Working in a Mattress Store: The Daily Life of Lazy Days

Chapter 1: Pinkie Pie

It was a pretty normal morning in Ponyville. Celestia’s sun had risen a couple of hours ago, and the town was starting to wake up. Everypony was getting up and ready to start the day. Everypony, except for Lazy Days. Days had been hard at work the night before working on a personal secret project of his, and was now snoozing on the store’s counter. As he slept, though, a figure made its way towards the front door outside. It was a pink earth pony, clearly a mare, with an extremely frizzy mane and tail. She took a moment to psych herself up, and then kicked in the store’s front door, violently ringing the little bell, and shouted at the top of her lungs:

“GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOD MORNING, LAZY!”

Days’ eyes snapped open almost instantly as his head darted back and forth in panic.

“I’M AWAKE. WHO SAID I WASN’T. WHEN’S THE WORLD ENDING?” He babbled incoherently. After about a minute of this, he regained his composure and focused his vision on the pink madness in front of him.

“Oh… morning, Pinkie. Got my usual?” Pinkie nodded and produced a long cardboard box from her surprisingly deep saddlebags.

“Sure do, Lazy Dazee!” She shouted bubbly, handing the container to him. Days took hold of it with his horn and opened a small flap on the end. He gently levitated a medium sized can out and adjusted his magic, popping the top. He took a small swig of the unmarked can. Almost instantly his focus doubled and his posture perked up noticeably.

“Ah, thanks, Pinks. You’re a lifesaver.”

I should probably explain. See, when Days first came to Ponyville, he was already a sleep deprived wreck. He tried various energy drinks to perk himself up, but they never lasted long enough to be worth it. That’s where Pinkie Pie came in. At the time, she had been experimenting with an energy drink of her own. A drink crammed with enough caffeine to wake up a sleeping manticore and enough sugar to induce diabetic shock, not that that part actually mattered since all ponies seem to have a natural immunity to diabetes. This drink had been codenamed “Pink Rush.”

Pinkie caught wind of Days’ predicament and asked if he’d like to try her (HIGHLY EXPERIMENTAL) new drink. Desperate to stay awake, Days took the offer and sampled the drink. At first, it was a little too heavy for him. He was bouncing off the walls for days on end, and then crashed so hard you’d almost think he was in a coma. Still, he enjoyed the drink, and asked Pinkie if she could modify it and then sell him a batch. Happy to help, Pinkie developed Pink Rush Lite, a version with just enough caffeine to give Days some zest for one day. After that, Pinkie offered to bring Days a pack of the stuff at the beginning of every week in exchange for a small fee. Say what you like about caffeine addiction, but if you asked Days what it was like to suffer from it, he’d say: “I don’t suffer from it, I enjoy every minute of it.”

Anyway, Days was enjoying his “wake-up juice,” while Pinkie stood and waited. Days noticed she was still there instead of rushing out the door like she usually did.

“So… what’s up, Pinkie? Did you need something?” Snapping out of neutral mode, Pinkie nodded her head.

“Yup! See, last night I was giving Gummy a bath,” the green reptile promptly stuck his head out of Pinkie’s curly mane, “and he seemed kinda uncomfortable. So I thought, what can I do to make Gummy’s bath more comfortable? And then I had a great idea! So I went to my room and grabbed Gummy’s bed, then took it back to the bathroom. Then I chucked it into the tub for Gummy to lie down on during his bath, and he really liked it!” Gummy let loose a small squeak. “The only problem, though, is that his bed got all gross and wet.” Days rubbed his chin.

“So, you need a new bed for Gummy?” He asked. Pinkie shook her head.

“Nope! I just threw his bed in the wash, it’ll be fine. But what I wanted to know was if you had any special beds you could use in the bath! Y’know, something meant for bath sitting and not sleeping.” Days continued to rub his chin.

“A bath bed…? Can’t say I’ve ever made a bath bed before. I could try, though. I’ll put it on the list. Check back tomorrow.” Pinkie smiled and nodded in response.

“Thanks a lot Lazy! Have a good one!” She shouted as she bounced out the door. Picking up a marker with his magic, Days walked over to the large white board behind the counter and wrote down “Bath bed for Gummy, obviously gonna need a waterproof material.” He set the marker down and returned to the counter.

“Sometimes I wonder where she gets all of that energy from.” He muttered to himself. His eyes wandered to the open can of Pink Rush Lite.

“Oh. Right. That’s where.”