Then came the second dickish move. We had a large company contract some drop off stuff with us, a telecom company we will say rhymes with Hey Tea and Tea. Customers would bring in their old cable boxes, wires, remotes and the like, and we would scan them and ship them back to Hey Tea and Tea, the company THAT LEGALLY OWNED ALL OF THIS HARDWARE. The customers would not pay us a nickel, but the telecom company would pay almost double what it actually cost to ship the package. There is no way Jeph could look that gift horse in the mouth and decide he was still owed the stable and all the horse’s tack as well, right? Surprise, surprise, Jeph had to take it one step further. ANY and ALL parts/cables/WiFi adapters/USB drives the customer returned to us that didn’t have a scan tag on them, Jeph would pull aside and either strip for copper or sell on eBay. And he would force us, the employees to package his eBay sales or copper wiring into boxes and ship them for him. He even popped batteries out of remotes and recycled them somewhere to get a tax credit. None of his employees ever saw a penny of this money (not that I would have accepted it). We estimated he raked in roughly three to four thousand a month just from stealing alone. For those of you bad at math, that is the price of TWO brand new 2018 Honda Civics.

The Revenge

The third (and fourth) final dick moves are what solidified my hatred for this boss, and my desire to strike back. They both came in the same week, roughly the same time, and both viscerally repulsive. My favorite coworker had recently gotten pregnant, and although the father got the hell out of dodge when he found out, she was doing very well for herself. She and I frequently closed together, and she promised she would bring the baby to sit in the back for the dull hours we had to kill from 6-10. We also had an annual store review from corporate that week, so our boss called a late night meeting after we closed one day. Our boss started out by saying that he was proud of our pregnant coworker for working so hard even with her “disability.” (Yes, even his sense of humor was slimy.) Then, in front of all fifteen employees, HE FIRED HER. He told her that because the Christmas season was coming up, and she would only slow down the store being pregnant and all, he had to let her go.

After she left, hatred seething in her eyes, he turned back to the fourteen of us who were left stunned, and continued on like nothing had happened. He proceeded to tell each of us our jobs for this weekend, leaving mine for last. My job, because I used to drive a decently sized mini van, was to ferry the corporate required supplies, cash for the safe, and OUR ONE WORKING FIRE EXTINGUISHER between the two stores while he kept corporate distracted between visits.

At this point I had taken enough shit from this guy, and I formulated my plan. I started by calling the Hey Tea and Tea fraud department, and telling them everything I knew. I took pictures and emailed them directly to the rep I was talking to, who seemed a little too excited about fraud being committed. I then scheduled a visit from a Hey Tea and Tea rep at the same time corporate was supposed to show up. My next step was to call Not FedEx and explain exactly what I just told y’all, with a few extra things thrown in that I couldn’t share for privacy reasons. They promised to send a rep as well, to the same store, at the same time.

The final step was put into action that Saturday. I dutifully loaded up my van with the supplies, cash (upwards of $4000 if I remember correctly), and fire extinguisher, and headed out. Except I did the exact OPPOSITE of what Jeph wanted. I took the crap to the first store he owned, which was the second one to receive a visit. After he texted the team saying they were moving on, I packed up all the shit and drove it to the other store they just left. Now I am unsure exactly what happened at the other store, but from some coworkers I pieced together that the Not FedEx rep showed up right after I left, but didn’t stay long, and the Hey Tea and Tea rep showed up just before Jeph had arrived and had time to hide his ill gotten gains in his office. The one coworker who was close enough to the office during the corporate meeting said there was lots of angry words being thrown and threats being made towards Jeph and his position as a franchisee. He also lost his franchises the ability to ship for Hey Tea and Tea, at least for a period of time.

Regardless, the very next day I was off because I was (and as cliché as this sounds I swear to God it’s true) helping my grandfather who just got out of the hospital. I receive a call from Jeph, saying I needed to come in right away, and work a double shift as well as close the store. I told him I couldn’t do that, and I was taking a personal day. He fired me right then and there, citing my usage of the work computer to run a photoshop business during work hours. (I’m assuming he was referring to the graphic design work I did FOR HIM, FOR FREE, which he asked me to learn how to do.)

The sad epilogue to this whole story is that he is currently still in business, and still running the same scams he was before. He WAS however fined for not having proper supplies in his stores, as well as forced to use corporate’s package rates rather than his own. So in some small way my revenge worked. He currently has a two star review on Yelp for both of his his businesses, and I hope to have a party outside his store one day when it goes belly up.

