Fic: Everyone Comes To Pan's Part One
Everyone Comes To Pan’s
Part One
"This is the haunt of the few gentle Fays who remain from the wreck of the race. "
- Edgar Allen Poe
*
"Come on Mr. Pollack, you can't fire me! It's a week out from Christmas."
Frank stood in the middle of the kitchen, a tray of wet and dripping dishes in his hands, his hair net slipping over one ear. His face was warm from the heat of the sink he'd been slaving over for the past couple hours during the dinner rush; warmer now that his boss had just dropped a bombshell on him.
"Frank, buddy, I'm not firing you. I just," he sighed and shuffled through the small brown envelopes through his sausage fat fingers, and chewed the unlit stub of a cigar from one side of his mouth to the other. Frank tipped back his head and looked at the ceiling.
Pollack sighed. "Things are tough all over and I gotta let you go. I'm sorry," he finished with a shrug, holding one of the little envelopes out to Frank.
"Fuck," Frank said, hefting the tray onto the drying rack before wiping his hands on his apron and taking the envelope. It felt pretty thin. Frank tugged off his hair net. "Fuck, man."
"I'm really sorry, kid,” Pollack said, patting Frank on the shoulder as he walked past.
"Sure," Frank sighed. His name was scrawled in red on the front of the envelope. Lero, F. "Sure you are."
Frank took his time packing up the stuff in his locker. Sacked. Again. This clearly was not Frank’s year. It was just a crummy assed job doing dishes, but the thing at Pollack’s was the fourth job he’d lost in 8 months.
Frank stuffed his hair net into the bottom of his back pack.
The lockers were tucked away in a backroom of the kitchens. Just a couple of free standing ones, like the kind you got in high school only smaller, and smelling, impossibly, worse than anything Frank could remember from his youth. Frank heard the door to the storeroom open.
“...and canned the guy.”
Frank didn’t recognize the voice off the bat; he’d only been there a couple of months but the waiters had mostly been dicks, too big and important to talk to the pot scrubber. And as for the chefs? Forget about it.
“Jeez, thank Christ. I swapped out as many shifts as I could to steer clear of him. I know a fucking Jonas when I see one. Hey, hey, pass me the self raising.”
Frank loosened his grip on his back pack. He turned to say something - he didn’t know what, but something.
“For the love of -,” the second voice said, straining under the weight of lifting something heavy. “Dude, don’t start that shit again...”
“I’m telling you,” the first guy cut in. “The guy was a Class A screw up. And a klutz! How many plates has he broken? I mean, I’m pretty sure he could curdle milk just by looking at it. He’s that useless. I’m not kidding.”
“Is this like that time you swore the Sous Chef was stealing sticks of butter to grease his roller skates?” The second voice groaned. Frank heard the sound of heavy things being dragged across the floor and the door opening again.
The first guy laughed. “Say what you like, but that guy? A jinx in any kitchen.”
The sound of the storeroom door slamming shut behind the voices jolted Frank. He shoved the rest of his gear into his pack and bolted out the back doors.
Out on the street it wasn't snowing yet, but the clouds above were groaning grey-blue with the weight of it. The wind whipped down Chancery, and Frank turned the collar of his denim jacket up and pushed his hands deep into the pockets as he walked into it. Goddamnit .
He couldn’t really blame the chefs for the things they’d said. It wasn’t like it was the first time he’d heard it after all.
Frank couldn’t explain it, but lately he was a fucking jinx in the kitchen. Everything he touched turned to shit.
In the job before Pollack’s he broke every second dish he washed. Before that he made a sack of flour explode and in the one before that, the live lobster tank in front of the restaurant smashed while he was cleaning it and half the lobsters escaped down a storm drain. To be honest, Frank didn’t really feel too bad about getting the sack for that. Live lobster restaurants were total bullshit anyway.
On the trash heap at fucking Christmas. How the fucking fuck was this his life? It wasn't easy getting work; not many people ready to believe a guy covered in as much ink as Frank was worth a shot, even if it was just washing dishes and scrubbing floors. But kitchen shit was all he knew how to do. It was his thing, even if, for some reason he sucked at it right now.
Frank knew he could be better. He just had to find the right place for him, the right kitchen. And when he did, he knew the pace, the sound, the physical exertion - getting it right, getting people fed well - that would be all he needed in life. When everything went right in a kitchen, it was an almost zen high - it was worth waiting for.
Frank shivered in the thin denim and wrapped his crummy excuse for a scarf round his face. Fuck it, he didn’t even have a proper coat for winter, let alone a kitchen to screw up in.
If he was lucky, he had enough in his severance envelope to make it through the next couple of weeks; it wasn't like he had a million people to buy gifts for anyway. Well, there was Bob, but Frank was pretty sure he'd be happy with a six pack and bag of Cheetos. He'd have to be.
On the sidewalk ahead, a guy in a red jacket trimmed in white and floppy Santa hat was shaking a can at people as they passed. "Spare some change for the lonely this Christmas?" he asked cheerily as Frank reached him.
"No. Can you?" Frank snorted, intending to push past. Only the street was so crowded, Frank kind of got blocked in next to the guy. Frank glanced at him; from a frame of pretty, sooty colored lashes, gold flecked eyes glinted back. Frank blinked. He didn’t think Santas came in cute.
The guy smiled. "Of course!" He chirruped.
Frank stopped trying to squeeze between two elderly women who were loaded up with bags and packages, and turned to the Santa.
The can made a light tinkling sound as Santa held it out to Frank. "Take as much as you need."
Frank pulled back. The sidewalk was teeming with people cramming in last minute shopping. They slipped past Frank and the guy without so much as a second glance.
"Um, I think I 'll be fine. Thanks anyway," Frank said, frowning. That Santa suit was pretty thin. Thinner than Frank’s denim jacket, anyway. "Jesus, aren't you cold?" Frank pulled the neck of his thin jacket closer.
The guy laughed again. "I never feel the cold, Frank,” he said.
