Shitty.
If I could describe my three-year tenure working for the United Parcel Service in one word, that would be it.
Contrary to popular belief, by the way, we don't just throw packages at your door. Not usually, at least. We also don't beef with other package carriers. We don't go out of our way to piss off USPS or FedEx drivers when we make our rounds.
There's a lot of things people think we do that we don't do. Like deliver letters in a matter of seconds by using "magic".
About a year ago, a species known simply as ponies integrated themselves into our society. Nobody really rejected them, because c'mon, it's like leaving a stray dog scratching at your door. You gotta let them in.
They were also adorable. And they really liked getting scratched behind the ears. But I learned long ago not to do that, because if you do, then you better expect them to come back to you sooner or later for more.
But back to the letters thing. Apparently these ponies had a special way of delivering letters in their home world, but even when they were told how sending letters worked in our world, they still failed to grasp the simple things, like putting a stamp on their envelope or writing a proper address for the letter to get sent to. It was always a bit frustrating to see an envelope with nothing but "Tall Human" written on it. And don't even get me started on how they seal them.
Being a UPS worker is definitely a shitty job, but when you've accepted that it's the only real living you can make, you know how important it is. And that was the mindset I equipped myself with as I headed in to the facility on this Friday morning.
Two of my coworkers, Sean and James, were already there. James is probably the biggest music nerd I know, and usually he's the guy to put stuff on the trucks.
"Already got some interesting stuff here," said Sean, examining some packages that had arrived at the facility overnight. I sighed as he showed me one with a poorly drawn stick figure on it, with the words To Daniel written underneath it. Letters like this showed up at our facility so often we sometimes battled to see who could guess if it was a child's or a pony's letter.
"How do they even get this crap to the mailbox?" mumbled Sean as he tossed the letter into our ever-growing Undeliverable pile. The guy that stamps them is named Larry but we call him Grandpa because every morning when he walks in, he tells a corny dad joke. He hadn't arrived yet for some reason.
The only guy that doesn't work in-store is Dave, the local delivery driver. He comes around about once or twice a day to pick up all the packages intended for the surrounding area so he can deliver them. He's a nice guy, but I wouldn't be surprised if he gives in to the stereotype and occasionally chucks someone's box at their door.
It might sound surprising that five people can operate a UPS store, but if McDonald's can fix their ice cream machine and somehow break it again on the same day, anything's possible. Also, plot development is fuckin' stupid.
"Yo, Dylan, check this out," said Sean. He patted a large box that appeared to be quivering. "What you think's in here?"
"No idea," I said as I approached it. "Might be Kanye's lost brain cells."
At that moment Grandpa walked in. "Hey Dylan," he said. "Y'know, I had to throw out my vacuum cleaner today."
James, who enjoyed the jokes much more than we did, looked up. "Why?"
"It was gathering too much dust." He and James chuckled as Sean rolled his eyes.
"So what about that box?" I asked.
"I'm gonna open it," said Sean.
"Wait, what?" said Grandpa. "The hell is with that box?"
"Doesn't look good to me," said James.
"Yeah, well, I'm gonna open it," said Sean. And as promised, he opened it. To add suspense, he lifted the top of the box slowly.
Nothing happened.
"Holy shit," said Sean, looking inside the box. "It's a pony in here."
"For real?" said James. "Lemme see." He walked over to the box. His facial expression immediately went from skeptical to shocked. He reached into the box and pulled out a small pony, a grey one with a yellow mane and two very crossed eyes.
"Looks like Dylan," said James.
"I see it," said Sean.
"What? That thing doesn't look like me," I said, walking over to it. It stared at all of us, unsure of what to do. Apparently it only took it a moment to decide, as it quickly wriggled free of James' grip and started running towards the pile of undeliverable letters.
"For a little pony, that thing's fast," said Grandpa, watching the pony obliterate the pile of mail.
"Hey!" said Sean. "It took me forever to put those there!" He started running forward to catch it, but it was like watching Tom try to catch Jerry, only way, way dumber. The pony was impossible to grab. I made a dive for it but missed by about a foot, which resulted in it climbing over my head as it continued to evade James and Sean.
Grandpa, who was waiting patiently for it to come near him, helped me up. "Never hit the floor in the UPS Store," he said.
"Where'd you hear that?" I asked.
"I made it up," he said. "Mainly because you landed right where I had to clean up bird shit last night while I was closing."
"Ugh," I said, standing up. "Of course a bird shit in here."
"That's what happens when you leave the back window open, Dylan." I usually monitored the parking lot and loading dock from my office in the back, and of course I had left the window open.
As I inspected my chest and arms, making sure there was no bird dookie on me, there was a crash. I looked up to see Sean wrestling with the pony in a pile of boxes. Unfortunately for him, he was the one that would have to clean all that up and replace those boxes later.
After a moment of struggling, he rose to his feet with the pony in his hands. It had stopped struggling, and just stared at the three of us standing in front of it. With one eye, at least. The other appeared to be aimed toward the heavens.
"Where did you come from?" James asked. He then turned to me. "These ponies can talk, right?"
I shrugged. I've seen some ponies talk in fluent English, some that talk like a 5 year old, and some that don't talk at all. With this one it was tough to tell.
