Perchance to Dream

Disclaimer: See prologue

Summary: Stan's horrendous day continues.

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At Work II

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When Cartman said that I would get it, Lardass apparently was everything BUT joking. Nobody's thrown any punches at me … yet, but just about everything else that could possibly go wrong this afternoon has. On the walk over here I was nearly hit by a record twenty-three speeding cars, had my coat splattered with slush that left stains that are going to take from now to forever to get out, and was used as an escape route by two fighting squirrels. Lemme tell ya: THAT ain't anything CLOSE to fun.

It didn't get any better when I arrived at Jumpin' Java either. Apparently all twenty-three of those cars were headed here: the place is fucking PACKED. I'm not talking amiable chatter with all the tables full, I'm talking rock concert loud and Standing Room Fucking Only.

"STAN!" shouts a beleaguered Gregory from the front counter. "Get your scrawny ass back here right now!"

All conversation ceases. All eyes turn to me. Once I'm properly identified as, indeed, Stanley Marsh, the boy who just totally kicked the ass of Eric T. Cartman, who is also the boy who's the laughingstock of the school, the poor kid the Jew kicked out of his group, the voices all start up again. Only this time, they're not discussing what they want in their house latte.

"Queer!"

"Fag!"

"Poor sack of shit!"

"Hippie!"

"Fucking fucker!"

"Ass master!"

"Emo fucktard!"

"Oh, shut the FUCK up!" I exclaim, making my way around the counter, dropping my bag and shedding my muddy coat.

"Stan, I'm an hour behind on my accounting today. You think you can handle all this?" What a loaded question. Was he not listening? Or is he questioning my ability to be professional and not scream back at the taunting dickheads? Obviously he doesn't know that I had worse from the aforementioned dickheads, and all this shit does is bring back bad memories.

"Of course I can handle it."

"Great. Enjoy yourself." Yeah, whatever Greg. You go play with your numbers; I'll deal with the cock-munching asshatted douches.

"How may I help you," I say tiredly to the first one in line. Somebody I don't recognize by name, so not a senior.

"I'll have a hazelnut mochacino with cinnamon, chocolate, and extra whipped cream," it says from behind the worst emohair I've ever seen. Its hair encompasses its entire head, and is trimmed neatly around the neck, but you can't see its face at all because of the hair.

"Alright," I reply, making sure to check each box on the order form to make sure it can't yell at me for getting the order wrong. "Six-sixty-eight."

The emo thing hands me seven. I give it back its thirty two cents and make its coffee, and hand it over.

Next up is Tweek. Tweek wants the most caffeinated thing I can possibly make: a double cappuccino with four shots of espresso, triple whipped-cream, made with the Colombian blend and garnished with chocolate.

"Seven-thirty-nine," I say, and Tweek has a spaz attack because he forgot which pocket contains his wallet. If I were Tweek, his parents, or Rebecca, I would do everything in my power to make sure Tweek only ever has one pocket.

"Seven thirty nine, Tweek," I say gently.

"GAH! Oh Jesus, Oh Jesus, where is it!? Damn gnomes…I need my coffee! GAAAAAH! WAY TOO MUCH PRESSURE!"

"TWEEK!" I shout, freezing him. "Calm down. Check your back pocket." Hand shaking, he reaches back there and finds it. He opens it, fishes out a ten, and hands it over. I punch it in and pull out his change.

"Two sixty one is your change," I say, handing the money back. "I'll go get your coffee, alright?"

"Kay…" he says, twitching. Since I know it's only a matter of time before he freaks again, I'm unusually quick about getting Tweek his coffee. In between spurts of the Colombian coffee, I insert a shot of espresso, topping it off with the chocolate and whipped cream, slapping on a lid and throwing in a straw and thrusting it into Tweek's waiting hands.

"Next!" Token steps forward.

"How may I help you," I ask darkly.

"Get me a coffee, fuckwit," he spits.

"Plain house coffee?" I ask.

"Yes. Plain house coffee. One cup. To go. Are you retarded or something?" I grimace.

"Seventy-five cents," I reply, instead of haranguing him about his horrible manners. That would be about as pointless as the music he listens to when he wants to "get crunk." He scowls and digs three quarters out of his pocket and slams them down on the counter. I scowl back and drag them back across, tossing them in the register and filling up a Styrofoam cup with coffee. I hand it to Token with a look that clearly communicates "Get lost, asshat."

Some long-haired blonde boy with a douchy accent, a bow tie, and a beret orders a cup of Earl Grey tea and some English Muffins. He pays with a Traveller's Cheque from the Bank of England, for … 20 pounds.

"Don't you have anything in dollars?" I ask.

"I don't think so, no…wait…how many dollars do I owe you?"

"Five. Even."

"Oh, a fiver…I do believe I have one of those from the last establishment I visited. Hold on a moment," the boy says, fishing through his pocket and pulling out a wrinkled bill bearing the colored visage of Abraham Lincoln and handing it over.

"That's correct, yes?"

"Yes, great. Hang on, let me get your stuff," I mutter, slipping the bill in the register and making his tea. I pull two English Muffins from the display case, grab packets of butter and jelly and hand them over.

"Enjoy," I say, as the boy is pushed out of the way by … oh, fuck, Cartman.

"Fag," he opens.

"What the fuck do you want, Cartman?" I ask, bristling.