“It’s like 90 below out here. What are you, wearing a fucking tee shirt? Here,” Frank unwound his scarf and held it out to him, it wasn’t much, but at least Frank had a jacket.
He heard a kid in the crowd of shoppers start wailing, and then felt a short sharp jab to the shin. “Ow, what the fu-” Glancing down, Frank watched unable to move out of the way, as a small girl with a scrunched up face pulled back and kick him in the the shin again with all her might. “Son of a...”
“Oh, jeez, sorry mister!” A woman, who could only be this kid’s harried looking mother, grabbed the little girl’s hand. “Ginny, you apologize!”
“Don’t get rid of Santa!” the little girl yelled, and drew back her foot to punt Frank again. But before she could, her mom scooped her up.
“Don’t what?!” Frank could not believe this was frikken happening. He turned back to the guy in the Santa suit who was still fucking grinning. Fine, thought Frank, last time I offer a cute guy a scarf.
The mom shuffled a little ahead, hitching the kid up onto her hip. From over her shoulder the brat poked her tongue out at Frank. Frank poked his tongue out right back.
“What the hell is this day?” Frank said, tipping back his head and blowing at the sky.
Santa laughed. “You know that one good turn deserves another, right?” He quirked a grin out the corner of his mouth.
Frank waved the guy off and started to turn away. But Santa called, “Here!" and tipped the collection can. Frank had to stick out his hands to catch the contents; a small pile of silver and gold coins filled Frank’s cupped hands.
"What - don't!" Frank held his hands away from him, trying to shove the money back at him.
A group of teenagers crowded around them, pushing between them, drowning out the sound of Santa’s laugh. Frank clutched his hands to his stomach, trying not to drop the guy’s coins all over the sidewalk. There was a gap in the crowd but when Frank looked up, ready to give the money back - force it on him if he had to - Santa was gone.
"Oh for crying out - " He scanned the street, but he couldn't see past the shoppers and seasonal revellers; couldn't see the guy or his Santa hat anywhere.
The coins glinted in his hands, warm against his palms, and they all looked freshly minted, glittering and bright under the light of the streetlamps.
Some of them were odd shapes - little octagonal rounds with holes in the middle, round pointed triangles with grinning faces on them. He stuffed them into his pockets. "Next street collector I see is getting a whole lot of..." Frank fished one of the coins out of his pocket, "Mag Mell? Where the hell is that?” He made a little noise of disbelief. “Merry fuckin' Christmas," he said, stuffing the thing back in his pocket and making his way through the throngs of shoppers down into the subway towards home.
It was raining when Frank left the subway, that wet, misty kind of rain that gets you wetter than you realise. Frank pulled up his collar and trudged through it. His shin was still aching, and his now wet jeans chafed on it a little. Brat, sheesh!
When he finally got to his place he got a little jolt of joy at seeing the lights were on. Bob was home.
But then he remembered about the job and the rent and the jolt turned icy in his gullet.
Frank weighed up heading down the street to the Irish bar on the corner for a couple of hours verses facing Bob and telling him he’d lost another job.
A neon four leaf clover flashed in the distance. Maybe they'd take Mag Mell coins? Couple of them had four leaf clovers on them. Frank looked back up at his apartment and sighed. Fuck it, he thought, better to face the music sober. He stomped up the stoop into the lobby of his building.
*
Bob stood in the hall looking Frank up and down. He held out a hand for Frank's bag, shutting the door once Frank had shuffled inside. “You want a towel?” He asked, kicking the door shut behind him. “You look like a drowned rat.”
“Nah,” Frank said, shaking his soggy hair at Bob instead. "Thanks, man," Frank said. Bob growled and pushed Frank’s head away from him.
Normally Frank’d be half way up Bob’s back by now demanding a piggy back and popcorn. But he felt dousing the guy with melted snow was as much of a liberty with Bob Bryar’s personal space as he had the right to demand right now, since there wasn’t going to be any rent coming this week either.
“Yeah, well. You gotta get a new job, but I won’t turn you out. Okay?”
Frank stared. “How... how did you know.”
Bob crossed his arms. “I can read you like a book, Iero,” he said and walked into the kitchen. “What else happened?”
Frank sighed and pulled out one of the kitchen chairs to sit on backwards. “There was a cute Santa. Maybe I worked with him somewhere? Called me Frank, anyway. At least, I think he did.”
Bob made encouraging sounds from the depths of the fridge, so Frank continued.
Frank considered sticking something down the back of Bob’s pants while he was in this vulnerable and ripe for comedic hi-jinx position, but thought better of it. “So I offered him my scarf,” Frank said. “Coz he had on, like, just a red shirt, right. And the next thing I know Wednesday Adams appears out of nowhere, and tries to kick a hole in my shin. Starts screaming about me getting rid of Santa -”
Bob’s stood up suddenly and nearly knocked himself out on the door roof of the fridge.
“Ow, fuck. You did what to who?” Bob emerged from the fridge, rubbing the back of his head and holding a can of coke.
“I didn’t do anything. So kid kicked me and accused me of getting rid of Santa, like I’m some kind of fairy hit man or some shit.”
Bob scowled. “Well, that’s how you get rid of … um... them.”
“Them?”
Bob looked uncomfortable. “Magical people. Faeries. Whatever. You, you know, you give them clothes.”
Frank snickered. “Okay, Harry Potter. But this wasn’t frikken house elves; this was a guy freezing his sack off in a Santa suit.” Bob wasn’t laughing back, though. He was rubbing his beard and frowning.
“Rowling borrowed that from real life, Frank,” Bob said, fixing Frank with his craggy-browed stare. “From Fairytales. Like, it’s how you free them, or whatever, from your service.”
Bob looked really uneasy now. He frowned. “You know the one about the poor cobbler?” He lent back against the counter. Frank shook his head, he’d never really been big on kids stories. He couldn’t really think of any off the top of his head.
