Dollface stopped counting her tokens to happily shout, "Oh hi Missy!"
She threw her legs over the bench with a smile for her cousin, Prissy Missy Custer, all three bottles of cheap perfume and crusty box dyed red hair in a high, unconditioned ponytail with a neon pink banana clip. It flared around her like an unwashed mane.
Cyndi Lauper, she was not.
Missy snapped her gum with a sneer. "So, like, find yer ma yet? Or does she, like, never wanna see your, like, pizza face, like, ever again?"
"They stopped searchin' last year, actually. They think she's just dead now, 'cause fifteen years is a reeeeally long time t'be gone." Dollface answered, not realizing she was being made fun of.
Missy gaped, then nonchalantly blew a bubble. "A loser an'her, like, loser friends."
She glanced over Dollface's padded shoulder. "A fat cow, the, like, carpet muncher, and, like, uuuh..." Missy searched Dollface for an unoriginal idea, "Like, oh yeah! The Space Cadet!"
Missy brayed, the sound empty without her usual back-up chorus of friends. Dollface blinked and cocked her head.
"Ya'll sure look funny without yer friends. Did yer daddy lose that client?"
Missy blinked at her, surprised at the unintentional jab. "What's it to ya, bee-atch?"
She pushed Dollface, not that hard, but hard enough for the much smaller girl to fall onto her skinny butt with an "Oof!" Dollface popped back up again, just like a gopher doll on whack-a-mole.
The light behind her eyes rattled, angered.
Dollface tried to ignore it, and tried to change the subject, "Well, I noticed you guys have been driving that big 'ol Minivan lately. Usually your family drives a Mazda or BMW. Or even a PRIUS!"
Missy pushed her again, throwing Dollface off her balance and into the bench again, hitting her back on the attached table. Izzy and Princess cringed at the loud crack.
The light shook violently, and Michael started telling her to grab the belt on her chain and tell her how good it would feel if Dollface just-
Dollface shook her head, signaling for him to be quiet.
She'd handle it.
"Hey! No fair!" Dollface kicked her legs back up and planted her feet on the tacky carpet saturated with grease and the remains of ice cream. The shine twitched.
Dollface looked at Missy's hair. Looking at the girl's muddy roots, her brain tried desperately to patch things up so she could have a good time tonight. It was best not to get into another knock-down, drag-out with her cousin again. "I could help ya with yer hair. I could even do it with you. Ya really just need t'condition it an-"
Missy slapped Dollface across the cheek.
Hard.
Missy started yelling at her as she gasped. Michael ignored what he was told and began telling her to reach for the chains clipped to her belt.
Dollface squeezed her eyes shut, thumb quietly unclipping as instructed.
"Hey! That's enough girls!"
Mike, the half dead security guard that usually lurked in a corner or wandered dazed in the hallway now towered over them, having taken three strides of his long, long legs to break up the small cat fight that had started.
Missy crossed her arms and jutted her chin up at him as Dollface attempted to back up in close quarters, chains forgotten.
"I'm not gonna be yer daddy, but I am gonna tell ya right now t'quit! Otherwise, I'll have ya banned for th'summer."
Dollface sat down again.
With a huff, Missy turned and stomped away, red ponytail whipping anyone in range. The amount of RAVE in her hair made her sound like a bush full of horny squirrels.
Dollface cussed her cousin out in her head, watching Missy leave.
"Y'all really had t'start a fight with that girl again?" Mike glared down at Dollface sternly. Michael was silent again. Even he seemed ashamed.
"We did not start it. But Dollface definitely dragged it out." Princess said, flatly. Izzy nodded quietly, too scared to say anything.
Dollface's eyes stang.
Owie.
"I don't' know what it is with you two, but th'secon' yall see each other, blood starts runnin'."
"Sorry sir," Dollface mumbled with a runny sniff, "But I thought it never hurt t'help."
"Well, she takes that as an insult. Y'need t'learn how t'keep yer mouth shut more, babe' gurl."
Dollface suddenly became very invested in her boots out of shame.
Mike had been someone very impressive in his youth, being so big an' strong, an' all. Now he was some ex-Marine wash-up at a knock-off Freddy Fazbears' in his forties with a bad case of Dunlap's.
Mike was supposed to be a police officer on the tiny police force, but after the county had been sued for diversity discrimination, a woman had taken his place instead. Bad luck just kept coming, because soon after, his wife died.
"Y'all aren't even payin' attention t'me, are ya?"
"Yes, sir?" Dollface looked up, not really sure what the question was. She was too scared to ask at this point.
Mike let out an exasperated sigh.
"Look, just," he rubbed his face with a large, calloused hand, "Do me a favor, babe'gurl, an' stay outta trouble's way? We can't have you to goin' after each other like last time."
"Yes sir." She felt bad for making forever-tired cousin Mike feel even more exhausted and remembering how much hair she'd ripped out last time, "I just wanted t'help..."
Mike sighed as he lumbered off to doze on his feet somewhere, "I know, babe'gurl." He was so much crabbier and sadder now that his wife, Princess's favorite dance teacher, had died. It had been nearly a year
Dollface had always thought about them being good parents, having met the big Polish woman before the cancer had set in last year.
Their wish was never granted.
Raina'd seemed happy and content, even when her life was going to be cut short. Dollface could admire and respect that in a funny, sad way.
Dollface had, at some point, hoped that they secretly were her parents. She held the toy soldier Mike had sent her for her birthday from Germany one year, and gulped.
She never admitted it aloud.
"Really Dollface?" Princess, never one to ignore a good scolding, started up before the more timid Izzy could change the subject. " That girl is nothing but trouble. She treats us like shit! 'It never hurts to help'? Really?"
Dollface rolled her black eyes, still studying the toy in her hands. She pocketed it, "Guys, an enemy is just a friend ya haven't made yet."
"You say that all the time." Izzy piped up. "You even said it before we walked in. You say it a lil too much"
"C'mon guys, she has to have SOME good in her!" Dollface tried to counter with, small nervous giggle escaping her throat. "And look at the bright side! Half priced tokens, a round or two of laser tag, and-"
Dollface drummed on the table as the three watched Jeremy set down a dairy-free pepperoni pizza and carefully placed the veggie lovers in front of Princess with a cloud of skunk. "Dinner with a show!"
"Oh my gawd Dollface," Princess put her head in her hands, pink glasses getting smudged in the process, "Only you."
As if on cue, the scheduled show came on with a tinny clatter. Dollface laughed out of excitement. Friendly Bear was starting his opening skit with Rodney while the house lights dimmed.
She bounced in her seat, thoroughly enjoying the terrible pop songs covered by Chelsea and Rodney, laughing along with Friendly's poorly timed jokes, and quickly ate her fill of cardboard flavored pizza.
Maybe they could all come work here when it reopened as Fazbear's.
Izzy and Princess muttered about the ugly blue fox outside of the lazer arena.
"Probably out of order. As usual." Princess mused.
Dollface quickly hushed them. They were at her favorite part, the one where Chelsea's talking cheesecake sang a perfect falsetto about the restaurant's famous cheese pizza.
The pizza in question tasted like cardboard slathered in spaghetti-o sauce, but it was edible!
I think.
"Can we hurry up and play already? I really want to get a prize from that doll thing!" Dollface was jolted from her munching when Princess snapped a question in her flat voice.
"I thought you said you hated th'ventriloquist, Princess."
"Eh, I warmed up to it." Princess answered Izzy, "I am going to miss it when it goes."
"Fine," Dollface muttered, already getting up. Why fight it? They'd seen this show zillions of times anyway, and her companions were getting restless, "I need t'stretch my legs anyway."