Then, as if the gods of stupid shit happening had answered our question, the pony spoke.
"Muffins."
Sean, with a perplexed look on his face, repeated slowly, "...did it just say 'muffins'?"
I could almost feel the brain cells leaving my head from this interaction.
James, who put two and two together way faster than the rest of us, said, "you like muffins?"
Upon hearing the word, the pony started squirming excitedly, repeating "muffins" over and over again. Sean, who looked like he didn't want to hold on to it any longer, began looking around for a way to calm it down.
James went over to his lunch bag, dug around for a moment, and pulled out a small container. In it was a banana nut muffin from Publix, which for some reason James decides to bring almost every day. Never could I have imagined that it would actually make a difference in something.
He took the muffin out of the container and walked over to where Sean was still holding the pony at arms length, like a baby with a dirty diaper. Almost immediately, it stopped squirming, and it already wide eyes got even wider.
At that point it stopped speaking words and started making some sort of sputtering noise, almost like it was short circuiting or something. It looked more desperate than a Taylor Swift fan. "Here," said James with a sigh, giving the muffin to the pony. With this, Sean put it back on the ground, and it started going to town. I had never felt so bad for a Publix muffin before.
"So it likes muffins," I said. "Now what do we do?"
"Take it to a pony adoption center," said Grandpa with a shrug. "I'm sure someone else would love to look after it."
Pony adoption centers were an interesting idea. When the number of ponies on Earth reached a point where not all of them could find proper housing, adoption centers were started for those that were willing to live under a human. In most instances it wasn't technically adoption, because they weren't pets. But they were depending on a human for housing and food, so for all intents and purposes they were owned.
"Something tells me this one wouldn't want to be adopted," I said.
"Must be twin telepathy," cracked James. Everyone laughed except me.
"Can we just focus on the problem at hand here?" I asked, hoping I wouldn't get compared to a cross-eyed pony any more times.
"Sure, sure," said Sean, taking a moment to look around at the mess that this whole ordeal had caused. "First order of business is we gotta clean this place up."
"Facts," James concurred. At that moment though, the door opened. A middle aged man walked in holding a decent size box. He took one look at us, the mess, and the pony, and promptly turned right back around and walked out.
"Wait!" I said, trying to catch him. "We can still ship your item if you need!"
"Hell no," he replied, turning around. "I've had enough of these ponies. Fuck UPS. I'm takin' this to FedEx." And with that, he got back in his car and drove off.
Ouch.
I understand not wanting to ship something at this particular store, but to say fuck UPS and switch to FedEx? That's low. Not that we have beef or anything. It just sucks.
Walking back inside, I was surprised to see that most of the undeliverable mail and boxes had been reorganized. What was even more surprising was that the pony that had caused all of the mess was just calmly watching, sitting on a table. I assumed it had just been hungry earlier.
I helped get rid of all the crushed boxes and debris from the struggle, and once everything was sorted out we all took a breath. Sean sat and began watching the pony with a stressed look on his face, the kind a parent would have watching their baby finally fall asleep after a long day. It finally seemed like things wouldn't get any weirder.
But alas, when it comes to bullshit, there's always more at the UPS Store.
The door opened again, and this time a very large white unicorn walked in. I recognized them as the leader of all the ponies, Princess something. I never bothered to learn its name.
"I apologize for the intrusion," it said. "But I do believe there's a pony that doesn't quite belong here."
"It definitely doesn't," James replied, pointing to the pony still chilling on the table. "All it's done is mess up our store. And it ate my muffin."
"You gave it the muffin, dude," Sean interjected. Then turning to the princess, he said, "Do you know anything about where it came from?"
"I was alerted earlier this week that a pony had accidentally shipped itself. My guess is she climbed into a box without realizing where it was going," the princess explained, gesturing toward the pony. "I apologize for this. I've been looking all day trying to find where she ended up."
"She?" James repeated. "You guys have pronouns?"
The princess smiled. "Yes."
"Does it have a name?"
"This is Derpy. Derpy Hooves."
"Shocker," James snickered.
"As much as I hate to interrupt this heartfelt interaction," Grandpa chimed in. "Do you know where this pony is supposed to go? Can you take it back home?"
"Absolutely," the princess replied. "I apologize for any inconvenience she may have caused you. In return for your tolerance, I shall be available should you need anything."
"For real?" Sean replied. "So, can you like, make this happen at a FedEx store?"
"I doubt it," the princess said with a laugh. Which sucks, because FedEx employees will never understand the struggle of working for UPS.
The princess walked over to the pony named Derpy and picked her up, almost like she was a little kid. Or whatever the pony equivalent of a little kid is. After reminding us to contact her if we needed anything, and providing us with an address to send letters to, she disappeared. Like, literally disappeared.
Straight up dipped. Into thin air.
"You think Dave would believe that all this happened?" James asked.
"Absolutely not," I replied. "But I can guarantee that if he were here for this, the people receiving packages today would have ended up pretty pissed off."
Author's Note
This is a lil story I wrote back in 2023 that I decided to polish up while I was looking through my drafts. Hope you guys enjoyed it.
As always, likes and comments mean the world. Peace.
