Zoo Girls- Episode 1 - “Whatever Happened in the Dark”
It was a quiet morning in the house that day, a stark contrast to the normally lively and busy occupants. Minnie would be getting ready to work as Lilibet woke Stella up so they could carpool to their respective colleges together. While that was happening, Yvette would already be ready for the day and cooking breakfast for everyone before she headed off to her bakery job. However, the events of the night before left everyone tired and feeling quite crummy. If it weren’t for Yvette’s phone alarm waking her up, it was likely that they all would’ve stayed sleeping in the living room all day. Too bad that they all have jobs and classes that they had to go to that day.
The four of them stood around the island in the kitchen, drinking coffee in an attempt to get rid of either their hangovers or to wake them up. For Minnie, it was both. Lilibet, Stella, and Yvette didn’t drink, somehow having gotten a form of hangover from consuming too much candy and soda. Stella had also snacked on a few of her personal “goodies” that basically left her hungover.
Lilibet was squinting from the fact that she had managed to fall asleep and break her glasses the night before, leaving her having a hard time seeing things far away.
“I… think that I’m gonna tell my teacher that I’m sick today…” Stella mumbled, leaning against the island and resting her head on one of her hands.
“I wouldn’t do that.” Lilibet advised, “You already called in sick last week, and I know that you just went to a concert.”
“So… what are they gonna do? Kick me out?” Stella chuckled.
“Despite the fact that it’s just community college, they can and will kick you out, sweetie.” Minnie told her daughter, putting her hand on her hip as she gained a serious tone. “I mean, you can drop out and go to work full time, but you’ll have to pay market value rent.” She chuckled.
Stella’s eyes widened at the thought. She was spending nothing on rent and the other two women were paying half of market value.
“What the fuck mom?! That isn’t really a choice!” Stella scoffed.
“It’s only fair, remember our deal?” Minnie reminded Stella while taking another sip of her coffee.
“Whatever. I’m going to get ready.” Stella huffed and walked out of the kitchen and to her room.
“I gotta go get ready too.” Lilibet mentioned and looked at the time. “If you’re not ready in twenty minutes, I’m leaving without you! We will get McRonalds on the way” She yelled out to Yvette, leaving the room as well.
That left just Yvette and Minnie in the kitchen together. There were a few more moments of silence as the women had a little bit more time before they had to go to their respective jobs.
“So… were you serious about, ya know, making her pay market value rent?” Yvette broke the silence. She was genuinely curious.
“I mean, yeah. I promised her that as long as she did her best and was learning something, she wouldn’t have to pay rent. But if she drops out, she isn’t doing her best.” Minnie explained.
“Huh, well, what about her working full time at the bar? Wouldn’t she be doing her best then?” Yvette asked, slightly cocking her head.
“No, not really….” Minnie sighed, “I mean, yeah, it’s a good job, but I just don’t think that it’s the best that she could be…”
Yvette could tell that Minnie was starting to get upset and she decided to end the conversation.
“Well, I’m gonna go get ready as well. Jay doesn’t like it when he has to work a minute over his scheduled time.” She chuckled, walking away so she could get into uniform.
“Alright honey!” Minnie replied in a chipper voice, popping back from her previous mood.
However, as soon as she left the room, Minnie began to massage her temples. “Fuck…” she mumbled.
Thirty minutes later, Lilibet and Stella were in McRonald’s drive thru to get breakfast. Stella was sleeping in the passenger seat.
“Uh yeah, I’ll get a bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit and a-“ she turned to ask Stella what she wanted, but she was still asleep.
“…Yeah, two bacon, egg, and cheese biscuits. And two orange juices.” Lilibet finished her order.
“That’ll be $12.83. Pull up to the front window” the cashier replied, who looked even more tired than the two girls. The poor cashier seemed to have been working a twelve-hour shift straight.
Lilibet felt bad for them, understanding having to work long shifts. She tended to have overnight shifts at her pizza delivery job. While the tips paid well, she would come home extremely tired and wound up in bed within ten minutes of arriving home. She didn’t even talk to anyone during this time. One may call this rude, but Stella and Minnie were not morning people either.
The female pulled up to the next window to pay and get her food.
“Thanks.” She said to the worker before driving away. She sat the bag on the center console, planning to eat when she got to the college. However, she shook Stella awake so she could eat.
“Huh?” The deer jolted away, confused, as she didn’t know that she had even fallen asleep.
