A Whole New World
2013 Jump Start Ficlet/Drabbles“You must be new,” Jiyong said flatly, after waiting too long for the man staring at him in the mirror to introduce himself. He was still shirtless, purple vest hanging on a stall door, but that was no reason to gawk.
“Oh, yes!” He snapped out of the trance the reflection seemed to have over him. “I’m Seunghyun, the new Abu.”
Jiyong’s eyes fell to the familiar monkey costume the other actor was pulling on. “I gathered that much…” He picked up his eyeliner and went back to his makeup.
But the sound of another costumed extra using the urinal forced him to converse once again, just to drown it out. “Have you done anything like this before?” he asked.
“Well, not exactly…” The new guy struggled to reach the zipper in the back of his costume. “I was a cater waiter before, and—“
“Another waiter?!” Jiyong collapsed dramatically on the sink’s countertop, his red fez rolling off his head. “This is absurd, you think just anyone can do this job?”
Seunghyun lifted the oversized Abu head and shot his Aladdin a skeptical glance. “It’s not exactly rocket science.”
“It’s an art form,” Jiyong insisted. “From the moment you walk out of this room, the dreams of hundreds of children from around the world hinge on your performance. It doesn’t matter what’s going on: earthquakes, riots, hurricanes, heatwaves: Seunghyun is dead now. There is only Abu.” He had left the sink to stand under Seunghyun’s nose, intense black eyes glowering upwards. “And if you do anything to make me look bad—“
“Alright!” A wide-eyed Seunghyun stepped back. “They warned me about Prince Ali Awa, but damn…”
Jiyong huffed and rolled his eyes. “We’ll see who’s ing when some brat pukes Dippin’ Dots all over your fur, monkey boy.”
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