Fic: Wolf in Sheep's Clothing (Part One)
Wolf in Sheep's Clothing
Author: Birddi
Beta: aramuin - who is the reason this got done! AMAZING PERSON HERE!!!
Disclaimer: It’s illegal to own people. So does it make sense to even have these?
Rating: R, no warnings?
For the prompt: “We seriously need bakers. Seriously.” + “Wolf in sheep’s clothing.” + “One is a werewolf and doesn't know it.” + 5 of the prompt sentences + 6 of the daily prompts. This story was prompted out.
Summary: A wrong turn had Kris working in a diner in San Glam, California. He’s getting used to the little eclectic town, and its zany inhabitants. He’s doing great, he just wasn’t expecting to meet Mr. Right or that his rockstar looking crush would be quite so…crazy, really. What’s with Adam insisting that Kris is going to turn in a ball of fluffy teeth and desire for blood on the full moon?
“Are you done showing off?” Cook asked.
“Hey boss, just who’s the cook around here anyways?” Kris asked, sticking his tongue out at his new employer and laughing at his own pun. Kris took the extra few seconds to take in his freshly grilled cinnamon bun French toast with orange butter cream icing. Kris carefully poured maple syrup into a star pattern across the top and finished it off with a dusting of powdered cane sugar, something Kris had to have special ordered online.
Everything needed to be perfect. Adam was here.
-
When Kris’s car broke down a few hundred feet before the glittery welcome sign of the town of San Glam and just past a very fifties looking all night diner, he figured it was a sign. Kris wasn’t even surprised.
But first stop, Kris thought, was the diner. Then he checked his wallet. Then his pockets. Then his car consol. Then his guitar case which was rather good thinking on his part because he was able to round up a five dollar bill.
Kris seats himself in a booth towards the back near a window so he’s in the warm sunshine. It’s a stereotypical diner, a bit like the last nine or so he’s passed since driving West. Although he’s always been a little partial to the non-chain restaurants like this, and since driving to California he’s gained a further appreciation of them. It might also be that Kris’s mom is a fan of Supernatural.
Currently he was the only one there besides a boy bussing a table towards the back. Not really a surprise at it was four-thirty in the morning.
Kris looked at his beat up truck sitting on the side of the road, stupid bad luck. It was a lucky thing that he didn’t have anywhere to be, just one last foray of independence before he went back to Arkansas with his figurative tale between his legs.
“Hello. Can I - shit. Does Adam know you’re here?”
Kris looked up to find a boy who was presumably his waiter (apron and open pad of paper) was staring at him in what was probably flabbergasted shock. He was a cute kid, even if his entire presence just screamed his discomfort.
“Uh,” as that didn’t make any sense, Kris ignored it and smiled, “Just a menu? ...Please?”
His waiter seemed to freeze momentarily, surprising Kris that it was possible to have even stiffer posture, before running into the kitchen with a holler.
That was how he met David Cook and David-but-just-call-me-‘Archie’-Archuleta.
-
“So, your car broke down? You have no money for it, nowhere to go and you need a job.”
“Yeah...” Kris nodded along having pretty much having just told Cook and Archie his life story over a cup of coffee and a few pieces of burnt toast and kind of gross eggs. “Know of any?”
“In San Glam?”
Why they were both so surprised with his question Kris didn’t even bother fathoming. “Yeah, it’s not like I can pay a mechanic to fix my car unless I have a job.”
Cook didn’t ask why no one could just wire Kris the money just hummed in response, but Archie was still young, “Can’t your parents help you out?”
Kris managed an embarrassed smile; thinking of his mom’s last round of arguments to come home and find a real job, like a music teacher or something for the church. “We’ve come to some different conclusions about things, they weren’t too keen on some of the things I had to tell them.” Like the state of his bank account Kris inwardly winced. “Kind of hoped this trip would clear that up for me.”
Cook nodded with an understanding that probably came from being in a similar place, drinking from his own cup of coffee. Kris really like how laid back the guy seemed, Kris didn’t miss out on how similar their wardrobes were; at least day-old jeans and baggy shirts. Kris wasn’t convinced he’d be able to pull off the strip of red and blonde in the front of hair. The contrast actually put Kris more at ease and he found himself not minding the earlier pang over the reality of his situation.
Archie looked stricken, like he couldn’t imagine what that could be like and Kris’s estimate of the kid’s age dropped another few years. Then he leaned over to take Kris’s hand in his, “Pack should always support each other.”
Rather touched even if that was a weird word to describe family, he squeezed the boy’s hand gently in response. “Thanks, it isn’t all that bad. But yeah, know of anyone who needs a musician?”
