A generic sort of modern AU

[kremdelacreme]

Work days at a tattoo parlor might seem more interesting and unique than the average part-time wage slavery, but sometimes, it has just the same qualities as most customer service jobs. Dealing with tiresome people, fielding calls, complaints, appointments, and confused wrong numbers, maybe poking a hole in someone if you've been a very good boy today. But it's what he does, and it's what he enjoys, and right now, even though he's tired of it and looking forward to going home, he'll be eager (enough) to go back in tomorrow and do it all over again.

There's something to be said about job satisfaction, these days.

It doesn't pay enough for him to be able to afford his own wheels though, and so he's just gotten off the bus at the stop about a block away from his apartment building, and is walking. It's starting to rain, which isn't uncommon for this time of year, but it's also freezing out just now, so it adds another layer of misery to an already irksome day.

But he counts himself fortunate, especially when he spots those few homeless that tend to lurk out of the weather in this neighborhood. He has little to offer them between his own necessities, and what he's been attempting to save up, so he resigns himself to walking by with his head down. It's only because he's staring at the sidewalk that he actually notices what looks like a flattened, dirty animal on the sidewalk, and he's about to step over it with a disgusted noise, until he glances over and realizes that it's not just a flattened, dirty animal, but that it's actually attached to a significantly less flat, but still filthy, dog. He doesn't see any sign of a collar, but it doesn't seem right that a dog this big and apparently well fed is just out here as a stray. So he stops, kneels, and holds out his hand about a foot from the dog's face.

"You're going to start smelling worse in about five minutes," he points out, mostly talking to himself as he looks over the dog. It might have been white before it rolled in...whatever that is all over it.