TL:DR: Boss is a total douche bag to me and customers, steals from a contract company, fires a pregnant woman for “slowing down the store” then gets his ass reamed by corporate and loses the major contract.

(source) (story by Chewbacca_Q_Wookie)

#prorevenge #by Chewbacca_Q_Wookie #pro revenge #revenge stories #pro revenge stories #pro #revenge #revenge story #last10

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alchemisland · 5 years

Text

The Moors Mutt III

Night fled day. Before the others rose I read the sky. Spying an uncharacteristically vernal mustard sliver, I imagined another world past the clouds, opposing ours directly, and their rising summer sun.

God, shrouded in cancerous sadness, could but weep. Too weak to conjure flame.

The storm, furious mute, spoke through man's works, droplets exploded musically; dull on timbers, shrill on sheet, like crackling fire on thatch.

Foot travel was impossible, even treacherous. Lar wouldn't have it. 'I know someone. Unpaid tab, lovely spacious wagon. Hold tight.'

Unpaid tab, yes. Lovely wagon, no. Against the rising slope, his contraption strained. Its light frame shed water. The man knew his charge and kept us steady. Hold tight proved apt phrasing.

When the carriage wasn't veering towards fatal tip, I dismantled the day's duties into gelded chunks. Easy. Ten manageable tasks. Ten had a ring to it. A certain motivating roundness. Ten tasks set to Heracles condemned to misery by jealous Hera. Ten commandments from on high.

The day passed quickly. I worked mostly absent of mind, scanning peeling labels for keywords. I napped again at some indeterminate point, rising to the first red flares of evening.

Near freedom, the final banality seemed yet more soul destroying. Fortunately it proved easy, simple scribbles to confirm a job done. Mac donned, packed bag overshoulder, I signed the final form with a flourish.

On the doorstep, gazing out at the torrid tempest I was to endure, and again the following day, for a brief moment Cairn Cottage seemed inviting.

I cast a final backward glance. Inside Acrisian frames, there lay my ancestors in oils, frozen in perpetual offence.

As discussed, Charon on his chucking carriage arrived and ferried me back to Sperrin.

Outside the tavern, wet as it was possible to be, I waited. I don't know what I hoped to see. Some queer curiosity took me. I wished to see how they spoke without me. Maybe it was awkwardness that prevented an unannounced arrival. I pressed my ear to the door. Lar told a joke and howled with laughter, joyous overmuch at his own humour. When I entered I hovered in the open doorframe, dripping like a swamp witch. A wave of relief swept over Lar, which he wrestled into a piteous pout.

Two drinks waited, patient as unconfessed sinners. When I peeled off the mac, he flashed a one-sided smile. I muttered a reluctant thanks.

We feasted after. A meal to see us off. For strength, we ate lashings of gravy thickened by meat juices, steaming Yorkshire puddings, slabs of succulent pork, bog mushy peas, and custard to follow.

Afterwards, we reclined swollen. When the small crowd shifted, Fergus rose to slip the bolt unbidden.

My mind was in custardy. I was eaten witless. I wondered had Lar planned the old stuff and sneak.

'Are we, as lantern thieves, away with the light?' Lar undid his top trouser button and grew an inch before my eyes.

'We are.'

'Handled a gun before?' That old chestnut. Long I had anticipated such a discussion.

'I have and don't intend to again. Hate hate hate them. Listen, speaking of, we need to talk about this whole thing.' Lar's brow furrowed. 'I believe with alternate ends, disagreements arise.' I thought carefully and he waited patiently. 'This isn't a fox hunt.'

'I never said it was. You seem a bit peeved actually. If I can be bold, why hate the gun and not its wielder? Is a rifle always an instrument of terror no matter the context? On the shoulder of an adventurer piercing the interior, emboldened by its weight, is it the selfsame tool that greedily dispenses random death in the hands of a deranged person? Say a rifle, bought with pacivity in mind, never packed to shoot, merely to brandish and quell cooling tempers, where do you class that?'

Nobody is perfect and there was the proof. When it came to criticising people en masse, Lar was your man. Less evident was his enthusiasm when the crosshair turned to his own private club. Gunfans, gunmen, - for men they were mostly - whatever their preferred nomenclature, are tiresome, everybody agrees.

Realizing I had zoned out, I nodded extra vigorously at his next points, hoping the nod was taken as a sign of attentiveness and not agreement.

