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Nickel hasn’t felt more miserable than this very moment.
The loud clatter of dishes reverberates throughout the kitchen. It had been a particularly busy day at the restaurant–not an unusual occurrence for this time of day especially. Despite their initial differences, Nickel had grown accustomed to his uniquely bizarre bunch of coworkers. Tea Kettle’s presence as head chef was enough to straighten everyone out. She ran a tight schedule with high expectations, and Nickel had been no exception. For better or for worse, TK’s management was enough to keep the place running, regardless of how mediocre the food was sometimes.
Of course all of them had to leave to go compete on the new season of Inanimate Insanity. Of COURSE Tea Kettle had to join them! Because of their recklessness, Nickel now finds himself doing his least favorite task in the whole wide world: washing dishes. Ugh!
He can hear the chatter of the patrons–his former fellow contestants–-out in the dining area. Dealing with people has never been Nickel’s strong suit. Taking orders was a chore, and he’s been nowhere near timely with when he’s gotten their food out. Even Taco went to compete! Doing every job all at once wasn’t a viable option. Nickel knew this—yet somehow, the place was still running. The kitchen was a mess. He can almost hear Tea Kettle’s voice now, telling him this is no way to run the place. She’d entrusted him to take care of it while she was competing. Could she be any slower?!
The water flows from the faucet, filling up the sink as Nickel struggles to scrub the dish with one available leg. His lack of arms turns an irritating job into an insurmountable task. Washing dishes was usually Cheesy’s job, he reminisces sourly. He wasn’t good for much else, in Nickel’s eyes. They’d been on the same team in Season 2, yet he couldn’t recall much he’d done for their team at all.
Nickel frowns, teeth clenched as he reaches forward to scrub the plate up against a rough sponge at the bottom of the sink. It’s the only way he’s been able to properly scrub all the grime off, and it’s one of the most tedious jobs ever conceived. He’s been washing the plates as they come in—there’s enough people out on the floor where he has to start reusing dishes as soon as they come back to the kitchen. He already has the bowl ready for the next order, he just needs this plate.
His mind begins to wander back to his coworkers. He bets they’re all on a team together by now, having fun and playing the game without a care in the world. That’s how the competition always starts—with the way things are going, Nickel hopes they all get eliminated. They must be having so much fun without having to manage this trainwreck. A small part of him almost wishes he joined them, if only to get out of this awful one-coin job.
As soon as the dish is cleaned enough, Nickel twists the faucet off, hastily places the plate atop his head and steps down from the step-stool he’d been using to reach the sink. It’s a big step—patronizingly so when Trophy’s around. The times Trophy had commented on his height weren't few and far between—Nickel had found that Trophy stopped once he stated this was why he had no friends. TK didn’t like that very much.
He paces himself carefully across the kitchen floor, making his way steadily to the opposing counter. He’ll have to go back for the bowl—there’s only so much he can do with two legs and no hands. Nickel had no time to dry the plate properly, and he can feel the consequences of his actions drip uncomfortably atop his head and on the cold floor beneath him. He’ll worry about the state of the kitchen later he thinks, the customers on the floor are going to eat him alive if he can’t get their orders out.
A knock at the kitchen’s industrial doors is enough to prove the fear instilled into Nickel by Tea Kettle—the restaurant patrons are brutal when hungry. They must be coming to dig into him for being so slow, he concludes. At least they’re polite enough to knock.
“What?” Nickel rasps impatiently, setting the plate down as he returns to the sink for the bowl. He doesn’t have time to entertain any complaints. He’s running a tight schedule here!
“That’s no way to greet a guest,” a high-pitched airy voice replies. The right door opens a smidge, and a circular salmon-colored figure slips in. Nickel, who has now put the ceramic bowl on top of his head, steps back down from the step stool once more only to face Balloon. His expression, focused and clearly irritated, softens ever so slightly as they lock eyes momentarily. Nickel is the first to break it off, beginning to walk with purpose over to where he had set the plate.
“You know people have never been my strong suit, Balloon—” he comments between strides. The water that had dripped onto the floor from before is Nickel’s ultimate downfall. He moves a bit too hurriedly and his foot slips, causing his feet to fall out from under him as he falls flat on his face. The sound of the bowl dropping from his head and shattering onto the floor in front of him comes soon after, which causes Balloon to instinctively crouch behind the counter to protect himself from any potential shards that could’ve flown his way.
