Cakebear's, 1982:
"Hey creepshow!"
That was a new one, Garvey turned his head to look at the girl he shoved the wet napkins into yesterday. He looked at her name tag, Summer Winslow was on it. "Can I help you?" he asked. "Yeah, you can. Stop looking at that kid all weird like." Summer said, Garvey stood up, almost towering over Summer. "Or what?" he asked. "Size doesn't scare me. I'll knock you down back on your face like yesterday." Summer said. "Don't bother, I'm not taking your guys' crap any longer." Garvey said, walking away, Summer seemed to follow. "What's your infatuation with that kid anyway? This has been going on for the past week where you have hung out with him and talked with him like he's your only friend." Summer asked. "He is my only friend, not like any of you guys would be." Garvey said, continuing his walk away from her and entering his safe space, the janitor's closet. Before he could shut the door, Summer grabbed the door and held it open. "That's kinda sad man." Summer said, leaning on the door to keep it open. Garvey glared daggers at Summer. "Number one, I can't make any friends with you guys here because you think I'm a 'creepshow' or whatever and make fun of me for my ideas on books." Garvey said, filling up a bucket of water. "Dude, have you heard your own ideas?" Summer asked.
"Good ideas, yes."
Summer rolled her eyes. "Whatever you say dude." she said, leaving the door. Garvey didn't understand them. They didn't understand him either, always making fun of his ideas and him in general. They called him edgy and over the top for simply having ideas for stories based around death and murder. "That's pretty gorey and edgy there bud." Was the first thing that set off this chain of people making fun of him. But it wasn't that bad, not as bad as he thought it would be. Sure, he got made fun of by everyone in this establishment every day, but John was here to pick things up. John made everything better, and he had to remember the old saying, it could be worse. He couldn't have any job and be living on the streets, at least Cakebear's had a good pay. The bear on the stage continued to sing and turn around, the stage seemed to swivel with his body movements. That's what happens when you put a stage in the middle, you're gonna need Cakebear to look and try to interact with every guest, and a moving stage seemed to help with that. Maintenance on that must be hard to do, he heard that most of the workers had to stay overnight to try and work on the stage and Cakebear if he had any problems. Since he was the only character, if there was something wrong with the animatronic, they would put him in suit mode and have him go around delivering cake to children. That was what Garvey wanted to do when he first joined, be one of the costume entertainers to wear the suits. He was lucky enough to listen to the tapes in the breakroom because of others wearing the suit. It seemed to be easy, but of course, Garvey was stuck with being a janitor. Now, he was going to have to clean up another mess. Some girl was allergic to chocolate and threw up all over the floor, so now he had to start mopping.
"Hi Garvey!"
Garvey looked down to find that John had entered the supply closet. "Hey bud!" Garvey said, ruffling the kid's hair. All of Garvey's anger towards people had disappeared at this moment. John and Garvey were just in the closet, Garvey's safe space. The safe space was, well, pretty cramped. Full of cleaning supplies and bad smelling chemicals. The Write family got their cleaning supplies for cheap and it barely gets the job done half of the time. Garvey would sometimes have to buy strong cleaner to help with the mopping and wiping down tables. He could be using that money to buy food or pay off his mortgage but that wasn't how Cakebear's operated. He sometimes wondered if Freddy's was any better. "Do you need any help?" John asked. The boy's smile warmed Garvey's heart as he shook his head no. "It's a simple job here, just cleaning up some throw up." Garvey explained, maybe he should have kept that to himself because he saw John's face wrinkle in disgust. Garvey chuckled at that as he poured some of the cheap cleaner into the bucket of water. "I can carry the bucket for you!" John said, holding out his hands to hold the bucket. Garvey simply smirked and placed the bucket on the ground. "Okay then, pick it up." Garvey said, holding out his hands towards the bucket. He grabbed the mop itself and looked to see John struggling to pick it up. "Yeah, that's what I thought. You need to get a little stronger." Garvey said, picking up the mop and walking out of the room, John followed him.
"But why is the water so heavy?!"
"Water is much more heavy than you think, especially if there is a lot of it in one place." He told John, who simply hummed in response. "But it's never heavy when I have a glass of water." The young boy said, Garvey chuckled. "You'll learn why that is one day." Garvey said, still holding the bucket in his hands. Good thing he knew how much water he needed, the last time something like this happened, he was basically leaving a water trail towards the puke and someone slipped and fell right on their back. No lawsuits, but he did get an earful from the owners. Now that he was friends with the owner's kid, maybe getting earful's would happen less often. John was a good friend to keep around, even if he was a young kid. Being a kid of both Peter and Martha, being one of the only kids and frankly, the only person that was ever nice to him, Garvey would like to keep John around for as long as he could. He was the only good thing that had happened in his life for as long as he could remember. Garvey put the bucket down and got to work on mopping. To and fro, just like Jessica taught him. Jessica was the manager of the building, she opened and closed the building every day and made sure that everyone, aside from Garvey, was comfortable working here. Everyone was a jerk to him, even the manager that taught him how to do his job. Nevertheless, Garvey continued to mop up the vomit that was staining the pristine floor. He continued to mop and mop, not paying attention to him. John had seemingly walked off somewhere else, probably didn't want to disturb him, or he just didn't like seeing the puke. Whatever it was, John continued his work, occasionally looking up at some remarks about the vomit, or just to see children jumping over it to visit Cakebear. The performer was wearing the suit, showing children the cake in his hands. Garvey wished that was him, he would be doing a better job at least. The guy performing clearly hated kids, avoiding them as much as he could and only showing them the cake trick. Cakebear's cake that was in his hands had a small mouth. Underneath the plate was a button, pressing the button allowed the light on top of the cake to turn on. It was just some shotty magic trick, he was sure that the light had to be replaced all the time.
