MikkyD's

 Phil hated MikkyD’s.

He had nothing against MikkyD’s specifically; he was sure that he’d feel the same way about any other fast food provider if he had to work there. But he worked at MikkyD’s. And it was pure torture.

Phil adjusted his too-small black cap, which sat on his folded-down ears, and slipped another sinus-numbing pill (to allow him to work in such a odorous environment) , as the next customer walked up to his cash register. Some guy in his mid-30’s who looked like he’d eaten at this very MikkyD's his whole life. He had been staring at the Menu for the past 3 minutes and Phil was livid. Why do people take so long staring at the menu? I mean, really, it’s MikkyD’s! Everything on the menu is gross, so no matter what you pick, you’ll regret it. Just pick something!

The balding 30yr old finally looked down from the menu and seemed to experience a stroke when he saw the seven foot tall Phil.

“What are you staring at?” Phil asked dryly, knowing full well why the guy was staring at him.

After about a minute of working his mouth like he was trying to remember how to talk, the guy finally stammered,” You are a werewolf…”

“Uh, what gave you that bright idea, Sherlock?”

“You are an actual werewolf. In MikkyD's”

“Yeah, I can’t believe it either. ‘Welcome to shoot-myself-now, how may I take your order’ and all that jazz.”

“But, but….I don’t even…”

“Oh yeah,” Phil rolled his eyes and prepared his memorized werewolf-to-customer relations message, “Here it is: ‘Hi, I am a werewolf. I am not an animal. I will not harm you. You are my friend.” Phil gagged at that part before continuing, “ Under California Legislature code 22573, werewolves are protected by law from discrimination in workplaces. I am fully licensed, registered, vaccinated, and flea-treated.’ Now please order your stupid food.”

The guy had spittle dripping from his gaping mouth.

Phil sighed in annoyance, and turned to the co-worker at the cash-register to his left. “Cindy? Please take this one, he appears to have suffered a stroke and can no longer effectively order from me.”

Cindy motioned the still wide-eyed customer to her own register and sweetly asked the man what he wanted to order. Cindy made sure to stay out of range of Phil’s lazily swinging tail and cleared her throat at him from time to time whenever it got close.

The next customer, a rich looking business type, stepped up to Phil’s register. Unlike the last guy, this one had spotted Phil right when he had first walked in.

“They let your kind work here?”

“Unfortunately. Now, how can I help you develop diabetes today?”

“Nah, no diabetes for me today, I’ll take a fresh batch of heart-cancer though.”

Phil chuckled and said, “The Clubhouse Burger with the meal, perhaps?”

“Yeah, and a side of fake health food too, if you will.”

I like this guy, Phil thought as he carefully typed each command with his claws. “Okay, so one Clubhouse meal, and one side of Caesar Salad. Will that be all the garbage you require today?”

The guy chuckled, “Yeah, perfect. Thanks!”

He handed Phil his card to swipe. Phil typed in is own code which gave the guy Phil’s employee discount. When the food came, Phil handed the bag of food to the man and said, “Thanks, I appreciate it.”

To which the businessman answered, “Sure thing, Wolfy, I know your kind get a lot of crap for nothing, so I try to help where I can. Take care”

“See ya. Alright, next customer…”

Okay, this guy looks like he’s been clubbed in the head by several angry persons, and he’ll probably order something with bacon in it. Lets see how bad this interaction goes. WOOOOOT. ugh.

The man stepped up to the register and belched.

The fumes from the man’s digestive system set Phil on edge, and he struggled to think clearly.

“Welcome to the wondrous land of fake food, I’ll be your fake food host, so how can I fulfill your wildest fake food dreams today?”

The man said nothing for a second, then squinted his eyes at Phil and said “You’re being funny, right?”

Phil gave the biggest, cheesiest grin he could give. It was so big, and it had been so long since he’d last smiled that day, that it actually hurt to pull back the skin on his muzzle to allow for something a human might think of as a smile. But it was big, and silly, like something a cartoon dog might give.