There’s a beat of silence followed by Nickel groaning angrily into the floor. Balloon, assessing the damage and deciding it’s safe to approach, carefully sidesteps any ceramic pieces and picks Nickel up. The former opens his mouth to ask if the latter was alright, but he gets quickly interrupted.
“I JUST washed that—UGH!! Seriously, this is a PAIN IN MY—”
“Hey, it’s nothing we can’t fix—”
“WE? I’ve been here ALONE all day! There’s no we! Now I have to clean up this STUPID mess—it’s—just—ARGHH!!” Nickel, suspended in the air by Balloon, kicks his legs in frustration. Balloon presses his lips into a thin line.
“Nickel, I know,” he says, tone of voice level compared to Nickel’s irritation. “I came to visit you—I figured it might’ve been a bad time which is why I knocked, but it was… kinda loud out there. And quiet in here. I didn’t think it would be this… bad,” he remarks, finally setting Nickel down. Nickel huffs, brows furrowed angrily.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” he retorts with venom.
“With just you in here, I mean! With that kind of crowd outside too…” As Balloon continues, Nickel is begrudgingly drawn back up the step stool and to the sink to scrub another bowl. This time, his dishwashing is much more aggressive as the bowl keeps falling over in the sink when he tries to scrub it with the sponge. Balloon looks toward the shattered ceramic pieces on the ground and then to Nickel, and decides to approach him.
“I’ll help,” he offers, and Nickel scoffs. “Right, because we all know what happened last time you tried to help with cooking.” He goes right back to his pathetic attempt at scrubbing the very dirty bowl, yet Balloon still remains in his peripherals.
“There’s no flour involved with washing dishes, Nickel,” he deadpans in return. “What could I possibly do wrong?” Nickel growls. He was just wishing for help minutes ago. There’s still sharp pieces of ceramic on the floor… with the nature of their society now, ESPECIALLY with Balloon present, that’s a hazard and he knows it. The food still needs to be made, too…
“...Fine—FINE! Okay. Just—do this.” Balloon smiles, humming in acknowledgement as Nickel jumps down from the stool once more. He’s quick to get a broom and dustpan to clean up the mess from earlier. Getting a look at Balloon from this angle… he seems to have gotten the grime off the bowl pretty easily. That makes his job a little easier, at least. He quickly disposes of the shards, and once he quickly surveys the area, he paces back over to the clean plate on the opposite counter.
“All clear,” he says, which beckons Balloon to bring a clean and dry bowl over for Nickel to use.
“Great—what next?” Balloon says, which Nickel racks his brain for a reply. Glancing at his notes from earlier, it had called for a grilled cheese and a caesar salad. Easier than some of their other options, he muses to himself.
“Caesar salad and grilled cheese,” Nickel grunts wearily, before moving to set up the grill and ingredients with a kind of practiced precision that Tea Kettle had worked into him. Balloon looks at him from the sidelines as if he’d grown a second head.
“You know,” he begins, elbow on the counter and his head resting on his hand, amused, “I never would’ve guessed cooking was your strong suit, Nickel.”
Nickel looks back with an eyebrow raised as he prepares the bread and the cheese to go onto the grill. “I’ve literally been a line cook since I started working here. Oh no, the chef is good in the kitchen, who could’ve guessed!”
“They looked pretty hungry out there,” Balloon comments in turn, which makes Nickel work faster. “Why don’t we double up? Grilled cheese can’t be too hard.” He stands upright, and Nickel tentatively moves to make room for him.
“TK’s gonna have my head if you burn down the kitchen,” Nickel states flatly.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Balloon parrots Nickel’s line from earlier, and he scoffs again. “I’m serious! I’ll do this, you make the salad. This’ll be over faster than if you do it alone. You know I’m right.”
“Whatever! Just make sure it’s brown—but not too brown. Oh—and make sure the cheese is melted too, but not too melted.” Balloon nods tentatively, hand curled around the handle of the now sizzling pan as Nickel moves to the side opposite of him to make the caesar salad.
Balloon’s never been one for cooking. Or baking. He’s not great with physical mediums—could cooking be considered an art, he wonders? Perhaps the more pretentious sorts of cooking, such as the ones with tiny portions and big inedible decorations. The kinds of food Silver would enjoy, he muses privately. Balloon has always been better with the metaphorical and abstract, anyways. Written words, like his poetry. Words from a pen come to him much easier than food from a pan. He always finds inspiration from his surroundings… Maybe he could work some sort of food metaphor into his next work.
