How (Not) To Dress To Impress

[control_freak]

Who: Foster and YOU
What: Foster's stubborn refusal to wear presentable clothing gets him on the RM's shitlist. He gets turned into a cow.
Where: The carnival grounds
When: Before the kidnappings
Warnings: Over-the-top self-deprecation, and... uh, he gets turned into a cow.



A. Before

To be honest, Foster wasn't terribly interested in his new... career. His 'hiring' was less of a blur and more of a short yet tedious process of being told what he was going to do and why and then being left to do it. Which... he understood. But he didn't really... care?

He didn't care about the job. His mistakes, yes. He couldn't stop thinking about it. But the whole... part where he was supposed to talk to people? What was he supposed to do? Didn't she know what kind of disgusting, worthless garbage she was counting on? Why, she'd be better off with no one than relying on someone like him. No, she would be better with even literal piles of refuse lining the walkups to her shows. His revolting presence would drive people away, would... would...

Also.

He didn't really like talking to people.

But he had a couple of days to "settle in." To... explore.

And then he has to get to work.

Which he does--a skinny, sallow figure the off-brown colour of an old cement road, dressed only in striped flannel pyjama pants and a haphazardly wrapped blue scarf. On his breaks, he retreats back to the back lot--honestly just a dressed up trailer park, he doesn't understand why they call it a backyard.

And he might not dress for the job--barefoot and ribby, with no shirt and tangled yellow hair--but he's definitely got a way with words.

"Life is short, you know! Too short to live without a little wonder. Without awe. Without magic! But tonight... tonight you can have all that and more! Buy your tickets now..."

He smiles, just shy of brightly.

"Regret lasts a lifetime. No matter how long or short...!"

B. After

There's a new addition to the menagerie.

It's not very exciting. In fact, it's so ordinary that it's kind of odd.

But there it is: a sleepy-eyed, standoffish brown cow.

If you talk to it, it ignores you. If you try to pet it, it moves away.

So.... normal cow?

Lmao no

Comments

B

[dontpokethat]

Ginko is... pretty sure there didn't used to be a cow in this pen.

In fact, he's pretty sure they didn't used to have any regular cows at all, and he can't imagine why the Ringmaster would want one.

He pauses in mucking out the stalls to lean against the fencing to examine the cow. "So what's your deal, huh?"

[control_freak]

It's.... humiliating, to be a cow. To be an animal. Livestock. Cattle.

The Ring Master had made it very clear. This was a punishment. For his own disgraceful behaviour. His willful disobedience.

A public shaming... but also a secret one. He's still trying to decide how he feels.... how he's supposed to feel. Should he be honoured? Grateful that she graced him with her personal disapproval? Proud--and therefore deeply ashamed--that he was so terrible at following even simple instructions (even if he had a perfectly good reason, he thought--but that was just it, of course, his thinking was flawed, it was always flawed, he should have known--)

Maybe it's a good thing that all anyone sees while he goes over and over this, over and over and over... is a cow, standing emptily in a pen.

Ginko's arrival is... a distraction. Foster isn't expecting to be spoken to directly. Some people have mooed at him or whatever. It's annoying, but for the first time, he's not even expected to react to them. It's....

Well.

It's annoying. There's no really salvaging that.

He turns his heavy, drop-eared head to regard Ginko with large brown eyes, but says nothing.

.... hopefully Ginko isn't expecting anything else.

[dontpokethat]

He's really isn't expecting an answer, and after a moment he turns away to keep cleaning. But he does keep talking and glancing over at the cow every so often.

"Not like the Ringmaster to bring in just an ordinary cow. So far as I know, we're pretty much good on petting zoo animals, and you... don't seem friendly enough for that anyway. No offense. So there's got to be something about you that makes you notable, right?"

[control_freak]

The idea of having hands all over him--reaching for his face, his body, faces in his--evokes an immediate reaction in Foster, like he's been offered something deliberately offensive. It doesn't show, because cows don't have much in the way of facial elasticity. But even the suggestion of it is enough to fill him with a brief, aggressive feeling of revulsion.

One ear flicks. Then, with no apparent warning, he moves, advancing a few hoofsteps to stand at an diagonal to one corner, broad brown side turned oppositionally to Ginko.

He makes no sound. But if it's possible for a cow to give someone a dirty look...?

[dontpokethat]

Ginko frowns back at the cow before turning back to his work. "Hey, don't give me that. I just said you aren't going there - for this very reason, actually."

After a while, he finishes cleaning out that stall. Once its usual tenant is back inside, the time comes to move on to Foster's stall.

Ginko is not looking forward to this.

He considers the cow for a moment before stepping out of the stable for a moment. When he returns, it's with a bag of apple slices. He opens the stall door and takes one of the slices out of the bag, holding it out so the cow can smell it.

"Alright, c'mon out. Your turn."

[control_freak]

The cow lifts its head for a second to stare at him--or the apple slices, but mostly him--for a second. Then it lowers its head again in apparent disinterest.

Well. Literal disinterest. Foster doesn't give a single fuck about Ginko's bag of apple slices.

His hunched back as he snorts apprehensively into the straw is an unconscious physical threat as Ginko approaches. He might not know how to be a cow himself, but the cow brain knows what its body means.

Because no matter how he thinks about it, he doesn't feel bad. Not bad enough. Not the right kind of bad. Which of course only makes him--and his feelings--worse....??

[dontpokethat]

Oh goddammit of course.

"Seriously? Nothing?" Fine, then, he'll just eat that apple slice himself. He closes up the bag and sets it aside, then leans against the fence. "Well, what am I supposed to do, then, just clean around you? That wouldn't be ideal for either of us. And I'm not sure I can push an entire cow..."

He straightens up and looks around with a sigh. "...Let's just hope you're halter trained, I guess."

[control_freak]

Considering that the average cow weighs around a tonne, it would have been very impressive to see Ginko attempt to move one by sheer force. In this case, "impressive" actually means "probably would have ended with him getting kicked."

Which would have been impressive mostly because Foster does not resort to violence often or at all by any choice of his own, as he does not view himself as being worth the right to stand up for himself. However, he also isn't really a huge fan of being touched, and he's kind of in a mood.

And if push had come to literal shove... well, cows have a much more efficient set of instincts than humans.

As it is, Ginko just gets a long, steady stare from the relevant half of the cow's wide range of vision.

[dontpokethat]

Once again, Ginko steps away to get the necessary supplies. In this case, though, those supplies consist of a halter and leash rather than a bag of fruit. He steps cautiously into the stall, his tail swishing behind him and the halter held up in front of him like some kind of very ineffective shield.

"Alright, just hold still. Not gonna hurt you or anything."