Bob sighed. “Once upon a time there’s this poor cobbler,” he said. “And he can’t make enough pairs of shoes to survive, but one day he comes into his workshop and it’s full of shoes, so he hides out to see who's making them, and he sees these little guys come in and make them; they work all night. And so the cobbler is super grateful and makes them some little shoes of their own and leaves them for them. Only the little guys, they freak out, and he never sees them again. He gets rid of them and then, he like dies of poverty of something else all medieval and crappy.”
At the end of Bob’s speech Frank snaps shut his jaw. The entire year that he’s known Bob, he’s never heard him string that many words together in one go.
“Um, okay?” Frank says. “I didn’t know you were like, the keeper of the lore or whatever.”
Bob shakes himself, rubbing at the bridge of his nose, which Frank can’t help noticing had gone kind of red. “I’m not,” he sgrumbles. “Just shit my dad used to tell me. When I was a kid.”
Bob turned back to the fridge and pulled out a leftover take out container. “You want some of this?” He says, not looking at Frank. “I’ll heat it for you, but I’m not cooking shit.”
Frank reconsidered climbing on top of his only friend in the world. “You’re a star, Bob Bryar. A big soft, Irish star.”
“Half Irish,” Bob corrected. “The other half is Kick-Your-Ass-If-You-Don’t-Pull-Your-Shit-Together, so... you know,” Bob shrugged.
“Santa didn’t want the fucking scarf anyway, so he’s safe. And that kid is a brat.”
Bob chuffed out a laugh. “So long as Santa is safe. All I’m worried about.”
Frank felt better being home already. “Is um, is your girlfriend here?” he asked, hovering around Bob’s shoulder as he put the food in the microwave and bashed the buttons.
Bob grunted, lifting his chin in the direction of the living room. “She’s looking forward to seeing you. You know, I think she’s into you man.”
Frank waggled his eyebrows. “I know dude. Good thing I don’t dig chicks, huh?”
“Yeah, fuckin’ yeah,” Bob said, cracking open a coke. “Whatever.”
Frank headed to the living room, opened the door and Bob’s girlfriend threw herself at him, leaping up and licking his face. “Peppers, you little minx!” Frank cried, dropping to his knee and letting the tea-cup Chihuahua smother him with her doggy kisses. “Did you miss me? Did you miss me baby?!”
Peppers danced around his feet yipping at him.
“I’m home, scruff muffin. We can sneak around behind daddy’s back,” he said, rolling her over so he could rub her tummy.
Love Frank. Love Tummy. Love Frank and Tummy. Love Frank
“Yeah, she really does love it. Look at her,” Frank called back at Bob.
Frank tickled up by Peppers’ ears and back to her tummy. “That’s my girl,” Frank sighed, running his fingers over her silky skin.
“She is a heart breaker.” Bob said, coming into the room and throwing himself on the couch. He dug an Xbox controller out from under him and resumed playing.
“She is a woman of discernment and taste,” Frank corrected, as Peppers licked his hand. “And she loves me.”
Bob snorted. “How can you tell,” he said, arching an eyebrow and restarting the game.
Pepper’s wriggled over and sat staring up at Frank her tail thumping.
Love Frank. Frank mine. Love Frank. Love Frank. Love Frank.
Frank grinned at Bob and shrugged. “Look at that face. You can almost hear her speaking,” he said.
Bob rolled his eyes and handed Frank a second controller making a sound that may or may not have been a “Humph.”
*
The red haired man walked across the park to Frank’s bench and sat down next to him.
Behind him, the gleaming golden roof of the Library shimmered, it's arcane spires piercing the diamond studded sky. Dark as it was, Frank could see everything perfectly, as if each tree and blade of grass and, even the man next to him, was lit up from within. Frank should have been cold in just his t-shirt, out here in the park in the middle of the night, but the air was light and warm on his skin.
His new companion shivered. His features changed every time Frank looked away, and his skin seemed brazen, flowing from creamy white to vibrant pink and blue in places. Frank blinked and rubbed his eyes, but it didn’t make any difference. It was like he’d been drawn and smudged, Frank thought. The only clear thing about him was his hair, scarlet and shaggy and bright.
Frank focused on that colour. He immediately felt calmer and happier just looking at it. He wanted to put his fingers in it, like paint in a pot, and drag the color all over his skin.
“Hi,” the man said, shuffling a little closer to Frank; so close Frank could smell the warmth of his skin and hear the colour of his large eyes, golden and warm.
“Hello,” Frank said back. In his lap a brown paper bag crinkled. Frank took a handful of crumbs from the the little bag and scattered them on the path in front of the bench. Out of thin air, a flock of little - what were they? - Little people, tiny people, with gossamer wings, descended on the crumbs. Frank turned to say something to his new companion, but the man seemed unsurprised, and unconcerned that they were being surrounded by - by fairies or some shit.
“I miss you, Frankie,” the man said after a few moments of watching the little creatures squabble over the crumbs. He held out his finger and one of the fairies flitted through the air and alighted on the end of it. The red haired man stroked the little creature’s gossamer wing. Frank shivered.
“Miss me?” Frank asked, watching the man’s finger slip so gently over the wing.
The red haired man smiled. “I do.”
Frank missed the man. He desperately missed him. Which was strange to Frank because, he'd never seen him before in his life.
The little fairy flitted away. They both watched her disappear across the park towards the Library.
“Can you come home soon?” The man on the bench asked.
“Come home?” Frank said, looking down. The bag of crumbs had been replaced by the edge of a bed sheet, scrunched up in Frank’s tight fists. The ground beneath the bench started to shake. Frank grit his teeth. “Come home? I am home.” Frank hissed.
The red haired man reached out, and ran the tip of one finger down Frank’s cheek. Frank's skin tingled and burned in its wake. “Are you sure?” The red haired man said.
The thunder under the bench became a roar, and Frank woke up, sitting in his bed and blinking at the room, trying to remember what he’d just been dreaming.
It was something terrible, he was sure. But also something warm and happy and - But it was no use. It was gone so fast that chasing it only pushed it further away.
Frank rolled over in bed and tried to get another half hour. Maybe the dream would come back.