“Eat.” Lilibet told her, focusing on the road so she could get the two of them to class on time.
Ten minutes later and the pair was at Stella’s community college.
“Thanks for the food. I’ll pay ya back later.” Stella told Lilibet as she climbed out of the car with her backpack and ran onto the campus.
“No problem, have a good-” Lilibet couldn’t finish her sentence due to Stella having shut the cat door.
She shrugged and drove to her college, which was only another ten minutes away from the community college. Lilibet parked the car and looked at the time on her phone. She had enough time to eat her breakfast and walk to class. However, upon getting out of the car and collecting her stuff, she found two empty wrappers and orange juice containers. All that was left were the four small pieces of bacon that had been picked off. Stella had eaten both of their foods.
“Crap….” She thought to herself.
There was nothing Lilibet could do. She just got her stuff, ate the measly bits of bacon, and made her way to class. She was annoyed, but there was nothing that she could do. Stella tended to eat everything if you didn’t specify what she could eat exactly. It’s her fault, at least that’s what Lilibet thought.
She could just eat after class anyway, right?
Hopefully
Later on in the day, Yvette was working on baking a cake in the back of the shop. She tended to work in the actual bakery section while someone else worked in the front, serving customers. Yvette had a hard time talking to people that she didn’t know, so she preferred to stay in the back as a baker. However, this came with the caveat of forfeiting all tips since she didn’t work both, like her other coworkers. She was dozing off every few minutes as she mixed the batter. The poor girl was just so tired…
“Yvette!” She sprung up upon hearing her name being called.
The voice was Chloe, her co-worker. Chloe was a small and pudgy, yet very sweet Pug. She had just started her shift in order to help Yvette with her baking. Chloe worked exclusively in the back along with Yvette. While she had tried to work up front, she didn’t get the tips like the others did and it wasn’t worth it to do double the work for basically minimum wage. At least working in the back paid $10 an hour.
“Wake up Y, you’re lucky it wasn’t Kyle who caught you.” Chloe warned her friend.
Yvette could feel her cheeks warming from the embarrassment from being caught dozing off. She almost over-mixed the batter as well.
“Thanks for waking me.” She awkwardly chuckled as she turned off the mixer.
It was a good thing that she wasn’t caught by Kyle, her boss, who likely would’ve given her a stern talking to. He’s an older Penguin who didn’t put up with much.
“What did ya do last night? You’re not usually this tired?” Chloe questioned the cat.
“Uhh, long story…” Yvette shook her head, not wanting to go into all that they had done.
“Well… whatever, let’s get to work!” Chloe cheerfully bounced over to the racks so she could get a proper pan to put the batter in.
“Yeah, let’s go…” Yvette smiled, feeling better now that her friend was here. Even if she was starting to heat up from Chloe being around.
Minnie was able to get a couple more hours of sleep before she went to work, but she still had a terrible hangover. So even while she was in her uniform and massaging a customer, she was oddly quiet. It was normal for her to be cheerful and chatty with others, but today wasn’t one of those days. She just prayed that her customers were decent. The deer had bags under eyes and her hair in a messy ponytail. All in all, she looked more like the lunch line cook than anything else.
“Am I going too hard, honey?” She asked the bull as she rubbed his back. She knew that with her hooves, she could go too hard on those who were tender.
“No, baby, you’re doing just fine…” he answered in a flirty tone.
Minnie rolled her eyes as she continued to massage him for the rest of the hour. It didn’t help that the soundtrack that he chose had a lot of… sensual songs. Setting a mood that she definitely wasn’t going for.
“Okay, time is up. I’ll leave the room so you can get dresses.” She told the bull while wiping her hooves.
“Thanks baby, but you can stay if you want.” The bull sat up, only a towel covering up his bits.
“No.” Minnie dryly replied as she looked him in the eye. She couldn’t even think of something witty like she normally did.
The female walked out of the room, shaking her head at the bull’s actions. She didn’t even care that she likely wouldn’t even be getting a tip. She just wanted this day to be over with.
At the end of the day, the women all sat at the table and ate dinner together. Lilibet had picked up more fast food on the way home. As they ate, the women shared a knowing glance. They were never gonna do what they did last night again. All of their days had been pretty crummy. As they were in silence, a quiet voice spoke up.
“Shit, the other biscuit and orange juice was for you, wasn’t it?” Stella piped up upon the realization.
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