Chapter Text
“That’ll be eighteen fifty.”
The man on the other side of the counter grunts and just sort of tosses his money down, coins bouncing off in every conceivable direction, scooping up his pack of cigarettes and lottery ticket before hustling out the door.
Remus sighs, looking down at the money that he hasn’t even collected yet, let alone counted, pinching the bridge of his nose before scooping it all up and dumping it in the register.
That sounds like a problem for later.
He looks around the empty store, turning to peer out the window at the parking lot before he slips out from behind the counter, making his way over to the coffee machine and setting a fresh pot to brew, tossing a wet paper towel on the floor and pushing it around with his foot to clean up where someone has dripped red slushie throughout all the aisles.
He’s exhausted.
He shouldn’t even technically be at work right now.
He had worked his scheduled seven to three shift earlier that day, went home, cleaned his apartment and went to the laundromat for the first time in over a week, did some work for his online coding gig, and had just been getting ready for bed when his manager called to say that the overnight person had called off and that Remus needed to cover it.
His manager had then hung up before he could even begin to argue.
He’d sat there for a bit on the end of his bed, trying to work up the courage to call him back and say that he couldn’t do it, before he’d gotten up with a curse and started getting dressed. He’s supposed to work again from seven to three tomorrow, well, later today by this point, but surely his manager won’t expect him to work the entire thing…
Right?
He sighs again, knowing that he’s probably stuck here until three o’clock, stooping down to pick up the now pink paper towel and wincing when his back cracks, tossing it towards the trash can. It doesn’t quite make it in, hitting the side with a wet slap before sadly sliding down the side, and he stares at it in despair, very seriously considering just leaving it there.
The bell dings overhead, letting him know that someone has just pulled into the parking lot, and he grumbles as he snags the paper towel and drops it in the can, pouring himself a cup of coffee and dumping in enough creamer and sugar to cover the bitter, burned taste that just comes standard with their machine, shuddering as he takes a sip and resumes his place behind the register again.
He calls out a greeting when a man lets himself into the store, leaning against the counter and daydreaming about taking a nap as the man wanders the aisles, the steady rhythm of his boots against the linoleum threatening to lull him to sleep, head dipping down towards his chest a few times.
Remus blinks hard and gives his head a little shake, taking a deep gulp of coffee before slapping at his cheeks, trying to force his brain into alertness. He glances at the clock and groans, it’s somehow only two, wondering if he should go for something with a little more oomph, like one of those five hour energy shots or an energy drink.
They make his hands shake, and his chest always hurts a little after drinking one, but the other option is quite literally falling asleep on the job, and he’s likely to get fired if he does that.
He really needs this job, even if it is the worst.
He reaches over the counter and snags one of the energy shots from the display, ringing it in and digging his wallet from his pocket, setting his change to the side when the man approaches the counter.
“Good evening, sir. Did you find everything you need today?”
“Yeah, thanks.” The man dumps an armful of chips, candy, sodas, and a single beer onto the counter, leaning backwards as he peers out the window. “Let me get fifteen on pump seven as well.”
Remus rings in his purchases, eyeing him before deciding that he’s well over the age of twenty one, adding his gas and blinking a few times when the numbers at the bottom of the screen swim in front of his eyes.
“That’ll be thirty-two forty-six.”
The man holds out a hundred dollar bill and Remus simply stares at it for a moment, bemoaning that this is his life and wondering if he can get away with refusing it. There’s enough money in the drawer to make change, though, and his manager and the customers tend to get pissy when he refuses to break big bills.
Remus just knows that this is going to bite him in the ass later, and that he’ll probably run out of small bills well before the manager gets here in the morning and changes out the drawers. It always seems like once one person pays with a large bill, the next five people in the store will want to as well.
He bites back a curse as reaches out to take it, punching the little button on the screen and jolting when the drawer pops open.
It feels like it takes him far too long to count out the change, losing track several times of how much he has, but he’s not exactly firing on all cylinders at the moment. He passes it back to the man before bagging up his purchases, sighing when the cheap plastic bag immediately rips. He grits his teeth as he double and then triple bags it, holding it out with a pained smile.
“Thank you, have a nice day.”
“Yeah, you too,” the man says distractedly, looking at his phone as he snatches the bag, not even bothering to look up as he pushes his way out the store.
Remus rubs his hands over his face and yawns, looking down at the money on the counter for a moment in befuddled confusion before he remembers that he didn’t put his change away. He shoves it back into his wallet and cracks the seal on the energy shot, shuddering in revulsion as he chugs it.
He understands that they probably can’t make them taste too good, to prevent children from wanting to drink them, but there’s no reason they have to taste that nasty.