*
When Frank had first met Bob they’d hit it off because it was like Bob was the only person who seemed to actually see Frank when he was around.
This was at the Lobster restaurant, which, with hindsight, was probably the worst job Frank could have taken. Except that he'd met Bob, who spoke to Frank, not just at him. They’d bonded over a shared hatred for plunging living things into boiling water, and the head chef - a psycho who’d watched one too many British cooking shows and thought throwing sauce pans and four letter words around the kitchen was the way to get things done. Asshole.
Bob had quit that place not long after the Lobster Liberation incident (Frank still wasn't sorry). Now he worked at a bistro up town, but he’d offered Frank a place to stay when he didn’t have a bum dime to his name. He was the closest thing Frank had to a best friend in the whole of Chicago.
As compensation for having to put up with Frank, Frank had taken to getting up a few hours before Bob, or sneaking out after he’d gone to bed and cleaning the house from top to bottom. He’d make sure Bob’s breakfast was ready before he got up, maybe put some clean chef’s whites out for him, get the papers in off the porch and generally make sure all Bob had to do round the house was play Call of Duty and walk Peppers every now and then - when Frank wasn’t doing it. Man, Frank loved that dog.
Taking care of Bob seemed like the least he could do, under the circumstances.
Bob never mentioned it. He just left Frank to his own devices and Frank felt pretty good about that. As soon as he got some lasting work, Frank’d pay Bob the rent he owed or something, and then they could divvie up the housework or whatever.
Frank’d still be number one dog walker, though. That was a deal breaker.
He sliced an apple into a bowl and squeezed a little lemon on it and sprinkled it with cinnamon and sugar. He placed it next to Bob’s cereal bowl, then set the coffee machine going.
The kitchen was spotless, the living room was tidy and Bob’s laundry was folded, waiting for him on the bottom stair. Frank sighed, if only things went this easily in the work place. He looked down at Peppers sitting by his feet.
“Good morning, scruffmuffin,” he said. Peppers thumped her tail as Frank crouched down and scruffed her behind the ears. “I bet you want a W-A-L-K? I'm sorry, baby girl. I promise you a W-A-L-K when I get home tonight, okay? I have to find a job, kid." Frank stood and stretched. Peppers little tail thumped on the floor, and Frank grinned down at her. "I hid a chewchew in Bob’s bed. Go find it!”
Peppers scrabbled off towards Bob’s bedroom. Frank grabbed his jacket, keys and messenger bag. By the front door he paused, waiting for it.
“Peppers! Garrrgh! Too. Early!” A yell bellowed from the depths of the apartment and Bob’s bed.
Giggling, Frank locked the door behind him and headed out to find some work.
*
“Sorry kid,” the manager said. “I’m looking for someone with experience.”
“That’s funny,” Frank said. “The last place I tried said I was over qualified.”
The manager cold-eyed Frank.
“Yeah. Thanks for your time,” Frank said, hitching up his bag and turning to leave.
Well, that was it. The last place on his list. This town was officially dead to him.
An hour of aimless wandering later, Frank threw himself down on the park bench. He didn't have anywhere to go now. He'd trawled every street Downtown, asked in every two-bit diner, restaurant and café from South Side to Hillside and he was done. No one wanted Frank Iero in their kitchen.
He worried at a flaking piece of paint on the bench, digging his nail under the chip and prizing it off. He didn't want to go back to Bob’s place without some kind of news for him about work.
He shivered. What the hell was he doing sitting out in the freezing cold. He hadn't even noticed how cold it was as he’d been walking across town.
The late afternoon sun, low in the grey sky, glinted off the roof of the Chicago City Library.
Maybe Frank could go hide there for a couple of hours? He could lose himself in the books; he liked doing that anyway, usually. Plus, the city library had a big community notice board in the lobby. Maybe he'd find some work ads there.
Frank really loved that building; It had turrets, for crying out loud, and fierce-winged gargoyles plucked straight from Grimm’s Fairytales, Frank had always thought, hanging menacingly from the parapets. The doors were three times as tall as Frank, made from solid beams of wood, dotted with palm sized iron studs.
The frikken thing was a fortress of knowledge - straight out of a Dungeon Master's wet dream. Frank was fucking nuts about that place.
Today it looked like something out of a story book, with the glowering skies reflected in the tall, arched windows.
A flock of pigeons strutted and pecked across the entrance. He was never sure why, but something about pigeons always made Frank laugh.
Frank ran up the steps, scattering the flock as he went. It was as though he could hear their voices in the resulting cacophony of caws saying, Oh my god! What is it?! Flee! Flee!!
Grinning to himself as he pushed through the doors, Frank shrugged off his jacket and stuffed it into his backpack. He went straight for the notice board behind the information desk and stood scanning it for a few minutes.
It was warm and dry and quiet, inside. And, even though there were no help wanted ads, Frank was fucking glad he'd come here.
He walked along the shelves counting the numbers painted up high on little wooden 'flags'. 396-396.8, 397-397.9, 398-398.8. Frank turned aimlessly into the canyon of books and strolled down it, eyes scanning the shelves.
"Modern Folklore," he mumbled as he passed. "The Folk Meagerie. Under the Hill. The Magic of Mag Mell..." Frank stopped. Mag Mell. Huh.
He pulled the book off the shelf and then jumped about a foot in the air because behind it was a wide grinning face.
"Hi!” the face said, all teeth and glinting eyes.
"Jesus fuck!" Frank hissed pressing the book to his chest.
The face disappeared, and seconds later short guy, still grinning, popped round the end of the aisle. "Sorry," he said, holding out his hand. "I didn't mean to frighten you... no, strike that, reverse it. Anyway, hi!"
Frank blinked down at the guy's open palm, and because he didn't know what else to do he reached out and shook it.
"Hi?"
The guy jiggled up and down on his toes a little. “Look I'm not a weirdo or anything... no, strike that," he said. "Reverse it. I am kind of a weirdo. But my point is, I couldn't help noticing you.”