Foam pooled at the corners of his mouth. 'Even if we should not spend a single cartridge, it's a fool that lowers caution in victory! Wear these chains. Be it upon your head.'

I tried to interject, 'Lar, really that's a bit dram-'

He continued unabated, 'Should the beast prove strengthful and beguiling as I suspect, and we its seekers should become gunless hunted, it's not a good look for that book of yours.'

Though admiring of his passion on the subject, I had none to share. 'A gun is a gun. Any given situation is more likely to end in a leaden exchange with guns present, vise a vie, sans guns we are overall safer, despite feeling less protected individually.'

'Right. And when those eviller guns unleash in benign judgement, who better to return fire than kind souls equally armed?' He wagged a finger at my smirk. His voice lowered an octave. He swerved and spat, throwing his arms aloft with such momentum that his knuckles wrapped the timbers.

He paced, every inch of his pulpit touched. Standing again before me, he exhaled the temporary madness.

Fergus rose disturbed, a tremble evident. He vocalised disquiet at our clamour. Lar made his apologies; mine mumbled, Fergus' thoughtful.

He continued 'A thousand fools wait raging. I'll not be one with my arms held aloft in deference to a keeper. Either I should die on spent casings or triumph. Your charisma won't stop bullets or beasts. I'll have Fergus pack a rifle for you. Don't wanna use it, don't.' Empassioned, Lar slammed his hand down on the bar.

'Take your rod, Pilate. We'll see who time vindicates. Have you not heard that he who lives by the sword shall too die by the sword?'

'Have heard you, Judge not?' Pulling aside a rug, he revealed a hatch beneath his feet. Fergus tossed the heavy door to one side with apparent ease and fetched a swaddled armoury, which he laid for my reluctant perusal. I chose a revolver. Six shots, lightweight, swift off the hip. I remember a sense of perceived ceremony, as if my hand should be drawn towards the right snug.

Once I fixed the holster, Lar longed to bequeath a second gift. Claims that my recent experiences left me badly turned on gifts fell on deaf ears. A gift on the house, as he put it. He returned, book in hand, and slapped it face-up on the bar. 'Old Mortimer's Mort Timer' was printed in bold crimson, letters tall as wide.

'If this is a pitiful attempt to convince me guns laws increase gun deaths, it's ill considered.'

'Ignore the cover. Cowboy there is a vessel for universal truths. Makes for a good bedtime story. Try it. If you're still offended tomorrow, we'll debate then.'

Everything seemed less intense once the guns were sealed away. We sank a fifth, then a sixth shortly after.

'Have you a path in mind?' Lar slurred.

'Arrogant I might be, fool not; you know the land better. Speak freely.'

'I have some notions.'

'Notions - mere legless actions! As joint expeditionaries, in name rather than eventual royalty, I offer no pronouncement. What am I paying you for? Hardly your winning anecdotes. We're following your route to success or failure.'

I departed, lifting the flap for myself this time. 'I know the way. See you. First light. Rest well.'

Once abed I turned the book in my hands. Its garish colour lent a faint luminosity which it seemed shameful my hands should dull. I discovered the binding was frayed. The object showed more blemish than the ravages of time; later pages wore blotches. A hypothesis soon formed, which further probing confirmed. This book was licked by the ocean. A sea tome it was.

On the inside cover, faded and difficult, illegible without foreknowledge of the owner, I saw Fergus' name printed, a phyrgian squiggle.

I read it;

Ever hear the story of old Mortimer Considine? He was bold as block letterin', round as a cowerin' brushhog, feared and lovered in equal measure. Them scales was centred for him. Instinctively he knew right from wrong. Round Texas way at one point he was the toughest sonofabitch the world had ever see'd. Papers sid it, wimmin giggled it, smoke signalled it, so it musta been true.

Guns smoking, he toured the land righting injustices, collecting bounties and if rumour holds truth, fathering bastards, later becoming county scourges in their own right. Nothing on their old man though, dull facsimiles, whudever that means. Chaotic he was. Kindly too. Smart as a Greek. Strong as a mountain man, and I hear them Greeks had big boys too.

Now, he was fixing to be the best at shooting after his days out ranging. Tired of hauling baddies in for cash. He wanted hisself a wife and cosy home, young'uns to raise right. Make right some on his past transgressions. Hell, if he had cash enough, as he was heard to say only in deepest cups on full moon nights, when the moon controlled the tides of his tears 'well as them on the beach, he'd seek out his illegitimate sprogs and give 'em something for their hard lot.