He drops the empty bottle in the trash and looks around the store, wondering if he should sweep the floor. It probably needs to be done, Lord knows it doesn’t get done during the dayshift, but the thought of digging the broom out of the storage closet and sweeping makes him want to cry a little bit.
He’s just so tired.
“I’ll do it later,” he mumbles to himself, knowing that he won’t, dropping onto the stool that they aren’t supposed to have behind the counter and rubbing at his eyes, yawning again. He takes a quick glance out at the parking lot before he slips his book out of his bag, cracking it open to where he last left off and smoothing the page where he’d folded the corner down.
He’s a bit lost in the words when the door is yanked open quite violently, head snapping up as someone in a ski mask storms into the store and slaps a hand down onto the counter.
“Give me the money.”
He blinks a few times, caught off guard, brain sluggishly trying to catch up. “What?”
“Don’t fuck with me man, I’m not in the mood. Give me the fucking money.”
Remus’ mouth falls open, sitting there stupidly, not understanding at all what’s going on, until his mind finally makes the connection.
He’s being robbed.
“Shit, uh,” he leaps to his feet, book falling towards the floor, completely unsure of what to do.
He never technically received proper training when he was hired, the manager generally preferring to do as little work as humanly possible, and the man who was supposed to train him walked out within two hours of his first shift, leaving him to figure things out on his own.
He has no idea what he’s supposed to do in this situation.
He flails for a second, raising his hands above his head despite the fact that the man isn’t pointing a weapon at him, and then lowering them again, jerking them around at waist height quite awkwardly.
Well, he can’t see a weapon, but it’s safe to assume everyone has a gun these days.
He stares at him, very awake now, and thinks about making a move for the panic button beneath the counter, until he remembers that it had been disabled after one of his coworkers kept bumping it with her knee and his manager got tired of the cops showing up every few hours. His phone is in his pocket, but he won’t be able to dial 911 quickly enough before the robber snatches his phone and possibly hurts him.
He really wishes, at that moment, that he would have applied at the place down the street instead. At least they have bullet proof glass between the registers and the customers.
“Dude,” the robber shouts, looking quite angry now. “What is your issue? Just give me my fucking money! What the hell is wrong with you?”
He really doesn’t want to open the cash drawer.
He’s pretty sure that his manager will insist on taking the lost money out of his paycheck, even though he’s also pretty sure that that’s illegal, but it’s not like he can afford to lose that money or hire a lawyer to try and fight it.
Remus feels frozen, beyond panicked now, sweat dripping down his back as the robber reaches towards his pocket, images running through his head of the robber pulling out a knife or a gun.
Fuck, what if he gets hurt? He can’t afford to go to the hospital, nor can he afford to take time off work, and thats if the robber only hurts him. The cameras don’t even work, they’re only there for show, so no one will even know what happened to him. Shit, shit, he doesn’t know what to do.
He makes a sort of garbled noise, taking a single step towards the register and flinching away from it, mind racing so quickly he can’t form a coherent thought and heart about to pound right out of his chest, when his body seems to move of its own accord and he grabs the hem of his uniform shirt, lifting it up to his neck.
The man stares at him, eyes wide in the gap of the ski mask, and Remus stares right back, equally surprised at his own actions.
He’s… flashing him.
Someone is quite literally trying to rob him, and his first instinct was to show them his chest.
He’s not even in shape. Nor does he have like… boobs. Not good ones, at least.
There’s nothing to see but flat man nipples, untoned muscles, his patchy chest hair, freckles, and the soft skin of his lower stomach. He has a scar, sure, but it’s not even like it’s a cool scar that makes him look dangerous, but because he once fell out of a tree while stoned and scraped the shit out of his side on the way down.
He blinks, still showing the man his chest.
The man blinks back at him, raising his gaze to his face for a moment before lowering it to his torso again.
They stand in silence for what feels like several minutes.
The man finally removes his hand from his pocket, revealing that he was reaching for a phone this whole time, not a weapon, raising it and pointing it at him.
He hears the soft click of the camera shutter.
The man lowers the phone again, nodding slowly.
“Huh,” he says quietly, turning around and letting himself out of the store.
Remus just stands there, nipples exposed, watching as he makes his way towards a motorcycle he couldn’t see while sitting. The robber shoves a helmet over his head and straddles the bike, engine roaring to life. The helmet turns towards the direction of the front window, simply staring for a moment before the man revs the engine and slowly rolls out of the parking lot, Remus watching as it quickly fades from view.
He slowly lowers his shirt, smoothing it down with his hands and taking a shallow, pained breath, having to bend over and press his forehead against the counter when he begins to shake.
“What the hell just happened?” he gasps out, collapsing onto the floor and tucking his head between his knees as he struggles to breathe. “Oh my God, what the fuck?”