The guy with the pompadour mohawk arrives twenty minutes late to his shift with Starbucks in hand.
His coworkers smother laughter as he peeks through the various aisle ways and creeps toward where they have clustered behind the register to teach their clueless new hire, Roxas, which buttons to press when.
"Bollocks," mutters the suave Brit Axel had coerced into coming in on short notice with what sounded to Roxas suspiciously like blackmail, though the impossibly tall, slender, and sharp-tongued redhead, who had saved him when his coworkers were no-shows—insisted otherwise.
"Damn, I'm good."
Axel grins conspiratorially at Roxas who raises his brows in challenge. "Only because that guy is really bad."
Axel shrugs as Demyx approaches. He's still stealing side glances around, like a monster might pop up, as he sets his brightly packaged drink on the pitch black counter and sticks his hands in his pockets. "Saïx isn't here, is he?"
"Nah, but he already knows. Sorry, mate," Axel replies, mildly apologetic, flicking the side of the cup with his index finger, and sparing a side glance to the Brit. "And it's still steaming."
"Ah, fuck me." Demyx swipes his drink back off the counter, trudging toward the staff room and the "clocktower."
Axel watches him go with a smirk on his face. "Polite pass," he calls after him, and Roxas struggles to breathe.
So he flirts outrageously with everyone, then.
Demyx raises a certain finger in the air in reply.
Not mutual, apparently.
In the short course of Roxas' training, Axel and the Brit, Luxord, had placed a number of bets, the first and foremost of which was whether their laziest coworker would show up before their boss, if at all, and whether he would do so with a freshly purchased drink in hand. Luxord had insisted that even Demyx wouldn't stoop that low.
Except he had.
The door has barely shut behind Demyx when Axel stretches out a hand. "Pay up, old man."
Luxord scoffs and even the scoff sounds airy and British. "For the last time, Axel, my hair is light blonde, not gray, and I am twenty-nine, not two hundred and twenty nine."
Nevertheless, Luxord reaches beneath the register and produces a Snickers bar, which he forks over to the still smirking redhead in payment.
Roxas examines his coworker. The man has light, close cropped blonde hair, that Roxas would swear was bleached if it weren't so short and didn't match his goatee. He catches Roxas staring with small, sharp blue eyes and smiles, brows rising in thought.
His skin seems smooth and youthful, even as it stretches, though Roxas can see where Axel is coming from. There is a sense of age and wisdom in the straightness of the man's posture and his courtly accent. He feels like something out of Game of Thrones.
"Practically thirty, Lucky," Axel insists, though their mutual grins acknowledge he's teasing.
"Which is only what," Luxord leans against the counter and gazes up at him, giving Roxas a view of the complex network of silver chains that had made a captive of the man's ear, "four years your senior?"
Axel waves off this technicality with the Snickers bar, but Luxord pays this no mind.
"But I suppose next you'll say I'm double the age of this one," Luxord jerks a thumb at Roxas whose chin bounces up from where he is pretending to be busy inputting a long discount code into the register. He has already abandoned it three times thus far and is happy to do so again.
An indignant sound exits Roxas' throat, and Axel crinkles his nose in confusion. "Kid's in college. He's got stubble and that 'I need a strong drink or a strong coffee' look. He's not…" Axel glances at Roxas and removes the casual arm he had set beside the blonde's, biting at his bottom lip, and scanning Roxas' face. "You're not…"
Roxas shakes his head. He gets this enough that he should be able to fight off the pink flush rising to his cheeks, but something about the expression on Axel's face makes it impossible. "I'm twenty-two."
Axel's smile returns with less fervor and he pats Roxas' shoulder. "There you are, Lucky. He's just fun-sized."
Roxas feels himself squeak and bristle at the touch and the comment, the flush yet to make itself scarce.
Luxord hums and nods his concession. "Lady Luck is with you today, Axel."
Uncertain how to interpret this comment, Roxas opts to return his attention to inputting the hopeless jumble of numbers and letters into the register.
Axel chuckles but it seems insincere. "Damn. Shoulda made a bet on that too." He raps the Snickers bar against Luxord's shoulder, and Roxas wonders just how much candy has exchanged hands here.
Luxord's eyes narrow and his arms cross, drawing Roxas' peripheral attention to the silver studs accentuating the sleeves of his black leather jacket. "I think I ought to cut my losses." His tone becomes more pointed, "Weren't you on your way out?"
"Ah," Axel looks chagrinned, glances at Roxas and then his phone, brows furrowing, feet already carrying him out from behind the counter. "Shit. Tell Saïx I had to jet. You off at two?"
When Luxord doesn't reply and Axel's eyes, a catlike, flashing green with painstakingly neat liquid eyeliner wings, don't leave Roxas' face. Roxas nods dumbly.
Why?
Axel only nods back. "I'll swing by then."
Luxord, examining the mess the technologically challenged Roxas has made of the computer attempting to shift out of the discount screen without inputting the damn code, waves distractedly. "Cheerio."
Axel pauses in front of the counter and winks. "XOXO."
Roxas laughs, face heating. Leave it to the badass redhead with sculpted arm muscles and inverted, violet teardrop tattoos beneath his eyes to reference Gossip Girl.
You know you love me.
"That show hasn't been cool since eighth grade," Roxas finds himself taunting after him.
Axel doesn't look back before he struts out of Hot Topic. "And yet, you watched it."
Roxas' eyes trail after him, imagining Axel and Saïx or Demyx curled up together on a couch bitching about the sexcapades of New York socialites. He covers his smirk with a hand and glances back to Luxord, who has just returned the computer to its rightful state.
"Sorry," Roxas mumbles, sobering.
Luxord shrugs, and Roxas is relieved that he seems more easygoing than most of the employees he's met so far.
"It's easy to press the wrong buttons, when you're new," he meets Roxas' eyes as if he's trying to say something more significant. Roxas wonders if there's a you-break-it-you-buy-it policy. Luxord breaks the intensity with a smile, apparently sensing Roxas' confusion, and waves off his previous words with a wrist flick. "Just be careful, love."
"Uh," Roxas' grin returns, "love, huh?"
Luxord winces at his blunder. "It's an English expression," he runs his fingers down his jaw, stretching his mouth and pinching in exasperation. Recomposed, he smirks. "That's just how I speak to children."