Title: "The Problem with the World Is"
Author: Veritas Found
Rating: M / PG-16 / Teen
Characters/Pairings: Georgia Lass, Ken Mason
Summary: While reaping a soul at a cupcakery, Mason enlightens George on what the real problem with the world is.
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Notes/Warnings: Post-series. It occurs to me, after writing this, that in some respects this could be viewed as highly offensive. I'm apologizing in advance and asking you lovelies to consider the argument is from Mason's perspective and not necessarily my own. (Though this was partially written as vent-writing after living with a hipster for two months, even though it was started after a slow day at work where a recent rewatch had Mason mouthing off about how douchey cupcakeries are while I cored Lemon Drops. To make it even worse, I started writing it while chilling at a Starbucks. It was my life, guys – and, despite the bad, the cupcakery at least was glorious.)
"The Problem with the World Is"
"You have got to be shitting me."
George wished she was. Mason leaned over her shoulder, glancing at the address on the post-it in her hand. Yep, they were at the right place, and 600 Pine Street had turned out to be a bakery. Actually, she was pretty sure they were called cupcakeries – those little bakeries that seemed to be gaining popularity and exclusively sold cupcakes. From the looks of it, the place was doing fairly well. At least the foot traffic seemed to be consistent.
"That is fucking ridiculous. An entire shop just for cupcakes? That is…there is no way this is actually a thing. Georgie, tell me I'm seeing things," Mason said. She quirked a brow at him.
"What the hell is your problem now?" she asked, and he gestured at the storefront.
"It's…it's just so…cupcakes? Really?" he asked, looking at her. "It screams douchebag, don't you think?"
"I think we have fifteen minutes before my reap, and I'm hungry. A cupcake actually sounds kind of good," she said. She grinned up at him. "What d'ya say? My treat."
Mason was still Mason, and despite his grumbling he followed her into the joint after the promise of free food. The inside wasn't too bad, actually. There was a cute little café setup going on, and despite the steady flow there were still tables up for grabs. The cupcakes in the cases looked delicious, if a little fancy, and the prices weren't bad. George was debating between the Bananas Foster and the Samoas when Mason groaned again beside her.
"See this, Georgie? Gluten-free. A special section just for gluten-free. Why the bloody hell are you getting a cupcake if you're gluten-free?" he asked, glancing at her. She shrugged, ignoring the way the woman next to her was shooting Mason a withering stare. When the boy behind the counter asked her order, George almost rolled her eyes when she asked for a gluten-free Cherries Jubilee. "Bloody wankers. You know most people don't even actually need it? Like it's just the cool thing now. It's hip to be gluten-free. Won't actually kill you to eat it."
"And yet there are still those that will get violently ill at the possibility of cross-contamination," George said with a glance at the woman, who was turning red the longer she eavesdropped. While she agreed Mason had a point, she also remembered the girl that had spent a few weeks at Happy Time the previous month. The entire office knew she was Celiac, but even though Delores had made her a special cake she hadn't been as careful as she could have been with avoiding contaminants – and Tiffany had spent the rest of the party trapped in the bathroom. It had not been pretty.
"I'm just saying, George –" he started, but she nudged his elbow and glared at him.
"What do you want, Mason?" she asked, nodding at the boy who was waiting to take their order.
"Oh. Carrot," he said, and the teen rolled his eyes before grabbing the cupcake. George raised her eyebrows as she saw his ungloved hand.
"Bananas Foster," she said.
"Is that everything?" the kid asked. His voice was an almost painful deadpan. George glanced at the board behind him and asked for a coffee, and he rolled his eyes before going to the back counter to grab it. Mason snorted and poked at his cupcake, sitting on a pretty little plate with a plastic fork beside it. He was grumbling something about wasted youth when another employee walked up to the counter boy.
"Pete Gibbons, I swear to God – put a glove on! How many times do I have to remind you?!" the woman hissed, and the boy rolled his eyes again as he snatched a crumpled glove from where it had been lying beside a box on the counter and rolled it on. George chuckled a little to herself – or maybe it was more of a snort – as she realized how much the thing had looked like a condom.
"Happy?" he groused. George glanced down at her post-it. P. Gibbons. Seven minutes to go.
"Well, too late now," she muttered as he brought her coffee over. She seamlessly popped his soul as she took her change, and with a brief smile she grabbed her coffee and cupcake and followed Mason over to a table.
"I just don't understand it, Georgie," he said. "See this place? It's all so…ok. I get bakeries. Little bit of everything. Need a cupcake? You got it. Scone? Bingo. Bread, rolls, pie, whatever? We got it! But this? Cupcakes cannot be that popular."
"Food Network would beg otherwise," George said. Mason rolled his eyes as he unwrapped the cupcake, tore off the bottom, and popped it on the top to make a little sandwich. When George gave him a look, he grinned at her.
"Saw it on the internet," he said. He lifted his plate and waved it at her, adding in a sing-song voice that kind of sounded like a haunted house reject: "Cupcake sandwich!"
…right. And he called the establishment douchey.
"See, here's how I see it," he continued, and she rolled her eyes before taking a bite of her cupcake. Huh. Not bad. A little dry, but not bad. Not necessarily worth four bucks, but not bad. "The problem with the world, Georgie, is very simple."
Oh, she couldn't wait to hear this.
"Places like this? The gluten-free menu?" he continued, spitting out 'gluten-free' like it was a curse. She supposed in some circles – cooking ones that thrived on the 'integrity of the dish' and all that bullshit, most likely – it was. "It's all because of hipsters. They are destroying the world, Georgie."