Cook and Archie both seemed to laugh sarcastically at that, “In San Glam?” Cook shook his head, “You pretty much have to look high and low for someone who doesn’t do the music thing. Lost my last short-order cook recently because it interrupted their ska punks band’s rehearsals.” The last word was filled with loathing and for some reason Kris got the feeling it was more towards the genre of music than for the old employee’s leaving. “How’re your cooking skills?”
Kris looked back at his almost empty plate with the remaining bits of yucky eggs. “Awesome, and I can start today.”
Kris handled the cooking easily enough for the early morning crowd, even managing to fix himself another plate, this time of palatable eggs. Things really picked up around eight though, it seemed most of the village came in for breakfast but Kris was fine with the inflow of people. Having to prepare enough food for entire villages on mission trips had really helped him out with that skill set.
The kitchen was pretty small, with most of the space being taken up with a huge walk in fridge filled with lots of red meats and a geometrical broccoli. Yeah, Kris wasn’t too sure he’d be using that until he figured out if wasn’t just a really big piece of mould. Archie had laughed at him and tried to reassure Kris is was a vegetable, but Kris still insisted he’d get some other ingredients before the breakfast crowd came in.
For an informal audition to some of his culinary skills, Kris whipped up a waffle with a cream cheese berry spread. When Kris’s cooking had passed his new boss’s taste test and Archie’s enthusiastic request for seconds, Cook had smirked like he knew a secret Kris didn’t and offered him the use of an empty cabin out back and told him he could take a nap after the main crowd left.
Problem was, it was already going towards noon and the dinner had been filled all day, Archie had said it was because the diner finally had some good smelling food. Confiding that Cook’s food was hardly edible and they’d taken a hit with their former cook leaving, Archie had whispered while showing Kris where the food was that today had been their busiest day for a long, long time. It was a nice thought but Archie was just a little too sweet for that to be true. Kris might have snuck the kid some more waffles for saying it, though.
Although, the diner was pretty busy.
Kris had never expected people would want to meet the new cook.
He’d met a few of the locals; they seemed interested in him and were friendly enough. People in town had a bit of a personal space problem though, they’d hang back until Kris introduced himself and then they’d be within a hands distance, sniffing at him. It wasn’t horrible, a little uncomfortable, yeah, but not bad, and Kris had been told personal space would be measured differently in California than what he’d been used to in Arkansas. They also kept asking him the same questions as Archie though, as if Kris was supposed to even know who Adam was. It had confused him at first, but when he asked everyone seemed willing to move the conversation along without answering.
Weird.
“Kris, I want you to come out here to meet Tommy.” Cook called from the front, a different edge to his voice had Kris turning off the gas oven just in case his attention was needed more than just a second. He was starting to get sleepy.
Outside was a grumpy looking man, presumably Tommy, stalking one end of the counter to the other in an agitated way. He seemed to be muttering threats to Cook.
Maybe Cook wanted Kris to chase Tommy away? Cook did look pretty uncomfortable.
Kris took in Tommy’s many rings and decided to go with his general default attack mode.
“Hi!” Kris chirped. “I’m Kris. With a ‘K’. Like Krispy Kreme.”
The punked out man snapped to attention but then just stood there...sniffing? Kris filled the time with taking the new customer in more fully. He definitely fit in with the rest of the town’s artistic inhabitants. Kris figured from what he had seen this morning more than half the town had at least two artificial colours in their hair. Tommy seemed to be a frequent customer of the crazy hair salon down the street if the skittle effect of his hair was evidence.
“You talk to Adam yet?” Tommy bluntly demanded, going so far as to take a menacing step closer so he only had the counter between them, and for some reason that still came off as threatening. A resonating vibration hitched through the air and Kris absently wondered if someone had started a motorcycle outside.
“Nope,” Kris answered easily with a grin, “I’ve been asked that question a lot lately. I’ve been told Adam’s someone I should meet...but he’d been in,” Kris had to think for a moment to think what Archie had told him, “Nevada for a job conference, or something? Is there a reason why you’re asking me?”
“I’m not telling you,” came the growled answer and what may have been a muttered ‘outsider’.
Tommy was most definitely the grouchiest person Kris had met since he got here.
“My family owns The Den on Main Street.” Tommy all but glared. “You know anything about it?”