Frank winced. Wow, he'd never thought of the public library as a place to pick up guys.
"Um, okay. Well, I'm flattered and all but -"
The guy just laughed. "No, no, you misunderstand." The guy’s smile widened. "You looked so... I dunno? Lost, maybe? I hate seeing people looking like that. I collect lost people, see," he shrugged. "It's like, my thing.”
Frank blinked. “Um, okay?”
The guy nodded. “I’m Pete, and I’m about to go outside in this glorious sunshine and eat this glorious sandwich,” he said, holding up something far too large to be a sandwich all wrapped up in brown paper. “Wanna join me?”
"Well, um, nice as that sounds," Frank said, taking a surreptitious step backwards. Bob always said it was dickish how shy Frank could be around New People.
Do not get a job in Hospitality if you don’t like new people, dick head. Hospo is all new people, Bob liked to say. Frank thought that was fair enough in a work situation, but out in the everyday? Like, in a frikken library? Frank didn’t think it was his responsibility to de-shy himself or whatever for the library freaks.
"I'm not really hungry and - " Frank's stomach had other ideas about his shyness though, and growled loudly. He winced.
Pete smiled wider at the sound. "It's vegan," he said, shaking the bag a little. "C'mon. I can't eat it all myself. Tell you what, if it makes you feel better we can trade. My sandwich for a story."
Frank couldn’t help smiling. "You want me to, like, hang on... what?"
Pete put his hands on his hips, lent back and laughed. It wasn’t a big laugh, but he gave it his all, and Frank half felt the laugh bubble up in him too. He giggled. Okay, so, maybe he kind of liked this crazy asshole.
"You tell me a story - your story,” Pete said. “I give you a sandwich. Like, like tale busking!" Pete's eyes went a little distant. "Hmmm, that's a cool idea." He snapped back to Frank and grinned again. "I thought it up, okay, but you can use it if you want."
Frank shook his head. He had absolutely no fucking idea what the hell was going on. But he was starving suddenly, and smiling after what had been a pretty shitty day. Okay, so the guy was a whacko, but Frank was down with whackos.
"Okay, a sandwich for a story?" He asked.
"Your story," Pete said, nodding. "And don't try to trick me. I'll know if you do. We can smell our own." He winked and Frank found himself giggling again.
"Okay. C'mon then,” Frank said. “But I hate to break it to you, it's pretty crummy outside. It was just starting to, like, piss down when I got here."
They walked across the lobby and through the doors.
"You sure?" Pete said, and those words made Frank’s skin tingle. Hadn’t someone else just ask him that? He shook his head to clear it. Whatever it was, it was gone now.
They stepped outside, and Frank blinked. "Huh," he said. The sun was shining and the sky was bright blue.
*
"Okay, I've got, like... what the hell is that? Artichoke? Roast pumpkin and peanut butter. Or Carrot, spinach and grape jelly,” Pete said, prising up the corner of a sandwich before holding them both out to Frank to pick. “What's your poison."
The sandwiches were massive. And weird. Big slabs of seed filled, nutty scented bread piled high with the strangest shit Frank had ever heard of. Like, who put roast pumpkin in a fucking sandwich?
"Carrot and what the hell else, I guess," Frank said. Pete handed him half a slab, picked one up for himself and stuffed it in his mouth.
"Mokay, my smorry mees," said Pete, spraying seeds and bits of pumpkin everywhere.
Frank leaned out of the line of fire.
"Whoops. The story, c'mon," Pete said, swallowing his mouthful.
Frank took a tentative bite of the artichoke, grape jelly and peanut butter thing. The flavours burst over his tongue in new and starling combinations. Holy fuck, he thought and fell on the rest of it like he hadn't eaten in years. "This should not work as a food combination, but..." He stuffed another huge bite into his mouth. “Mit mo buzz.”
"I know right? Zachary makes them, over at Pan's. It's like he's fuckin' magic or something," Pete grinned.
Frank nodded fervently. "Wow," he said, only his mouth is disgustingly full so it came out as more of a 'mow', with crumbs flying everywhere.
Pete flipped his hand in the air. "Okay, you've eaten my bread and salt, payment is due.”
Frank frowned and dug around in his back teeth, plucking out stuck seeds. "Okay, okay. So, um, I came to Chicago a year ago, well, like almost a year..."
Frank started and after a second found he couldn't stop, he told Pete about Bob and Peppers and how Chicago felt like home, almost but not quite. And he told him how, even though it was fucking hard, he couldn't go home yet, not until he'd made it here. Not until he'd tried.
Pete nodded, and asked questions and finally, when Frank had run out of things to say, Pete said, “So, like, tell me one thing you’ve done since coming to Chicago that you’re really proud of.”
The question threw Frank a little. He scrambled around for something, anything he’d done in the last year that he could honestly say he was proud of. But there wasn’t a lot. Fuck, that was kind of embarrassing. ‘I haven’t held down a job for more than a couple of months’ wasn’t anything to write home about, nor was ‘Failed to ever pay my rent on time’.
“Ah, this one time,” Frank said, picking at the peeling paint on the park bench. “I like, freed a bunch of lobsters.”
“Dude,” Pete said. “You just got through telling me that was an accident. C’mon, we can smell our own.”
“Fine,” Frank said, throwing up both hands. “There’s, like, nothing. I’ve done nothing I’m proud of. Okay?” Frank tore the corner of the sandwich wrapper on the bench between them.
“Again, I’m calling bullshit,” Pete said and crossed his arms. “What about Peppers? Didn’t you say something about her?”
Frank scratched his chin and screwed up his nose. “What about her? A Chihuahua likes me. I’m not sure if you know this about dogs, but like, they love anyone with a bag of kibble and chew chew.”
“Yeah, but you were telling me something about Peppers,” Pete said again, and swirled his hands round, trying to grab for the thread of that particular story. “Like, something you did for her?”
