Not Yet Corpses. Still, We Rot.

October 4th, 2023.

“Shit.” Eliza mutters to herself. She had to be at work at 9 AM, and today of all days, the train was late. Well, the train was usually late, but now it had left her skipping her plan on getting coffee and running to the little shop on St. Antonius road, trying not to appear tardy. God knows she is. She quickly checked her phone and read the time. 08:48 AM. She put her phone away and promptly forgot what time it was, so she pulled her phone out again, took note of the time again, (still 08:48 AM,) and looked back up just in time to avoid slamming into a lamppost.
She picks up her pace some more to try and make it to the crossroad before the light turns red, but she knows it’s futile. It’s not like she hasn’t been here before, her school used to be just ten minutes from here, though in a different direction. She had spent countless mornings seeing how fast she had to run to get every green light, and in full honestly, she never made it. She’s never been the skinniest or the quickest, so it didn’t come to a surprise, but many mornings had been ruined by the stoplights turning red right in front of her. Nonetheless, she had to make it today. She picked up her pace a bit more, her lungs burning like the fire of Hephaestus. Unfortunately, her Greek history class did not change the fact that she did not have any stamina, even less than back in high school, and the light turned red before she could get to it. She leaned against the traffic pole, feeling her muscles ache and trying to catch her breath before having to cross the road.
Eliza came to a halt right in front of the store, taking a moment to collect herself and checking the time. 08:57 AM. She was on time after all, even if it meant she accidentally ran through a red light and nearly caused an accident. The door gave a little *ding* as she walked through it. She walked up to the man behind the counter who was restocking the little trinkets underneath the glass counter top. The man looked up, seeming a bit startled at Eliza being there, he obviously had not heard her come in. He looked like he had been working here for a while, so he had probably grown accustomed to the bell above the door. 
“Eh, hi! It’s Eliza, it should be my first day on the job?” Eliza said, it’s what they always said in movies and books, but it sounded so wrong coming out of her mouth. Luckily, the man didn’t seem to think anything of it, and simply responded with; “Eliza! Such a pleasure to see you again, I must confess, it kind of slipped my mind that you would be starting today, please follow me to the back and we will get you started.” The man, who was named Joseph Clifton, owner of Clifton & Co Taxidermy, just like his parents and his dad’s parents et cetera, started walking to a door with ‘employees only’ written on it. Eliza quickly followed, trying not to knock anything over with her bag. When walking into the little room behind the door, she noticed two things.
1: There were a lot of butterflies. Like a LOT. The store sold pinned butterflies, and some other bugs, so it makes sense that there would be some in stock, but this was insane. There were quite a couple boxes labeled in very long scientific names, no doubt of more butterflies, and about 65% of the walls were covered in picture frames with butterflies (and a couple other insects) pinned in them. This told Eliza that Mr. Clifton was a maximalist and that he really liked butterflies. (Or he simply overstocked them, and was trying to make the best out of the situation.)
2: There was a boy, sitting on a stool, playing a game on his phone. He had bouncy black hair with white money pieces. He furthermore had a stretched septum together with eyebrow piercings and a bridge piercing that caused his glasses to slide down a bit. His outfit consisted of fishnet sleeves and a red shirt, with a band on it that Eliza did not recognize, his shirt was tight enough to indicate to her that he may have some, a bit more concealed, piercings. He was furthermore accessorized with several belts, necklaces, bracelets, and rings, that no doubt made him jingle when he moved. Eliza was snapped out of her thoughts by Mr. Clifton’s voice, who started telling her about where the coffee machine, toilet and extra butterflies were, right before noticing the boy that was sitting there. He shot a quick glance at the clock, no doubt to check whether the guy was actually supposed to be on break or not, before introducing them to each other. 
“Eliza, this is Alain, Alain, this is the new girl I was talking about, her name is Eliza.” Mr. Clifton said, vaguely gesturing to each other. The boy, who was apparently named ‘Alain’ looked up from his phone and held out his hand. Eliza awkwardly took his hand and shook it, giving him a (well-practiced, but still very forced) smile. “I’m Eliza.” She said. Alain gave a half-assed smile and responded with; “So I heard.” A short silence fell before they both let out a giggle. Mr. Clifton told Alain that he only had five more minutes until his break ended and to hurry along, because he had to teach Eliza the basics of the job. Eliza was feeling a lot better about her first day already. She had been afraid that her coworkers wouldn’t like her, but at least she got on with this one. A couple minutes later Alain came out and started telling Eliza what to do and how to do it. At least, whenever Mr. Clifton was in earshot. The rest of the time, Alain was making small talk, big talk and shit talk.