Best gotta beat the best. Roving West then East, he rode into town with his holster turned front, making his business clear so to speak. Everyone he'd fought so far he felled easy, like dead trees keeling at a shove. There was big boys, tough men who a punch would never fell. Only the impersonal, devious strength of a bullet would do it, seemed a shame really fer all their liftin' and sweatin'. What finnesse they had in riding and wrasslin' they lost at steels, for Mortimer was quick as cancer and spun like a storm at the whistle, shooting 'em full of steaming holes.

Had himself a reputation now. When he came upon town and rode the highstreet on his black destrier like a demon called from hell, only the toughest mothers dared from the shadow of the awnings. Now this one place he went, or was bound for, he got to hearing was a hovel of wretched rapists and varmint brigands, living in squalor, wallowing in vile hedonism. Imperial in their particular perversions, namely unholy orgies in that there big church built by them mexicans was once this far into the states, them was once from further yonder than Mexico and came upward, with them layered temples like square sandcastles.

Pilgrims passing elsewise in other directions he met, but none going toward. Then he saw it, the black spires silhouetted on the matte of night, which held purple and pink and orange, flashes of winking silver, and all the gold jewels of the firmament. He had no want of killing and no provin' to do with regular folk, so he kept his gun shy in behind, his trenchcoat held firm at his chest with a single button, which he took from a sheriff's waistcoat.

You there, he'd said, so high on his horse he appeared a drawn shadow, as if some perfidious god had set to drawing charcoal on the mirror of the world. Up stole the pilgrim and leapt almost.

Mort?

Nay, giggled Mortimer, almost though. What's yonder?

Pilgrim, without lookin, answered quick, Ain't nothing there and no god. Kindly sort you seem. Can tell from ya eyes. Big ol blue ones like the desert moon at night. Not cold though, blue as magick fire.

Mortimer again requested the name of that spiked tower.

Babel, he says and left.

Babel, Mortimer says and left wondering had he heard that name before. He'd met a guy named Barber once. Polack chap taking his wagon clean through to York. Was that the same word? Maybe. Nobody could kill him, not with a gun. Too fast, too cunnin' at gunnin'. Few years left at the top, at least. If they did it, it'd be ignoble, uncunning and devious. Mind, he was cunnin' at augurin' too. Augured him a plan.

After tracing his steps at a canter, Mortimer spied the same stooped soul, satchel slung on his back, hooded. Pilgrim, he said, help me and I'll pay ye. When the work is done, I'll ferry you safe to your destination.

Deal, said the pilgrim so quick as to be near suspicious.

All the way he walked fast. Faster'n an old man, Mortimer reckined. The man had loped, limped and lounged before, as a man of advanced age, now he sprang more sprightly.

Mortimer had a suspicion maybe. Gut feeling. A gnawing doubt. Not enough too stop him. Reckined he was too cliver 'n devious to get got. That morning when they got close to town and descried distantly, from a rise which he took to be an ancient thing built by them northern southern mexicans, a multitude assembled in the centre of town.

Mortimer turned to his pardner to git planning and found hisself did in, plugged and smoking, a fresh red rosette pinned on his breast. The pilgrim relieved Mortimer of his possessions and stole away back into a fresh day, right quicker than ever he'd gone yet.

That was the story of that there Mortimer.

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no-ns-en-si-ca-l · 6 years

Text

Some Moments Leading up to This One • Christina Catherine Martinez

RATS

At some point the rats got out of control. Our parents purchased the rats from a guy who bred them in buckets of wood shavings in his garage. We surveyed the containers like they were windows full of puppies. The little pink and white things wriggling around in them were to be our pets. That they were bred to be food for larger pets belonging to families moving in more robust circles of economic activity did not occur us children.

COPS

My father was mildly obsessed with cops, tried several times to become one—making circles on practice tests for the written exam, making circles on the dirt track of the Sherriff’s training academy behind our house—but there was always some clerical snafu or abstruse psychological red flag (one question they ask is whether or not you turn around to look at your waste before flushing the toilet. Apparently there is a wrong answer to this). On rainy days my brothers and I slurped ramen noodles and watched the police documentary series COPS on Fox 11. Matthew lived next door and was a couple years younger than me. His parents told him he was too young to watch the show, but he pleaded them into the odd compromise of watching the title sequence only, which succored him enough to stalk the neighborhood with a nerf gun singing the theme song, bad boys, bad boys, over and over under his breath.