"You to shut the fuck up, for starters, faggot," he snaps back. I glare at him. "And after that, I want a triple chocolate, triple cream, Colombian-based mochacino, with extra chocolate on the cream and extra cream on top of the chocolate."

"…You are such a fucking fatass!" I exclaim, punching in his order on the register. "Jesus fucking Christ, lardo!"

"Don't call me fat you stupid poor fag!" he shouts back while the computer tells me his price.

"Ten ninety-nine," I tell him.

"…Are you shitting me?" he asks. "Eleven fucking dollars for a cup of coffee!?"

"No, ten ninety-nine, dumbass. Hand it over."

"This is an OUTRAGE!" he exclaims with a hint of his old melodrama, handing over the ten and a one. "This is BULLSHIT!"

"Oh, can it, lardass," I say, pulling a penny from the coin drawer and slamming it down on the counter in front of him. "I'll bring you your fucking drink in a minute." As I go about making it, I can feel his eyes burning into my back, watching my every move scrutinously. The end result is very creamy, very foamy, and chocolaty enough to send a diabetic into a coma. I put a lid and straw on the monstrous concoction, turn around and press it into his fat hands. He scrutinizes the drink itself, and then pushes it back towards me.

"You made it wrong, faggot," he says.

"I did fucking not!" I exclaim.

"I wanted hazelnut coffee!"

"You said Colombian you fucking douche!"

"I did not!"

"You did fucking so!" I start to exclaim, but am cut off by the rest of the store beating me to the punch, in a very tired fashion.

"Oh yeah? Well … I wanted hazelnut powder!"

"No, you didn't," I reply evenly, pushing the coffee back towards him.

"Yeah I did!"

"No, you didn't. Take your damn coffee and go, you're holding up the line."

"Fuck you!" Cartman exclaims, taking the drink and throwing it at me, hitting me in the face and causing it to explode all over me. I've got chocolate and whipped cream on my shirt and in my hair, and my skin is on FIRE from getting drenched in HOT COFFEE!

"You fat son of a BITCH!" I exclaim, leaping across the counter and on to his fat self, punching him neatly in the same nose I hit with a doorknob two hours earlier. He falls to the ground with the momentum of my leap and my punch, and I ride him all the way down, landing punches all over his face, his neck, his chest, I MIGHT have hit him in the balls, his gut…

He shoves me off his chest and onto my back, pouncing on me and pummeling me like he does every day. I kick him in his man-tits, pushing him back, then in the head, allowing me to escape from beneath him. I then execute a pile driver, elbowing him in the middle of the spine and dropping him flat on his stomach to the floor, allowing me to pummel his back some more.

As I had that day in Gym class, I'm pulled off Cartman by someone and have my arms pinned behind my back. In blind rage, I continue kicking at him until someone screams my name to shock me back to the present.

"STAN!" That voice belongs to Greg. My boss…oh, shit, I just beat the shit out of a customer. I am toast. Burnt wheat toast. Set-the-toaster-on-fire toast. Toast, in general.

"What the FUCK!?" he shouts, "Was that all about!"

"Take a look at me and I'll give you three guesses," I retort in my best snarky tone. He stops and lets his eyes wander up and down.

"If you tell me he threw a cup of scalding hot coffee on you…"

"Nope, not a cup of scalding hot coffee," I reply in false glee. "A scalding hot triple chocolate, triple cream, Colombian-based mochacino, with extra chocolate on top of the cream, and extra cream on top of the chocolate."

"…and he threw it on you."

"Thank you, Captain Gregory Obvious," I say, rolling my eyes.

"So you beat his face in, pile-drove him, beat the back of his head in, and kicked him in the face?"

"Yep," I reply. "I don't get paid enough to throw coffee back at him."

"Go home," he says, and I look at him funny.

"Home. Go get cleaned up and looked at…your face is probably burned. I'll see you tomorrow after school."

"I'm not fired?"

"He started it," Greg says with a wink. "Go on; get out of here, while they're all still stunned."

I hasten to obey, stepping on Cartman for good measure while I cross the store to retrieve my hat, coat, and bag. As I walk out into the biting cold and it touches my burning flesh, I wince. This is all sorts of not good. I end up walking home backwards, so that I don't have the wind in my face, but it doesn't change things much.

God fucking damn that Cartman. First he made me do something that's going to get me suspended, and now he's going to make me have to come in early as hell this weekend and work until close to make up all my hours. With a burned face that's going to force me to carry around a bottle of aloe vera gel for a week or two. Mom's going to have to throw my uniform top into the wash as soon as I get into the house; well, as soon as she's done mother-hen-ing me about my scalded face.

God.

Fucking.

Damn him.

-.-

Notes: Alright. First: I know this is a little over a week, but I had like…ZERO motivation to write this after finals. After Friday and Saturday's writing, I had a grand total of: 335 words. Yeah.

Second. Holy. Fucking. Shit. NINE reviews for last chapter! has a spasm of joy You guys! I LOVE YOU ALL!!

Now…can we NOT have a major recession for this chapter? Let's try and keep a minimum of five comments per chapter…make me nice and happy, and get you updates on a semi regular basis,

Third: the next update for this is truly up in the air. I'm heading home on Tuesday, back to the most Craptastic Internets in the Civilized World, and I don't know what my work schedule for break will be, so… I will leave you on a VERY general note and say that this fic WILL be updated again before Christmas :D

Happy Hannukah, everyone!

Phoenix II