The man looked at Phil like someone might look at a man in a straight jacket. “Uh..ha..well, I want a big burger with bacon on it. I can’t remember what that's called here”

There is a menu right above your big meaty head you dim-witted…. “Oh, that’ll probably be the bacon fake-food extravaganza of only 6 dollarsness. And it comes with an artificial liquid beverage and a side of gross potato things that probably should be fake but sadly, aren't.”

The man actually sneezed at this, and once again looked at Phil strangely. “You realize that this is a public restaurant, right?”

Phil slapped his muzzle with a paw. “Never mind.” You’re obviously immune to sarcasm. “You want the bacon burger meal?”

The rest of the order went smoothly, with random odd stares from the man at Phil, who sighed every now and then at how boring and dumb his job was.

Just then, another few customers entered.

A mother tried to keep her two little boys from running up to Phil, which caused him to recoil in surprise.

“I wanna touch da wolfy, momma.”

“He’s so fluffy! Can we keep him, momy?”

Panic. Little kids thinking I’m some huge adorable stuffed animal, great. PERFECT, this is ALL I needed to make today better.

They kept fighting over who would get to reach across the counter and try to touch Phil fist, while the mother simply ignored them and kept fiddling with assorted coupons and credit cards in her wallet.

Phil hated MickyD’s; sooooo much.

And just before he thought he’d have to suffer through being treated like a gigantic stuffed animal by two 4 year olds, he heard his manager call out to him from across the kitchen.

“Pphhhiiilll? Grab the next batch of fries for Shaylee at the window!”

The way that the Manager yelled out Phil’s name in a Texan drawl, which emphasized the ‘f’ sound far too much, made Phil’s neck fur stand straight up on end. Wary of his swinging tail, he motioned to Cindy to take this order for him, and grabbed the stupid plastic disposable gloves that he was required to handle. And, just as anyone with half a brain would realize, gloves and werewolves don't match well. Once again, he attempted to put on the gloves, only to have his claws cut through them and accomplish to only cover his paw-pads in plastic, annoyingly.

Phil turned around and bashed his snout into the hanging tv screen that showed the latest orders. Snarling, he ducked underneath it only to have his tail get stepped on by John who was passing by.

Blood red rage flashed across Phil’s eyes as he turned around to growl at John who promptly ignored him and just kept walking towards the back with bags of lettuce. If only. If only I didn’t need this job and didn’t want to be hunted down, I’d rip his fat throat right out. It’d be a service to humanity. And me.

Phil stepped up to the disgusting fryer, which had a stench that assaulted Phil’s over sensitive nose, and switched the treys for the fries. His clawed hands kept accidently digging into the treys and making the small little holes bigger than they should be. Some of the fries escaped the treys and started floating around in the vat mockingly. Phil ignored them and scooped up the finished fries into a red card-board box. Who came up with these things anyway? They aren't even made of meat. ‘Huh, lets deep fry slices of stinking potatoes into a vat of fat, and salt them so much that they could survive a nuclear holocaust and remain ‘edible’ ’. Yay, great idea. Shoot me now.

After handing Shaylee the thing of fries, he walked back towards his cash register. John came back from storage and spanked Phil as he passed by, right under the tail.. Phil’s face reddened and he snarled fiercely at John who only winked back at him. Must. Resist. Must. Stay. Strong.

John laughed aloud and asked, “Hey guys, what happened to the werewolf who fell into a washing machine? He became a wash and wear-wolf!”

Everyone laughed aloud at his ultra-lame joke. Phil just guffawed at how stupid it was.

John said, “I got a whole list of these! How do you stop a werewolf attack? Throw a stick and yell ‘fetch’!”

Phil’s eyes were turning red again. Phil carefully tiptoed back through the machinery and ducked his head under the TV screens to get back to his register. Thankfully it wasn’t dinner time yet, so very few customers were coming in.

He had to tilt his head down so he could see over his own muzzle to be able to look at the screen. Someone had logged Phil out and logged in with a profile called “furball.”

He exaggeratedly laughed out loud as he logged back into his own profile. He looked up as a new customer entered.