We were home schooled and Matthew was not. Every morning, around the time my mom began clearing up the breakfast dishes and herding us together to begin the day's work, I would see Matthew's little face inch past the living room window in his grandmother's big white Cadillac. I can’t remember if she lived with them or not, but she was always around, functioning as part chauffeur, part babysitter, and all around emotional punching bag for this supremely unhappy family (the entire second story of their house was added on as a private bedroom suite for mom). Every afternoon my brothers and I returned to the window just in time to see the white car pull up to their tight, golf-ready lawn and watch Matthew's backpack sail through the passenger-side window, followed shortly by Matthew himself. He yelled and spat and kicked papers and shit all over the lawn, without fail, every school day. It was such a treat. I credit this daily theater with planting the seed of skepticism in my attitude toward institutions, and I suppose by extension, to anyone in uniform.

Still, as committed members a religious suburban community, of some of my parents' closest friends were officers of the law. Not the slack-jawed, double-chinned avatars of male torpor, but sweet, boar-bristle ‘stached men with bright eyes and prematurely creased foreheads. The kind earned from continually raising brows at things children say. Especially children who don't go to regular school. Dad stopped trying to become a cop after noticing their off-duty penchant for K-Swiss sneakers and Hawaiian shirts.

Eventually, between the hours of 12 and 6 am, between backseat blow jobs and furtive jam sessions, I would run into these men. A tense skein of trust evolved as they circled the perimeter of my adolescence; tapping the glass, raising their eyebrows, and waiving me home. I lived in cars, but I was no good at it. I wondered what separated me from the subjects on COPS, who also just wanted to hang out but invariably, somehow, ended up face down on the sidewalk. I asked Gonzo what his rules of thumb were for letting girls off with a warning. He was immune to crying and pleas of period emergencies, but once, upon pulling over a swerving vehicle and finding a woman covered in exploded burrito, he did let her go. Gonzo is a close family friend, and I was convinced that he was the greatest cop that ever lived.

Years later I asked him why, at tender age of thirty five-ish, he left the po-po biz to become a teacher. He said he didn't like kind of person it was turning him into.

PUBLIC SCHOOL

For a radical experiment in parenting, try this: take a feral child (who loves Jesus), strap it to a translucent purple backpack, and place it in a structured learning environment. Years later—

APPLES

A lot of our games were about dying. The best, by far, was the night we tried to enact as many stock movie death scenes as possible without laughing. We were just hanging out. Someone was on the floor, and then Nadal starting noodling something sad on the piano, and then it kind of took off from there. We played a swan song for a gritty, browbeaten cop with a heart of gold (a peculiar trope, and, as I learned years later after experiencing the privilege of transatlantic flight, a particularly American one). We slipped through the hands of an action hero clinging helplessly to his buddy dangling off the edge of a cliff. Grenades crashed all around as Paul and I played out a lost cause on the battlefield. I cradled Paul's head in my arms, taking his shirt in a vice grip and screaming, “Don't you die on me soldier!" and then, for context, finessing a line about how he can't die, because he never taught me his secret gumbo recipe. Paul gasped for air, phantom blood filling his throat and mouth. It dribbled down his chin, sputtered off his lips and onto my shirt. Everyone clapped their hands over their mouths to keep from laughing. Just before his eyes rolled back in his head and his neck went limp, Paul pulled me close and whispered in a Cajun accent, "Don't forget the nutmeg,

mon ami....

" I brushed my fingertips over his eyes to close them. At this final touch, we could hold it no longer. Everyone burst laughing, crying, chugging beers, and yelling

ok, now me! me and you!

As the only girl, more than once I resorted to my privileged trope of peaceful cancer girlfriend. I'd stroke whoever's face very softly and whisper sweet platitudes about Finding New Love and how I Will Always Be With You. The beloveds raspberried in my face with laughter, and then we'd all drink some more. I died at least five times. We drank, the piano lolled on, we laughed until the laughter turned to honking chest rattles because we hadn't quit smoking yet. The roleplay kept going. In high school we'd made exclamations of love to one or more of one another. We filched wine and read e.e. cummings by candlelight, smoked weed and listened to records, made out in the McDonald’s PlayPlace, and screamed at one another in cars, breaking up and getting back together many times over. We heeded the tap on the glass and went home. We threatened to kill ourselves and harbored baroque fantasies about our funerals. Dying for fun at the crash house purged our maudlin adolescence and all its attendant delusions, suddenly petty in light of things like getting dressed for work and swinging a grocery basket in the crook of an arm and filling out apartment rental applications at Starbucks. An ironic bow at the threshold of adulthood, when all the quotidian necessities of independent living were briefly, intensely glamorous. We got oil changes and shopped for work clothes. We stopped buying Nat Sherman Fantasia's and got promoted to shift lead. We had people over for dinner and complained about our bosses. Then some of us got actual cancer, and some of us actually tried to kill ourselves, and once or twice we went blind, stabbing the roof of our mouth with the toothbrush, our girlfriends trying to pull rank on despair.