“No, I swear, she was absolutely flirting with me. I’m so glad she quit when she did because at that point, it was me or her.” He ranted about an old coworker whilst they were stocking up some items. Eliza giggled. “Come on, it can’t have been that bad. People think I’m flirting with them all the time, even when I’m not, and all of them have been just fine.” She said with and eye roll. “No really! She constantly asked about my dating life, she laughed a bit too hard at my jokes, and when I had just convinced myself that I was like, gaslighting myself or something, she tried to kiss me!” He nearly yelled, before realizing how loud he was being and quickly looking around to make sure Mr. Clifton wasn’t close by, but luckily, he wasn’t, and Eliza said sarcastically; “I think the most unbelievable part of that is that she actually laughed at your shitty jokes.” Alain put on an overly exaggerated offended face and he slammed his hand to his chest when he said, “I will have you know, my grandma deemed me the funniest boy alive!” This in turn ‘offended’ Eliza, who immediately stopped stocking the shelves and turned on her heel to face Alain. “You’re lying! My grandma deemed ME the funniest boy alive!” Alain laughed, “Funniest.. boy?” He questioned her, crossing his arms and turning to face her too, and quite honestly, towering over her. Eliza realized her mistake but decided to go with it. “Yeah, my grandma’s eyes aren’t the best, you know how it is.” She said, barely containing her laughter. “Oh okay. Oh my god, people used to think I was a girl, because i refused to get my hair cut, and I was a ‘late bloomer’, so to speak. I got misgendered more than this trans dude I know, even before he realized he was trans.” They laughed together. Eliza was trying to say something through her giggles but alas, the moment she tried to tell her little story, she choked on her words. Quite literally, she was not getting enough air and she started coughing, whilst still hiccing out from laughter.
A bit later, when they managed to calm down, Eliza had already forgotten what she was going to say. It was alright though, they had moved on to another topic, (aka, Eliza was talking about her cat,) and another topic after that, etc. They managed to get their work done with little to no problems, except when Mr. Clifton caught them looking at pictures of the above mentioned cat, earning them a nice long speech on the importance of focusing on the job. Alain had to reassure Eliza that he had gotten that speech nearly every day since he started working there two years ago, and he hadn’t been written up once, since she had been afraid Mr. Clifton hated her now and that she was going to get fired. Mr. Clifton really did not seem to care though, since about twenty minutes later, he walked in with fresh muffins from the bakery across the street and gave his workers some too, ‘for their hard work’. When Mr. Clifton left the room, seemingly in his own little world, Alain explained to Eliza that the baker from the little bakery across the street, which was named ‘divine pleasure’, (which sounded more like a sex shop, but the owner was such a sweet old lady, and nobody had the heart to comment on it,) had a bit of a crush on Mr. Clifton, and the other way around. She often gave him baked goods on the house, but neither had the guts to ask each other out.
At the end of Eliza’s workday, she was almost sad to say goodbye. Almost.
As much fun as she had had, she was overstimulated. She had to socialize with several customers, and Alain was very energetic. She took her time going home, and quickly slipped inside, trying, and managing, to avoid having to talk to her dad tonight. She loved him, but she did not have energy for him right now. Eliza slipped into her room and put on her favorite CD, laying down on the bare floor, realizing in that moment how much her back actually hurt. She ended up falling asleep there on accident, and she woke up around ten PM, so hungry she could eat a horse. Or maybe a whole stable of them. She popped downstairs, and made herself some soup, which was basically the only recipe she knew off the top of her head. She did notice they were out of celery and carrots, and decided to write celery down on the shopping list that was hung on the fridge. Unfortunately, she ‘forgot’ to write down carrots, but whatever, she didn’t like those anyways. When she had finished making her soup, pouring herself a bowl and putting the rest in the fridge for tomorrow, she was about to sprint upstairs with her food, when she bumped into her dad.
“Why are you making food this late?”
“I didn’t eat dinner.”
“Oh, okay.”
Eliza slipped past her dad, feeling lucky that he didn’t seem in the mood for chit chat either.