"Hipsters," she echoed, and he nodded. She wondered if her eyes were as wide as she thought they were. "Not, y'know, politics or terrorists or red algae or conspiracies or even, y'know, death. It's hipsters."
"Yep, hipsters," he said with a sage nod. He even made sure he popped the 'p'. She wondered how many pills he had taken that morning.
"And how the fuck do you figure that?" she asked. She wondered if he had noticed the hipster two tables over. He kept glancing up from his laptop, leveling Mason with a withering stare over his eighties-styled chunky glasses. Regardless, he had definitely noticed Mason.
"See, all of this bullshit? The cupcake stores, the not-really-real food allergies, the annoyingly depressing beatnik music, the men in v-neck t-shirts and vests? It's all because of hipsters. They are destroying the world, Georgie," he said. He shoved the rest of his cupcake in his mouth, and George grimaced as he continued talking around it. "Cahpetly distoying it."
"You are so full of shit, Mason," she snorted. The hipster's fingers were poised like little daggers over the keys of his Mac, ready to fire away some virulent stream of emo-fueled rage all over the Twittersphere, no doubt. Another quick glance at her watch: three minutes.
"Am not!" he protested, gulping down the last of his cupcake. "It is veritable fact, Georgie girl, that hipsters are the bane of the universe's existence. They are ruining everything, the rotten bastards."
"Just because they're a bit quirky doesn't mean they're ruining everything," she said. She swirled her coffee before taking a quick drink. "I mean, it's not like they cause cancer or anything."
"The lack of gluten in the diets they're enforcing on the rest of us could be exactly what caused cancer," Mason said. Her eyebrows rose as she dipped her head at him.
"You realize cancer's been around much longer than gluten allergies," she said. Two minutes. "And they're not exactly 'enforcing' their dietary restrictions on the rest of us. We're actually accommodating them."
"Nope," he said. She snapped an offended "Hey!" as he snatched her coffee and took a quick gulp. "I mean, I'm sure they didn't cause all the problems in the world, but they certainly do accentuate them. I mean, nobody would give a flying flip over global warming if hipsters hadn't started harping about the poor little baby seals dying on the shrinking ice caps and all that. Inconvenient truth my ass."
She knew she shouldn't have, but she couldn't exactly stop the laugh that stuttered its way out. She tried to choke it down with a snort, but he still caught enough of it to make him smile. He looked back at the table and began folding his cupcake wrapper.
"You know what else really pisses me off about hipsters?" he asked, and she rolled her eyes before leaning onto the table.
"No idea, Mason. Please share," she said. She was full-out grinning now. Mason leaned close, his eyes narrowed conspiratorially. He brought up a hand to shield his mouth.
"Avocados," he stage-whispered, spitting the word like it was a violent curse.
The next minute, the last of P. Gibbons's life, was a whirlwind.
George lost it – or at least she had started to when the Hipster slammed his hands down on his MacBook, shouted "THAT'S IT!", and leapt to his feet. George and Mason both jumped, Mason letting out a yelp as his knees banged into the underside of the table, as the Hipster stomped over to them.
"What the hell is your problem, man?! What did we ever do to you?!" he shouted, hands lodged firmly on his hips in a Royally Pissed Off stance. Mason leaned back, covering his mouth and pointing as he hissed a panicked "Hipster!" to George. She may have reacted more if another batch of shouting hadn't drawn her attention to behind the counter. The other employee (George was guessing a manager) was back out, shouting at P. Gibbons as Miss Gluten-Free Cherries Jubilee puked into a waste basket. Another woman shouted at P. Gibbons about Pukey's gluten allergies, and "Oh my God, you cross-contaminated!" P. Gibbons, for his part, seemed dully unimpressed, despite the way the spectacle seemed to be clearing out the remaining patrons. George's attention was jerked back to Hipster and Mason when Mason jumped back into her, and her eyes widened as she realized Hipster had gone from mere posturing to gesticulating wildly. He was in the middle of ticking off reasons hipsters were not causing the end of the world (including something about global warming and the dwindling sea otter population due to the subsequent surge in red algae), each point accentuated by an exaggerated swing of his arm, when he flicked his arm back so violently one of the clunky rings adorning his spindly fingers dislodged itself and went soaring across the room…
…straight into P. Gibbons's open mouth.
George glanced at her watch: 1:17 on the dot. She looked at Mason, who's expression was some odd mix of bemused, amazed horror, and Hipster kept shouting at them – until the Manager's screaming hiked up another decibel or twenty when P. Gibbons stopped groping at his throat, turned a lovely shade of Death's Bitch Blue, and fell to the ground. Hipster turned, startled by the thud and increased screaming, as P. Gibbon's soul appeared next to Mason and George, asking if he was dead.
"Should we…?" Mason asked, leaning closer to George in an attempt at whispering. Though really, given the level of noise in the cupcakery, he could have shouted and no one would have noticed.
"Uh…" she paused, her eyes sliding from Hipster to the graveling jumping up and down on the counter behind the manager. It grinned at her as another appeared beside it, and they both began cackling as they high-fived. Had they just…? She nodded, grabbing her coat as they both began rising from their chairs. "Yeah. Yes, we should. Let's…yes."
"Wait, so am I dead or not?" P. Gibbons asked as he followed them out of the cupcakery, where his lights flashed on and distracted him from continuing after them. He walked after the lights with a dazed, stoner-esque "Woah…" as they continued down the sidewalk, rounded a corner, and nearly crashed into a busker strumming a guitar and singing some soul-draining cover of "Hallelujah". Mason gave her a pointed look as they stepped over the case the girl had set out for tips.
"I'm telling you, Georgie: hipsters."