Kris shifted nervously because he had taken a quick run to the grocer’s and got to see a few of the stores in town, “Um, I think I passed it. Maybe, earlier? It’s the one with the stained glass of foxes and a full moon, right? And uh.” Kris cleared his throat, because yeah, he remembered from looking into the window what looked like harnesses and what might have been something out of Kris’s more exciting forays into porn. It also advertised things for getting things out of fur, “...stuff. I was kind of surprised. I really didn’t expect to see something like that on Main Street. Oh, uh... not that it’s a bad thing! I’m sure it’s a great location for your family’s shop, even for a shop for sex toys...” Yeah, even Kris couldn’t figure out how to save that conversation.
Tommy’s face went bright red and his left eye twitched, he might have made a gasping noise, Kris hoped the guy didn’t have a medical condition or that he wasn’t about to be stabbed. It was pretty fifty-fifty.
Cook laughed a little nervously from the other side of the counter. “Kris, can you come here, please? I think maybe a few more dishes of today’s breakfast quiche are needed for the table over there.”
Kris took a peek, they all seemed content on eating their respective breakfasts but hey, what did Kris know? He’d only been a chef for a few hours. “Okie-dokie.”
He could have sworn he heard Tommy mutter something like, “...says okie-dokie. Adam’s gonna...alive.”
-
When Kris first came to California he had thought he’d wind up in Los Angeles or Hollywood. Some place where a musician could get a foot in the door, but he hadn’t counted on the rent being so high or the 30 dollars a day for parking and had been forced to find a life elsewhere or move back to his hometown. It was more of a wrong turn than fate, really, that had him pulling into the small town of San Glam.
San Glam really felt like home, but funkier with all sorts of eclectic shops that made up the down town. Kris had been able to explore the town a bit, not as much as he’d like in the week he’d been here but he got to peek around enough to get the vibe of the place. Down the street was one of his favorite places to look at, Allison and Allisan’s hair studio had a purple Chinese dragon in the front window and floor to ceiling photos of Lady Gaga, David Bowie, and Cher were clearly visible from the street. Kris really dug the aqua reindeer chandelier. They were pretty busy from what Kris had seen, so maybe it was true that everyone in town had at least some type of crayola coloring, well… aside from Archie and himself.
A close second though was music shop. Kris could write songs about that shop. Kris still wasn’t sure what it was officially called, but it didn’t seem to matter as everyone Kris had talked to refereed to it as ‘the music store’ despite the fact that there were three competing music stores in town. It was an awesome mix of everything, where the only rule seemed to be that music was king. Kris had listened in on a debate between a pink haired grandmother and a violin toting grandkid on the musical merits of Elvis and Bach. One of the worker’s there, Matt even offered to let Kris play on his piano when he had caught Kris looking at it.
Due to his current position he frequented the grocery store more than anywhere else. Kris knew how to make good food; his Mama and his Gram’ma had taught both Kris and his brother well in that regard. That still didn’t mean Kris knew what to do with a dragon fruit or a fiddlehead but he was learning, with the owner’s patient explanations and Kris’s own experiments in the kitchen.
Luckily, Archie was around often enough and Kris had started to institute a system (with Cook’s grudging permission) that if any customer was brave enough to try one of his experiments that he came up with, rather than what was on either the menu or the specials’ board, they didn’t have to pay if they didn’t like it. So far that had only happened once, when Kris had accidentally doubled the amount of salt he wanted to use while he was finishing another order.
His car was still dead, not that he couldn’t figure that out… but apparently it was just broke. That’s what the mechanic had told him when Kris had finally been able to see him. Kris knew better; it was the curse.
He’d been suffering a lot of wrong turns and little inconveniences since he left Arkansas. He should have listened to his Dad’s warnings about getting involved with a warlock’s daughter. Kris wasn’t sure why Katy had finally dumped him over a year ago, something about them both needing to find true love and how that true love was elsewhere. Kris had kind of thought that was a load of bull but had politely kept silent at the time, too busy getting his heart tramped upon.
That was in the past and now Kris was determined that he was going to change his luck and make a real go of it in San Glam.
He felt good about being here, having already accomplished a lot since his arrival almost a week ago. He had gotten a job, and a place to live. Which alright… it was more that he was staying in the tiny refurbished cabin a few yards behind the diner that made his whole in the wall in Los Angeles look spacious, but it was free and had electricity and Kris couldn’t really beat rent-free housing right now.
Kris had been impressed by how welcoming and friendly everyone in town had been. Even Tommy grunted a good morning to him when they passed each other on the street.
Kris’s luck seemed to be turning around. Which was...awesome!
He should have known that’s when things were going to get weird real fast.
Because that’s when Adam came.
-
(( Click to Read Part Two ))
(( Click to Read Part Three ))