Speaking of surroundings, he finds some odd curiosity in watching Nickel work. In general, Balloon would never turn down a chance to gaze at Nickel from afar—but here, he seems unusually concentrated. It’s the sort of concentration he only gets from Nickel when he really means business. It makes Balloon wonder why he’s so invested in the first place. Initial intent aside, with the customers out on the floor, Balloon doesn’t blame him for hustling quickly. The way he seems to know where everything is and where it should go fascinates him. For a moment, he watches Nickel work the toppings into the salad. It… actually looks pretty good. He’s fairly impressed with Nickel’s ability to—
“BALLOON!”
The grilled cheese is burning, he then realizes. Was he supposed to flip it?? He was definitely supposed to flip it. This looks much too brown and melty and smokey. Definitely not what Nickel wanted him to do.
Sure enough, Chef Nickel pushes Balloon out of the way as he attempts to remedy the situation.
“Ugh—come on, come on!!” He uses a spatula—which Balloon hadn’t even realized was there—to flip the sandwich on its opposite side. The smoke and burning smell dies down somewhat, but the pang of guilt inside Balloon remains. He had just told Nickel a grilled cheese “couldn’t be that hard”, and then was too busy ogling him to grill said cheese. Real classy, Balloon.
Nickel’s sigh acts as emotional damage control as he turns to face Balloon with knitted brows. “Listen,” he says, and Balloon wrings his hands together uncomfortably. “I get you’re trying to help me. It’s whatever. I just—you—can you—” He stammers, and takes a moment to word his thoughts. “.......Go help with the other dishes instead? I’m almost done, and I don’t want to restart again, seriously. Just let me do this.”
“...Okay,” Balloon responds stiffly in return, and Nickel sighs again. Balloon curses himself internally for making such a dumb move. He moves back to the sink, in which there are a multitude of various neglected dishes and silverware. This is a job he could do well at least, he considers thoughtfully. Every now and then he casts a glance back toward Nickel, who is hard at work making the grilled cheese look presentable enough to whoever ordered it. Once they’re plated properly, they’re on a circular tray and out the door.
Only the sound of rushing water from the tap remains. It’s somewhat symbolic of Balloon’s own thoughts, he decides, as it’s all he’s left with once Nickel runs out to take care of business. This task is considerably easier for Balloon than it is for Nickel. Cleaning must be an easier task done with multiple people… keeping the restaurant open while competing in the new season is a move uncharacteristic of Tea Kettle to pull off. Perhaps it’s out of her hands, or perhaps she figured she would have been eliminated early again? Would she come back to work in between challenges? That seems like an awfully difficult way to live. If Balloon had to work a job in between the episodes he competed on, he figured he might have gone insane. There’s a reason he didn’t volunteer himself a fourth time.
The dishes are cleaned and stacked sooner than he thought they’d be. Nickel is still out there… Balloon’s own curiosity almost draws him out of the kitchen to keep Nickel company, but based on the mood he’s in on top of the mistakes he’s already made in the kitchen, he figures it might be better to stay put.
…The kitchen really is a mess. Balloon might be a terrible chef, but he can clean just fine. Which is exactly what he decides to do right up until Nickel re-enters.
Like he had when Balloon first arrived, a frown is plastered plainly on his face. Nickel takes in his surroundings, and his expression seems to lighten up somewhat once he realizes what Balloon had done in his absence.
“I figured I’d make myself useful if I can’t cook, at least,” Balloon elaborates sheepishly, disposing of the towel he’d been using to wipe down dirty surfaces. “What happened out there?”
“Ugh, you wouldn’t BELIEVE it, Balloon.” Nickel approaches, leaning with his back against the counter. “They wanted no caesar dressing in their salad—it’s basically not even a caesar salad at that point! How was I supposed to know that?! They didn’t even say that in their order!!”
“I’m surprised the grilled cheese wasn’t what did you in,” Balloon comments dryly.
“Oh believe me, they weren’t very happy about that either.” Nickel balances on his heels, still leaning back against the counter. “Yeah Balloon, they were just so excited to eat their burnt sandwich… heh. Definitely.”
“Guess that makes both of us terrible chefs, then,” he states coolly. Nickel bristles at this, much to his amusement.
