Hot Coffee

Chapter 1

Rigby was out in the middle of the park's field, picking up all of the scattered leaves. It was one of the many chores that he had to do under the request of his boss, Benson. Normally Rigby would be accompanied by Mordecai to help pick up the leaves, but Benson allowed Mordecai a single day off for his hard work on a recent party held by the park.

Rigby tediously picked up one leaf after another and lazily threw them into the trash can. Whenever he moved, he had to take the trash can with him, which was difficult since he was so short.

"Ugh…" Rigby groaned. "Why did Mordecai have to take his day-off on a day like this? Couldn't he have taken it when we were doing an easy job like running the snack stand?" Rigby threw another few leaves into the bin before collapsing onto the ground, rolling around in it in boredom. "But no… he has to go out and spend all of his time with his special girlfriend, Margaret."

Rigby rolled around in the grass until his head made contact with the black trash can. Rigby rubbed his head and again groaned with an "Ugh… why isn't stupid Mordecai here?"

"Because I'm on my day-off remember, dude?"

Rigby sat up and turned to his right. To his dismay, he saw that Mordecai was standing there with Margaret at his side. He sighed and stood up, wiping all of the grass that ended up in his fur. "I know that, but I just can't believe that you took your day-off today!"

Mordecai chuckled. "Come on, dude. You can pick up a few leaves without needing me to carry around the trash bin for you. Besides, today was the only day that Benson offered to give me a free day, so I wasn't really going to say no."

Margaret smiled. "Yeah, sorry Rigby if I'm stealing Mordecai from you for the whole day."

And every day after that, Rigby thought to himself. Rigby's eyes slightly flinched, but he was going to play nice with Margaret as long as Mordecai was around. "It's… okay, Margaret. Everyone deserves a break every once in a while."

"That's really mature of you to say, dude. Thanks for understanding. Maybe this will give you the incentive to work a bit harder so that we both can get a day-off."

"Yeah, sure," Rigby said under his breath.

"Alright, Rigby. We're going to be at the coffee shop for an hour or so." Mordecai pat Rigby on the shoulder before returning to Margaret. "When I get back, we'll break out some popcorn and watch an action-packed movie."

Rigby couldn't help but smile, knowing that Mordecai actually made an attempt to make him a priority over Margaret. "Sure, that sounds pretty great."

"Alright, see ya Rigby." Mordecai walked off with Margaret in the direction of the coffee shop.

Rigby sighed heavily as he began picking up the leaves again. He went through every inch of the park and picked up each and every leaf on the ground. In the end when he saw all of his progress, he actually pretty proud of himself that he could accomplish a simple task without Mordecai's encouragement.

He took the black bin with him back to the house and dropped it off near where it normally is. Rigby then climbed the stairs and entered the house before sitting down on the couch to watch some TV.

Though, it didn't last very long when Benson walked into the room and scowled at Rigby. "Rigby, what are you doing?"

"I'm watching TV. What does it look like I'm doing?"

Benson walked in front of the TV and put his hands on his hips. "You shouldn't be watching TV. You should be outside picking up the leaves."

Rigby jumped up from the couch, tired of Benson's assumptions. "Well, maybe if you looked outside, you'll see that I actually did pick up the leaves. Without Mordecai's help."

Benson rolled his eyes and went towards the front door. "I find that hard to believe."

As Benson left, Rigby grumbled and went back onto the couch, waiting for Benson to come back in and apologize to him for making assumptions. Rigby let out a heavy sigh. "I'm not always lazy," he mumbled to himself. "I can actually do stuff…"

Rigby began to slouch in the couch for a moment until Benson finally returned in the door again, calmer this time. He turned to Rigby and said, "I'm sorry I made an assumption, Rigby. There are a few leaves on the ground, but it's much better than it was before. Can you run the snack stand for the next few hours?"

Rigby turned to Benson. "What? No! I'm supposed to be waiting here for Mordecai so we can do stuff together. I think I deserve a break after picking up all of those leaves."

Benson sighed. "Mordecai just called a few minutes ago. He said he went with some girl to the mall and that he won't be back for another few hours. If you want, you can take a little break. But after that, I need you to get to the snack stand before the mid-afternoon rush comes."

Rigby frowned, surprised that Mordecai would actually flake on him to go to the mall, a place that he didn't even like to go. Rigby let out a light sigh, not loud enough for Benson to hear him. "Alright, I'm going to my room and taking my break. I'll go to the snack stand in ten minutes."

"Good," Benson simply said as he walked out of the room.

Rigby walked up the stairs and headed into his room. Like normal, the room was a bit messy. Mordecai's bed wasn't made and there was a bunch of junk all over Rigby's trampoline. Rigby managed to clear it mostly away so he could lay on it. He then used an old shirt as a small makeshift blanket and closed his eyes.

At this point, Rigby was no longer in the mood to do any work. He didn't want to admit it to himself, but Mordecai was the one who motivated him to get to work. In fact, Mordecai was the one who motivated Rigby to do a lot of things. Rigby covered his head with his actual blanket, hoping that it would cover up the thoughts. Obviously, it didn't.