Garvey was so caught up in Cakebear that he didn't notice behind him. A group of teens, three of them. Alex knew this was going to work. He was distracted right now, and he was cleaning up vomit. The perfect prank, everyone was going ballistic when they saw this guy, face covered in brown chocolate puke, he was starting to giggle just thinking about it. "Shush man." His friend to the right smacked him on the shoulder. Kyle was the one to make sure everything ran smoothly, Gabriel on the other hand, Alex could just see him itching to do this. The incredible smile strewn across his face, Alex counted on three with his finger and once he raised his third finger. All three of them shoved Garvey, he used his hands to hopefully stop the fall, which he did, but with all the water around, they slipped and he still fell flat on his face. Alex heard the building erupt with laughter and he took a bow. "Thank you! Thank you!" He said, walking up and pulling Garvey up. "This wouldn't have been possible without my dear compadre Garvey!" Alex showed Garvey to everyone, the building started to roar. After that, Alex let Garvey fall as the man tried to steady himself, taking a bow in a few directions. Garvey got up and wiped his face, Alex saw his friends run off to a different side of the restaurant while Alex stood there, hands crossed. "You think we can do a comedy act together? I'm thinking of making you all purple." Alex said, using his thumb and closing his right eye to get a good look at the puke filled Garvey. It was like he rolled around in dog poop. Garvey had his fist raised high, and Alex knew he wouldn't do it. He was the owner's kid, he could get away with stunts like this, the only downside was that there was an earful from his parents and maybe John since this guy is his friend.
"ALEX!"
Speak of the devil, John came rushing in to a grown man's rescue. If you think about it, Garvey is kind of pathetic. "I'M GONNA TELL MOM WHAT YOU DID." John said, stomping his foot on the ground. There was a primal instinct to push John, but he fought it. Garvey might actually do something to him if he did anything to John. "Whatever." Alex walked off, taking one final bow. Showmanship at its finest. As he was walking away, he looked to find that John was glaring at him, and Garvey was busy wiping himself off with napkins. Alex just chuckled to himself and went to meet up with his friends, this wouldn't be the last time he and Garvey would meet up like this, Garvey was fun to pick on, easy target, everyone laughs. Alex loved the attention from anyone really. From his parents, from the people at Cakebear's, from the school. Everywhere he wanted attention, he loved it. Garvey was a pretty easy way to get attention though, everyone wanted that man to suffer in some way. Obviously not death, but humiliated for some reason. Alex and his friends never understood why, but who was he to complain? If it was an easy way to get attention and no one was going to stop him or his friends from doing it, he was going to keep doing it.
Closing time happened shortly after Garvey's 'accident', he bid farewell to the only friend he had and walked to his car, on his way there though, he stopped. He looked over across the street to Freddy Fazbear's Pizza. The people who owned the building had a fierce competition with Cakebear's, so much so that it's literally right across the street. Garvey had always been curious about Freddy's. What was it like? How the employees were. They closed a little bit after Cakebear's did, maybe he could quickly go in and have a tour? Garvey rushed across the street, not paying attention and almost getting run over. He made it to the building, even from the outside, he could smell the stench of pizza sauce. He opened the door and walked inside, surprisingly enough. It was packed, Garvey looked around to find children everywhere, they looked to be enjoying themselves a lot. Some of them had pizza sauce all over their faces. "Hi there!" a woman said, curly brown hair going down to her shoulders and wearing a red and white uniform with black pants. "Welcome to Freddy Fazbear's, can I help you with anything?" she asked, Garvey didn't know what to say. "I'm just… looking." he said, the woman still kept her smile, but she had a puzzled look on her face. "Looking?" she asked. "Yeah… I work at Cakebear's down the street and I've just… never been in one of these before." Garvey chuckled, the woman's look faded back to her happy go-lucky look. "Oh! I see! Well, despite our rivalry, you are free to look around if you want." The woman said, walking away. Garvey waved at her as she walked away, muttering the word "Thanks" under his breath. He looked at the floor, the white and black checkered floor was covered in confetti, but it looked shiny. Garvey could see his own face on the floor.
He looked around to find that there were arcade machines lining the walls, they weren't licensed arcade machines, they looked to be their own games. Cakebear's didn't have any games, and if they did, he was sure that they would be licensed games like Donkey Kong or whatever. Garvey walked through the building's main area. It was bigger than he thought, a stage right at the end of the room with one animatronic on it though, a brown bear. Freddy Fazbear, Fazbear Entertainment's answer to Cakebear. There were others though, Bonnie the Bunny, Chica the Chicken, and Foxy, whatever Foxy was supposed to be outside of a fox. The bear was all alone on stage and the others… were moving around. He saw Foxy, metal hook and an eyepatch, leaning down holding something in his hook. It was a key or something, looked fake. Chica had plates in her hands and was delivering food, pizza and french fries. He thought it was cool.
Why couldn't Cakebear's be a place like this? Garvey didn't think much of it, Cakebear's had good pay and he wasn't going to change jobs, at least, not now anyway. Garvey turned on his feet and walked out the door of Freddy Fazbear's Pizza.
A/N: Took me a while to get this done haha! Sorry about that, I'm not sure if people were waiting for another chapter or not, but December got super busy for me and I felt like I was swamped with stuff and I needed to get priorities ready. This will be getting a lot more updates though through January as I'm ready to leave people with quite a bit of content before I take a break from this and go back to working on other writing projects and school. I need to get my Yo-kai Watch story back up and running again soon as well. New year, new me one would say haha! Happy New Year everyone!