Frank thought about Bob’s little golden tea cup Chuchu. He really did love the fuck out of that - Oh, wait…
Frank straightened up. “This one time, I got home to Bob’s and Peppers was acting kind of weird,” he said. “And like, when I picked her up she stank real bad. Bob wasn’t around, he’d been working nights… Anyway, I took her to the vet then and there, coz the smell was so bad, and like, her ears were all fucked up inside. And the vet said she had an infection, a really bad one.”
Pete grinned. “You saved her.”
“I guess,” Frank said. And yeah, yeah, he’d saved Peppers. Saved her little, star-bright life. He swallowed down a lump that had popped up in his throat out of nowhere.
Pete’s eyebrows shot up. “And you’ve done nothing to be proud of?”
Frank laughed. “Point.”
Pete grinned. “Peppers is awesome,” he said. “I mean, she sounds awesome.”
“She is. She so is.” Frank grinned.
"Where's home for you, Frankie?" Pete asked, picking at his teeth with a finger nail. "Like, where did you come from?"
"Oh, you know... East," said Frank. He frowned. "Um, Jersey, I think."
Pete's lips twitched. "East?"
"Sure," said Frank. "But anyway, I'm here now and that's what matters, right? It's not where you're fuckin' from, but where you're at."
Pete shrugged. “The past is important too.”
Frank wasn’t so sure about that. He nodded anyway, though. "Jersey might be in my future too, anyway, 'cause I can't get a goddamn job to save my life.” Frank said, and popped the crust of the doorstopper in his mouth. “And, that’s the end of my story... and this sandwich."
It was kind of a bum note to end his tale on, but it was true. And he had the feeling Pete cared more about that than anything else.
Pete nodded and dusted off his hands. "What do you do? What's like your thing?" Pete asked. “What are you looking for, job-wise?”
Frank shrugged. "Kitchen hand," he said. "Food Prep. I’ll wait tables. I can make coffee at a push, but I'm not much good with the milk -"
Pete slammed his hands together and yelped.
Frank jumped almost out of his skin again. ""Fuck me! What?!"
"That is why I met you today!” Pete leaped up from the bench. “A job!"
Frank took a deep breath and blew it out. "You know where there's some work going?"
Pete nodded. "Frankie do you believe in fate?" Opening his arms wide and leaning back, he said, "Like really, really believe? Because if you don't believe, this might not be real."
Frank could feel his eyebrows inching up his forehead. Pete really was kind of a weirdo.
"Um, okay? I guess I believe then, if there's a job in it for me," Frank said.
Pete frowned. “Well, that'll have to do." He took a deep breath and thrust his fingers into his hair, messing it up insanely. He looked Frank in the eye. "The sandwich you just ate," he said, leaning forward. "And which, unless my eyes and ears deceived me, you enjoyed the fuck out of, was from Pan’s, which even as we speak is in dire need of a kitchen hand!”
Frank's stomach flipped and a little tingle of excited hope danced through him. He got a hold of it real quick though, and pushed it down. Just 'cause this Pan's place needed someone didn't mean they'd need Frank.
"Point me at it, " Frank said. "I can only go see what they're looking for, right?"
"Right!" Pete replied, tearing off a wide strip of brown paper from their lunch and pulling the stub of a pencil from his pocket. He started sketching a rickety looking map on the paper. "Take the El to Oak Park," he said after a few more sketchy lines. "Second street on the left, and straight on till Mornington Cresent. Tell them Pete sent you." He looked up. "No, strike that. Reverse it. Whatever you do, do not mention me. The last guy I sent over there set the place on fire.” He grinned his mighty grin.
"Pete," Frank said, staring at the map. On the corner of the paper the word Pan's was stamped in a large swirling font with little stars and moons floating on the page around it. "I-I don't know what to say."
"Say, 'Thanks Pete!' and then go get that job."
Frank smiled and tucked the map into his inner jacket pocket. "Thanks, Pete," Frank said.
And Pete smiled back, huge and bright.
*
Frank hopped the first El he could and made his way, with Pete’s somewhat shonky directions still fresh in his mind, to Mornington Cresent. The map took him down a couple of strange little alleyways to a road Frank was pretty sure he’d never seen before - a leafy little avenue with quaint little shops dotted along it.
He walked the length of the street looking for Pan’s, but at the end there was only a narrow little pedestrian thoroughfare next to a second-hand book store.
Frank scanned the street. There was a tall old fashioned looking lampost by the entrance of the thoroughfare, and sitting under it was a little, dark brown pug. It stared at Frank. Frank stared back at it.
"Don't suppose you know how to find a place called Pan's?" He said, and couldn’t help laughing at himself. Reduced to talking to animals. Whatever the fuck next?
You're looking at it.
“Yeah, didn’t think so,” Frank muttered to himself. He turned back to the alley anyway, and walked a little further own it. There, half way down was a glittering silver dollar sequin sign. He walked closer to it. The sign said, PAN’S.
"How the hell did I miss that?" Frank. scratched his head.
Beats me.
The pug trotted past Frank towards the café and in through the big green door under the sign. Frank followed.
*
Frank wasn’t sure what to expect - the sign outside was kind of crazy and bling, but the green door was pretty weathered and in need of a fresh coat of paint. Pan’s was a good name for a café though, Frank figured; he hoped he’d be cleaning theirs soon enough.
But as he pushed open the big green door, Frank realised Pan’s was actually probably short for Pandemonium.
Every table was full, and between them rushed efficient looking waiters carrying huge trays of food and drink. The decor was pretty loud too; red and green and orange walls covered in art, with massive exposed beams of gnarled wood and wide knotty floor planks, pitted with use. At one end of the room was an open fireplace, as tall as Frank himself, stacked with logs and roaring with fire.
The tables were long, with high backed chairs, and three legged stools arranged higglydee piggledee around them. In front of the fire were wing backed settees, and on a rug by the hearth was the little black pug.
In fact, there were animals everywhere. Cats wound around chair legs; dogs dozed under tables; mice scurried over the table tops; turtles napped under the cake stands, and birds perched on shoulders. He saw rats scurrying up sleeves, which was super alarming in a café, but no one else seemed to give a rats ass. There was something a little bit Diagon Alley-like about the place. JK Rowling would shit.