Unfortunately, John wasn’t finished. “What would you get if you crossed a werewolf with a cow? I don’t know, but I wouldn’t want to milk it.”

It was just then that the customer, a woman in her late-20’s, came up to the counter. She nervously looked at Phil’s claws that were flexing around the sides of the keyboard leaving little cuts.

“Sir, do you know that you are…”

Phil just stared straight ahead while trying to control his breathing. “Yes.”

“And it will probably….”

“Yes.”

Neither one of them said a word after that. The woman just stared at the increasingly abused keyboard with a dumbfounded expression.

After another minute, she perked up and said “Yeah, so I’ll have a triple quarter-pounder and a large fries.”

Phil, under intense pressure, very carefully answered, “Will that be all for you today, ma’am?”

“Uh….sure!”

She dug out her checkbook and nervously handed Phil her credit card. Phil’s shaking paws gripped the card unsteadily and swiped it in the now deformed slot.

Denied.

Phil’s left eye twitched uncontrollably.

He swiped it again and thankfully it was accepted.

“Why are werewolves great vacationers? Because they are already pack-ed!”

Phil sat there, staring straight ahead, muzzle muscles twitching now, and tail stood up straight. A slight snarl came to his face, and he uttered a barely audible growl. Don't kill him...yet...

He finished the order, and the woman left. Phil was once again spanked, but he didn't' even bother to turn around to see who it was. Because he knew. It was John again. And, as usual, the only thing his manager did was laugh about it in the back of the kitchen. Phil's nerves were on edge, and he only barely noticed that the door had opened again, admitting another costumer. 

A gorgeous and majestic white-furred werewolf walked in. The large new-comer wore custom loose-fitted jeans that allowed his tail to move freely, and a plain white T-shirt. He looked around the room and spotted Phil immediately. He cocked his head to the side, and then walked over to Phil. As he walked, Phil consciously shuffled his paws, embarrassed that another werewolf would see how bad Phil's condition and job was.

I hate this job, I really really hate it. And now, having another werewolf see me like this, its just not fair. I want to kill them all and run away; but I can't.

Phil, with his own grey fur matted together by grease and random liquids, wearing his too-small Black cap and his over-sized bib of an apron, looked up both in exasperation and shame. His tail curled between his legs, so he turned away and looked at the newcomer out of the corners of his eyes. 

“Uh…sir… you don’t really want to order anything from here.”

“Bad day?”

Phil looked up at him, and nodded his head.

Just then, with perfect timing, John yelled aloud: "What do you call a hairy, ugly, stupid creature that's lost its way? A where-wolf!"

The restaurant manager laughed like a donkey, and Phil felt his own blood rush to his face as he stared at the white werewolf. The two wolves nodded at each other in agreement, and the white wolf slipped a small card to Phil right as an apple pie flew across the room and hit Phil in the back of his head, smearing into his fur.

That's it.

Phil turned around and roared so loud that a whole stack of sauces on the counter toppled over, and the tv monitors shook. The entire restaurant went silent. Only the sounds of the humming machinery could be heard.

Everyone was frozen in place as if life’s “pause” button had been pressed.

Huffing, Phil turned back to his register and ignored the packages of sauce that were littered all over his work station.

Cindy cleared her throat annoyingly, then went wide-eyed. She slapped her hand up to her mouth and struggled to stop herself from laughing. She then turned around to look at John and said, “John. He just huffed and blew your house down!”

Raucous laughter echoed from everyone in the entire building. Phil just bowed his head like a stricken dog and sniffled. He looked up desperately at the white wolf who's eyes snapped to the card in Phil's paw in response. 

"I've seen enough; call that number, and you have an easy case on your paws. I'm a lawyer. Its your lucky day, wolf bro. All of these lawless bigots will get what they deserve. And, if you have time, a bunch of wolves are meeting up for a rendezvous bonfire tonight. You should know the place, but if not, call the number: its my cell. Time to get you out of here, wolfy."

Phil smiled, wiped his muzzle, looked back at John and the manager, then left the restaurant with the white wolf, and never came back.