We scatter. But we find each other. Years later, Landon and I are sitting in the Seinfeld restaurant in Harlem. I’m on my first work trip with the gallery. Landon entered Columbia University as a film major, and is about to leave with a degree in computer science. Upon learning the average post-graduation salaries for his respective choices, the change was swift. I show him my little stack of business cards with the word director printed under my name. He pays for the meal with an elegant slip of his own card. The last time we dined, it was at a Cheesecake Factory in Orange County. He wore sunglasses to mask the bandages over his eyes, and I wept into some kind of alcoholic milkshake called a Flying Gorilla.

We pick at anonymous fried brown things and exchange tabs on where we all went. The food here is decent, except for the marinara sauce, which I suspect is with dishwater to make it last. We talked about all of the times we died and I ask, between bites of naked mozzarella stick, why he left the old crash house.

“I just thought we could be grown-ups,” he said.

I remembered the giant Patrick Nagel poster that crowned the faux-wood paneled living room, a crouching woman in pink thigh high boots, larger than life.

“Mmmmm," I said.

“And we just”—last time I visited the house she had grown a dick, a mustache, and a fist-sized hole near her shoulder—“like, we couldn’t do it,” he said. “We couldn’t have nice things or make a home.”

“You should have taken out the wallpaper."

“It was his mom’s."

“I know," I said, "but that’s a lot of apples."

MONEY

Money is an excellent balm, very near to forgiveness. I met John Wayne at a comedy show, and he quoted Austin Powers in bed, but the following week he was out of town on business, and it felt good to say “he’s out of town on business” in response to someone’s face screwing up about the yeah baby stuff. It generally worked, and I have no reason to believe John Wayne wasn’t his real name.

MONEY

“Does the taco place take cards?”

“They charge seventy cents to use a card.”

“Alright then let’s swing by the Chase ATM on the way.”

“Are you for real?”

“Yes. What? Yes I’m for real.”

“You’re just going to spend the seventy cents you’ll save from using cash for the tacos on the extra gas it will take to swing by the ATM for the cash.”

“It’s on the way.”

“It’s so freaking hot right now.”

“It’s literally right on the way.”

“I can’t believe you can make these kinds of calculations after we’ve been sitting under a waterfall all day.”

“I’m stopping at the Chase ATM.”

“If you’re going to trap me in this hot car any longer in order to save seventy cents, then I’ve earned seventy cents worth of bitching for however long this ATM detour is delaying tacos.”

“I can’t believe you can make these kinds of calculations after we’ve been sitting under a waterfall all day.”

“We haven’t even moved in the last five minutes.”

“Fine. It’s worth seventy cents to not have to sit in this traffic or hear you bitch.”

“Do you think if we had universal basic income, Post-Internet art would still exist?”

….

“What?”

“I don’t know.”

RATS

Oddly enough they fuck like rabbits. We brought home a brother and sister from the bucket guy, thinking they might respect their second chance at life by refraining from incest. Instead they multiplied, and we had to buy more cages to house all the pink little nubbies that kept popping out of the mama rat. Seizing upon this educational moment, our mother encouraged us to learn more about rats, and we observed the little nubbies at length, patiently waiting for them to grow into more comely beings. One day I noticed one of the nubbies lying still while the others inched around the cage with their little salamander limbs. I put him in my palm, and he was cold. I took him to my father, who was preparing his next sermon in the dining room. I had yet to attend public school, but I’d seen enough television to aesthetically forecast the kind of educational moment he might seize upon.

“Dad,” I cooed, “this one died.”

“Oh honey,” he said, taking the miniature creature in his hands, “He’s not dead… he’s just thirsty!”

And with that, he dropped the dead baby rat into his glass of lemonade.

I froze for a few seconds, then clapped my hands over my mouth to keep from laughing.

That’s when I became a comedian.

#(truth)

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