Every table seemed full. Only, these weren't the usual patrons of the cafés Frank worked in. There were no yummy mommies with children at their knees, no writers tapping at their lap tops. There was a guy over there with a beard to his waist sitting with a woman with waves tattooed all over her arms, and a boy with what looked like implants on his forehead, almost like horns.
There were piercings and ink and all manner of body modification as far as the eye could see, and crazy-assed clothes too. Frank smiled. Ink. The chances of Frank getting work here had, he felt, just doubled.
"Take a seat," a guy said, brushing past Frank bearing a tray loaded with steaming mugs and teapots and plates frothing with creamy cakes, held high above his head. "I'll be with you in a minute."
"Um," said Frank, unable to take his eyes off the woman sitting at the table in front of him who appeared to have an entire stuffed peacock sitting on her head, Frank assumed, by way of a hat. The peacock turned and blinked at him.
Okay, thought Frank. Not stuffed then.
“Um,” he said again. Only the waiter was long gone, weaving in and out of the tables on the far side of the diner. Frank looked around, but there didn't seem to be a spare seat anywhere.
Was this some kind of pet convention? Yeah, that was it. They were weird pet owning rockabilly cosplayers or something.
"There's a table at the back," the waiter said, flitting past again, this time with a cloth in one hand and two empty tankards in the other.
"No, I um -" Frank stammered. The guy stopped and looked Frank up and down. A smile lit up his face.
"Tell me you're here about the job!" He crowed.
"Man, I am so here about the job," Frank said.
"Oh my god!" The waiter launched himself at Frank grabbing one arm and dragging him between the tables. Looking back at him over his shoulder he said, "You are going to love it here!”
"Don't you want to see my references?" Frank stumbled a little.
The waiter shot Frank a grin and a wink. "Nah," he said, flapping his cloth. "Follow me. I'm Brandon, by the way." He stepped over what appeared to be an Irish Wolf Hound, lying between the tables. "Watch out for Hamish," Brandon said, glancing down. "He forgets this is a place of work."
Frank stepped over the dog, which ignored him completely. "Um, is that - is that legal?"
Brandon shrugged. "They're regulars. You know how it is. We're pretty familiar with them," he said waggling his eyebrows. When Frank didn’t reply, Brandon stopped, turned to Frank and looked him up and down. “Oh!” He said and shook his head.
"What?" Frank asked. God, he would die if the guy suddenly decided he didn’t want Frank after all.
“Nothing,” Brandon said, quirking a smile. “Just, I thought - you know what? Never mind.” He grinned, an impish kind of grin and lit up his whole face. “The hours are seven to three, five days a week, days shift around a bit, but we're all really flexible. Gee gets to choose his days since he's an oldest, but yeah, we can accommodate you! The pay is pretty shitty, but you get two meals and all your own tips. And baby, this lot tip big.”
Frank didn't know what was going on, but apparently he'd just gotten a job, so he felt pretty strongly that shutting the fuck up and going with it was the order of the day. Following his instincts in the face of Pete's crazy had served him well, after all.
Brandon turned and started leading him through the café again. Frank was so distracted by what appeared to be a ring tailed lemur swinging from a light fitting that he didn’t see Brandon stop, and ploughed straight into the back of him. “Fuck, sorry man -”
But Brandon hadn’t noticed. He was watching a table of weird looking old guys. “Dude, dude,” he hissed, drawing Frank close. "Watch this!"
The old guys sat down and as the oldest and most craggy looking one sat, there was and almighty and unmistakable FARRRRRRP!
The room went completely silent for a second or two and then erupted in hysterical laughter as the shocked, hairy old dude shot out of the chair. He turned and scrabbled under the seat retrieving an actual whoopee cushion, the kind of thing Frank hadn't seen since, well, he hadn't seen one in years and years.
The old man grumbled and muttered, slapping the cushion on the table before sitting, gingerly, down again.
Brandon slapped his stomach and nudged Frank's shoulder. "One of the classics! Priceless!"
Frank couldn't help grinning, but mostly it was in confusion. He’d once been fired for pranking a regular on April Fool’s Day by pretending to get his order all wrong. What the hell kind of café was this?
“C’mon,” Brandon said and tugged Frank's sleeve. He herded him towards a pair of high doors, with clear round windows in them. "The Kitchens are through here.” He pushed Frank through the doors ahead of him.
If Frank had thought the hubub of the café was intense, it hadn't prepared him for the mania of the kitchens.
Steam billowed into his face as he passed through the doors and he had to duck as a red pepper sailed past into the outstretched hand of a tall hatted chef, who began slicing it with lightening dexterity.
There were three large central tables around which five or six chefs moved in synch, like some kind of weird, stilted dance. Along two walls, flaming grills and stoves and ovens gently roared, while opposite them banks of glass fronted fridges and silver freezers loomed. In one corner Frank saw an open door which seemed to lead to a store room so chocka-block with boxes and sacks of flour the door wouldn’t close.
The clamour of pans and pots was undercut by the sounds of sizzling and steaming and bubbling, and the shouts of the chefs calling to each other in what sounded, Frank had always thought, like their own language. “Baist,” Frank heard. “Broil! Sautee! Grilladin!”
Food and utensils flew threw the air as they were required, and waiters sailed in and out of the two sets of doors, their trays piled high with orders.
But it was the smell, as always, that called to Frank. Rich, vibrant aromas and warm, mellow, hearty smells. Fresh fish, spices, blood, crisp greenery, apples and berries, reductions and sauces, the warm soul-scent of chocolate.
Frank's skin itched. He realized his fists were clenched tight against grabbing up the teetering stack of dishes or pouncing on a mound of unpeeled spuds. He felt fidgety and awkward in a way he ached to shake off. There was stuff that needed doing and Frank knew how to do all of it.
"Can I? Do you need..." He turned to Brandon and flapped a hand at the potatoes.