Rigby continued to lay in bed for a while, not even caring that he wasn't at the snack bar to follow Benson's orders. A few more moments passed before Rigby heard his bedroom door open. Rigby immediately sat up, the blanket still covering his eyes, and said, "Mordecai?"

"No, this isn't Mordecai," a voice said. Rigby immediately recognized it as Benson's.

Rigby removed the blanket from his eyes and huffed. "Oh, it's just you. I thought finally Mordecai came back from his date."

"Hey, don't worry about Mordecai. He's on his day-off because he worked hard, something that you clearly don't understand." Benson began to get a bit aggravated. "Something that you do need to worry about is the snack stand. Pops is there right now by himself dealing with the long line that you were supposed to take care of two hours ago."

Even that shocked Rigby. He had no idea that he had been out for two hours, but that didn't change his mind about how he felt at the moment. "I'm sure Pops can handle it himself. He's done it before."

"I don't care if Pops can do it himself. I gave you an order and I want you to do it. Or you fired!"

Rigby jumped out of his trampoline. "You know, you keep saying that, and I don't why. That must be the thousandth time you threatened to fire me, but do you? Of course not!" Rigby scowled and pointed at Benson. "I don't think you have the balls to fire me."

Benson began to go a shade of red that was even deeper than it normally was. Rigby flinched at the sight. "Why don't you stay here and find out if I have the balls to fire you? You'll see what happens. So make your choice."

Rigby walked over to the door. "Oh yeah, I'm making my choice. I'm not going to the snack stand and you can't fire me. You know why? Because I quit."

Benson was about to go into a rage until he realized what Rigby said in its entirety. In fact, Benson began to cool down a lot when he realized that Rigby was quitting. He didn't even know what to say and didn't make any attempt to stop him as he walked out of the house, leaving everything behind.

Rigby didn't look back as he exited the house. He didn't take the think about what he had just left behind. He just knew that he needed to get away from all of the stress of everything. The best way to get over his anger was to go to one of his favorite hangout places: the Coffee Shop.

He entered the casual café and sat down with no intention of looking anyone in the eye. He simply sat there and collected his thoughts on what has happened in the past few hours. Rigby didn't even have the money with him to buy the coffee since he left it in his room.

"Hey, Rigby," a familiar voice said.

Rigby groaned on the inside and looked up to see Eileen standing there in her usual waitressing outfit with a coffee mug in her hand. He normally wasn't into seeing Eileen, but she was definitely a friendly face to see after losing his trust with Mordecai, Margaret, and Benson. "Hi, Eileen."

Eileen looked around the coffee shop and asked, "Hey, aren't you normally here with Mordecai? It's weird not seeing you together."

Rigby raised up his hand. "What? I thought you would know. Mordecai went with Margaret to the mall."

Eileen gave Rigby a confused look. "What are you talking about? Margaret went back to work three hours ago. She just went home."

What the H is Mordecai doing, then? Rigby thought. He doesn't go to malls! Especially by himself! Rigby looked at Eileen and said with a calmer voice than expected, "Forget I said anything then. Mordecai is old news, anyways."

Eileen sat down across from Rigby and said, "It sounds like you two got into a fight."

Rigby shook his head. "It's a little more personal than that. The bottom line is that I have no job, no place to live, and as of now, no best friend."

Eileen let out a small gasp. "Benson fired you!"

Rigby shook his head. "No, I quit. I was sick of Benson bossing me around all the time, and I was getting sick of Mordecai ditching me all of the time to hang out with Margaret."

Eileen nodded. "I know how you feel. Margaret doesn't hang out with me much, either. Not that she hung out with me much before."

Rigby chuckled. "At least that's one thing we have in common."

Eileen tilted her head to the side a bit and asked, "So what are you going to do? Where are you going to stay tonight?"

Rigby rested his head on his hand and said, "Maybe I can find a nice cardboard box in an alleyway until I can figure something out."

"What! You can't do that!"

"Well, what do you think I should do? It's not like anyone else would take me in."

Eileen thought for a moment and then pointed to herself. "I have a couch in my apartment. It's not the most comfortable thing in the world, but you can stay on it… you know, if you want to."

Rigby looked away and frowned. He didn't want to seem like a desperate reject who lives on someone else's couch. Especially if that someone is Eileen and is the person who has a crush on her. Although Rigby was more comfortable with her, he certainly didn't have any affections with her. "Really? I don't want to be a burden or anything."

"No, no, no. It's not a burden at all! I can really use the company anyways."

Rigby couldn't help but smile at the gesture. "Alright, thanks Eileen. That's probably one of the nicer things that someone has done for me in the past few days."

Eileen smiled as well. "Okay! We can walk to my apartment together. I get off work in thirty minutes. Do you mind waiting here until then?"

Rigby nodded. "Yeah, that's fine."

"Great!" Eileen then went off, somewhat excited with the change of events.