“Don’t even TRY to compare our skills. You can hardly even call yourself a chef—I’m seriously never gonna let you live that down.” Balloon laughs at this, and a smirk from Nickel soon follows.
“Hey, at least I got the rest of the dishes done. No need to break any more bowls.” Balloon joins Nickel in leaning with his back against the counter, his arms resting comfortably on top of it. The smaller of the two hums in acknowledgement to Balloon’s achievement for the day.
“.......Thanks,” he coughs out, softer than usual, and Balloon cocks a brow.
“What was that?”
“You know what I said,” Nickel verbalizes faster than he would’ve liked to. His cheeks are rosy, and Balloon has him right where he wants him.
“No no, I didn’t hear you. What did you say?”
“I SAID THANK YOU.” He barks, words sharp. “For—For helping. Or whatever. It really sucked. Earlier today. You made it bearable. Easier.”
Balloon smiles in return, his own face feeling warm at the acknowledgement. “Hmm…”
There’s a pleasant silence between the two of them. He looks toward Nickel, and Nickel looks anywhere but. He wants to touch Nickel. It’s awkward. Balloon’s arm, which had been resting on the countertop still, moves forward somewhat off the counter and onto Nickel’s top ridges as if he were leaning on him. The contact is startling to Nickel but not unwelcome, as he allows it without any kind of retaliation. It’s a somewhat strange pose for Balloon, but he doesn’t hate it. Nickel’s face seems to have flushed two shades darker. This is fine.
“What now?” Balloon breaks the silence, and Nickel takes a moment to respond.
“...That was the last order,” he responds in a stilted manner, “thankfully.” His eyes are trained on the big industrial doors leading out of the kitchen. There’s two windows near the tops of them, but it’s difficult to see in or out unless you look through them head-on.
“I still can’t believe Tea Kettle has you working in here by yourself,” Balloon states in reply, and Nickel swallows dryly. “Yeah. It sucks. I hate it.”
Balloon stands upright, no longer leaning on Nickel. Nickel turns his body inward ever so slightly to face him. “It must be pretty boring when there’s no more orders to make,” Balloon presses dangerously, “the lunch rush must be over by now.”
Tension fills the room suddenly—at least that’s how it feels for Balloon. He’s playing a dangerous game. Like playing with fire on a floor doused in gasoline.
“I can think of a few things we could do,” Nickel says, and with that the game is already over.
Both of them know what the other wants. Nickel is the one who makes the first move, pressing his flat face into Balloon’s rounded one. This isn’t their first time by any means—Balloon’s thumbs meet Nickel’s side ridges with the kind of precision he’d seen the other cook food with earlier. Nickel can’t do much else but lean into Balloon, which is entirely fine by him. He caresses Nickel’s sides with a firm yet affectionate hold, and it seems to really get to Nickel. Seeing how flustered he gets will never fail to amuse Balloon—but especially at his job of all places. A sterile kitchen isn’t exactly the best place for kissing, he knows that—if Tea Kettle knew about this, she would tear both of them a new one for sure.
They pull apart for air eventually, and Nickel gets a good look at Balloon’s face for the first time. His cheeks are a darker sort of red. Nickel supposes it looks cute on him—he doesn’t even want to begin to think about how HE looks in comparison. His whole damn face is on fire. This was not how he expected the rest of his work day to go.
“Uh,” he says, dumbfounded. “Balloon, I…”
With the worst possible timing possibly ever, the sound of a bell dinging can be heard from the restaurant floor. Someone must be calling to be seated at a table. Nickel’s stomach drops. He looks toward the direction of the double doors, frowning again.
“You’re kidding.”
“Duty calls,” Balloon retorts smugly with eyebrows raised, releasing his hold on Nickel. Nickel looks to Balloon like he’d just kicked his pet dog.
“We’re not done here,” Nickel continues, “Seriously!” He seems to be a mix of disappointed, frustrated, and embarrassed all the same. Balloon almost feels bad for him, and compensates him with a guiding hand on the small of his back and a kiss on the cheek.
“Whatever you say, Nickel.” Balloon says fondly, then shooing Nickel off to go do his job—what he’d come here to do in the first place. Nickel yields, albeit begrudgingly. He supposes he’ll stick around to help Nickel out, at least for the time being.
Perhaps the rest of this shift won’t be so bad, after all.