"Huh?” Brandon said, seeing Frank staring at the piles of unchopped veggies. "Oh! You want to start right now? That's what I like to hear! But no, it's okay. Tomorrow would be good though. I just want to introduce you to a few key players first.”
Frank sighed.
A tall, imposing looking guy in a starched white jacket and tall chef’s hat came storming out of the storeroom waving a ladle. "Where's my rou?!" He shouted. "There can and shall be rou! Where in the name of Pan is it?!"
"Ray?" Brandon called, and waved the chef over.
"Brandon,” Ray said, pointing the ladle at him. “I swear on my mother’s horns, that guy is worse than the numbskull you hired last week. No more Norms. You understand?
"Ha ha!" said Brandon, his eyes cutting to Frank quickly as he made what Frank assumed he thought was a subtle, cut throat gesture at Ray. "Let me introduce you to our new guy." He turned a bright, if slightly forced smile on Frank.
Ray blinked. He looked Frank up and down, and gave Brendon a bemused look. "But -"
"Just in off the street looking for a job!" Brendon cut Ray off. Frank raised his eyebrows at Ray.
"Um... Hi!" Ray said, brightly, his former ire all but forgotten. "I'm Ray, the head chef!"
Frank hitched his bag higher on his shoulder and held out his hand. "Frank, um... the new pot guy." He said and looked to Brendon who nodded.
"Oh, hell no," Ray replied, and Frank felt his stomach plummet. Well, that didn't take long. Frank had known it was too good to be true. Ray shook his head again. "No, you? You, I need on prep."
Frank blinked. "Well, thank you anyway... wait, what?" Frank looked between the two men. Brandon raised an eyebrow and smiled.
Ray nodded and pointed his ladle at Frank. "You have chef's hands," he said. "I'm not wasting them."
Ray’s attention was grabbed by something happening over Frank’s shoulder suddenly and he narrowed his eyes. "Hey! Bert, what the hell are you... I'm sorry Frankie,” he said looking back at Frank. "I gotta," he waved the ladle in Bert’s direction. "See you tomorrow at 7am sharp."
Frank sketched a salute, and Ray hared off across the kitchen. He turned back to Brandon to see he’d been joined by three other chefs.
"And this is Keenan," said Brandon, flipping out both hands presentation style towards a tall, broad shouldered guy in chef's whites with what looked like hand-painted flames rolling up the sleeves. “Our Friturier.”
The tall chef pointed a meat cleaver at Frank. "You chop it, Eyebrows," he said, with a midwest drawl. "I'll fry that mother till it can't speak." He winked and then chopped something into tiny pieces, threw them in a bowl and tossed them in the air with what seemed to be... sparkly flour? He waggled his eyebrows at Frank. "Seven secret herbs and spices, little brother. Y'get me? Come on."
Two chefs next to him high fived and whooped. "Tell it like it is Keenan!"
"And," said Brandon with a sigh. "These are my brothers, Adam." The smaller of the two, with a bright smile, saluted Frank. "And Zach." Zach tipped his head back and smirked at Frank.
"S'up!" Frank said brightly, shaking the hands they held out for him.
Frank bounced on his toes in a rush of glee. These were his kind of people, in his kind of kitchen - covered in ink, with what looked like band shirts on under their whites, and one of them, Adam was his name? He was wearing brothel creepers - in a fucking kitchen. He giggled and turned to Brandon. “Thank you,” he said. This - This is awesome.”
"I know right?" Brandon said, smiling back and clapping Frank on the shoulder.
Brandon tugged Frank's sleeve and lead him back towards the café doors. Frank didn't want to go though. There was still so much to see, he was sure.
“I mean, I can actually start now if you want,” he said. “I mean. I’m free, right now. Totally free. All yours. If you want. Are you sure you don’t want me to like, I don’t know, do stuff with potatoes? Because I can, I can do things with potatoes. And like those potatoes are not gonna peel themselves. Right?” Frank babbled and pushed open the double doors...
And completely failed to see the waiter with a tray full of dirty dishes blocking his way.
The rim of the tray connected with his shoulder, tipping it sideways in almost cartoonish slo-motion and a stack of dainty little tea cups teetered and toppled over the edge of the tray.
Frank lunged for them; The first cup landed in his outstretched palm, upside down and a luke warm slosh of tea flooded up his arm. A second one landed on top of it, and a third and a fourth, the last one balancing on the edge of it's fluted foot, before toppling on top of the stack.
Frank kicked out a foot tand the cup landed with a tiny thud on the top of Frank's Converse, wobbled slightly and was still. Frank let out a whoosh of breath.
There was a clatter of plates and Frank looked up to see the waiter had caught almost everything else on the tray. Everything except a half-full cream boat which teetered on the lip of the tray.
A splodge of whipped cream tipped over the edge of the boat, splattering to the ground. The little creamer, unbalanced completely, tipped with it and plumetted to the floor..
Without thinking Frank kicked the tea cup on his shoe up in the air, caught it in his left hand, and leaped forward to catch the creamer too. Only he misjudged the distance; his foot landed in the splodge of cream and Frank started to skid.
"Oh shitballs," the waiter said, and Frank ploughed into him at top speed, sending all the cups, saucers, plates and delicate china creamers flying again. His momentum carried them back though the kitchen doors into the café, and straight over the back of a chair onto one of the - thankfully empty - tables.
There was an almighty crash behind them, followed by a plaintive little tinkle.
Then everything went silent.
Frank prised his eyes open and looked up. Forty pairs of café customer eyes stared back. Hamish the Wolfhound's head popped up between the tables. He barked.
"Um," a voice from under Frank said.
Frank looked down. Pretty, sooty colored lashes and gold flecked eyes looked back at him. Cute Santa was staring up at Frank with a smirk and a raised eyebrow.
"Welcome to Pan's,” the guy said slyly. “Rough and ready dining is our specialty. See anything you like?"
*
Part Two/ Part Three/ Part Four/ Part Five/ Masterpost