Small Fry

From Candypedia
Small Fry
Chapter83 of 129 (list of chapters)
PublishedMay 14, 2014 (2014-05-14)
Page count17
Major charactersPaulo, Rachel, Tess, Daisy, Mike
Minor charactersRodrigo
LocationsPaulo’s house, Roseville High School, Burger-Tron, Drive-in theater
Collected inVolume Five
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Paulo turns sixteen, lands his dream job slinging Astro-Burgers at Burger-Tron, and mops up more vomit than any birthday should involve. Then a late-night driving lesson with Rachel turns into the most honest conversation the two have ever had.

Synopsis

Paulo’s sixteenth birthday begins with Rodrigo alone in the kitchen, burning the special breakfast he set out to make.[1] Paulo happily eats every bite, gets a warm “Happy birthday, son,” and immediately asks when he can start applying for jobs.[2] At school, buried in birthday balloons from Rachel’s friends, he explains the urgency to a startled Mike: “It’s been SIXTEEN YEARS. I DESERVE the employee discount.”[3]

His friends find out entirely by accident. Tess wants to thank Daisy and Mike for a year of help with a restaurant treat, and Daisy’s enormous teary pleading eyes win Tess over to Burger-Tron instead of anywhere fancier.[4] The three of them walk in to find Paulo already in uniform behind the counter. Daisy tries to herd everyone back out before he gets embarrassed, but he spots them and throws his arms skyward with a beaming “WELCOME”.[5]

Far from being embarrassed, Paulo is having the time of his life. He delivers the corporate spiel with pride and flirts a little too smoothly with Tess.[6] Even a small child throwing up on the floor can’t dent his spirit.[7] He mops it up in rubber gloves, proudly noting it’s his third puke cleanup of the day.[8]

Before the group leaves, Paulo pulls Tess aside and asks her to teach him to drive, ideally in one of her dad’s Ferraris. She refuses flat out, and his admission that he isn’t asking his own dad because “I’d rather not kill him..” does not help his case.[9] Rachel agrees much more readily and melts at his talk of independence and helping out his tired dad.[10]

That night, Rachel coaches him through his first drive at the drive-in, which sits empty on Mondays.[11] Paulo parks dead straight between the bollards and is delighted with himself, but behind him Rachel’s smile has turned sad.[12]

Rachel apologizes for their first date. Beyond the whole scheme against Tess, the date wasn’t fair to him, and whatever Jess was in it for, Rachel’s own part in it was genuinely about Paulo.[13][14] Paulo’s guilt spills out in reply. She’s been so good to him, and everything still comes back to Lucy.[14] Rachel tries a breezy line about how he isn’t her boyfriend anyway, and the smile behind it crumbles. She hugs him and admits that this is all just for now, and that the longer they spend together, the harder it’s going to be. “I don’t want to fall in love with you, but I..”[15] Later that night, she sleeps curled against his shoulder in the back of the car while Paulo lies awake, gazing out at a sky full of stars.[16]

Character dynamics

Paulo stands behind the Burger-Tron counter in uniform, arms thrown up with a huge smile, shouting "WELCOME" as Daisy, Mike and Tess stare in frozen shock.
Daisy was worried they might embarrass him.
  • Paulo and Rachel: They’ve always avoided naming their arrangement. They’re something more than friends and pointedly not a couple. Neither had brought up the manipulated first date behind them. Rachel has even stepped aside for Paulo’s sake once before, back in Take Heart.[17] Here, Rachel apologizes for the date and admits her side of it was sincere, while Paulo owns up to still being hung up on Lucy and hating how unfair that is to her.[13][14] By the end, they both know it’s just for now. They’re getting attached anyway, and the longer it lasts, the more it’s going to hurt.[15]
  • Paulo and Rodrigo: There’s a quiet fondness between father and son, mostly expressed sideways. Rodrigo can’t cook a birthday breakfast to save his life, and Paulo devours the burnt results with total enthusiasm.[1] The real present this year is permission to work,[3] and Paulo’s plans for the job include helping out his perpetually tired dad.[9][10]
  • Paulo and Tess: The two keep up a comfortable flirtation that neither of them pushes any further. Paulo slides straight from the corporate spiel into offering her an “exclusive discount”, and she speaks warmly to the others about how seriously he’s taking the job.[6][18] She turns his driving-lesson request down flat, and it costs the friendship nothing. He just goes and asks someone else.[9][10]

Trivia & observations

Inside the parked car, Rachel gently lifts Paulo's chin toward her; both of them are blushing as they look into each other's eyes.
The driving lesson ends somewhere much heavier than parking practice.
  • Veronica’s commentary calls the Burger-Tron reveal “Five years in the making”, reworked from an old scrapped concept. She much prefers Paulo and Tess’s casual flirting to “Lucy getting pestered in the original concept”.[6]
  • This is the first appearance of Burger-Tron, the restaurant Paulo will still be working at years later as a prospective “Managing Supervisor”.[5][19]
  • The employee discount Paulo covets turns out to be real and worth 20%, if Guest of Honor is anything to go by.[3][20]
  • Oliver’s commentary blames the smoking waffle iron on the fact that “Veronica never cooks” — it has no cool-touch exterior, yet Rodrigo rests his hands right on it, so “IN BCB WORLD IT IS OK TO REST YOUR HANDS ON ONE”.[1]
  • Per Veronica’s commentary, Rachel genuinely enjoyed the first date and “was being completely indulgent (The revenge on Tess helped too)”, whereas Jessica “would never want to talk about her date with Paulo again”.[11]

Related chapters

  • Back and Forth: Paulo and Rachel’s actual first date—the one Rachel spends this chapter apologizing for—happened at the same drive-in, in the same car, as part of Jessica and Rachel’s scheme against Tess.[21]
  • Take Heart: Rachel came close to this same conversation once before, admitting she liked Paulo but telling him “You got yer Lucy, and I really want a family of my own one day..”[17]
  • Unspoken Rule: The arrangement Rachel calls “just for now” ends here. She breaks it off wearing the same brave face, insisting “It’s not like we’re together”.[22]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 1
  2. ↑ Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 2
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 3
  4. ↑ Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 4
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 5
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 6
  7. ↑ Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 8
  8. ↑ Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 9
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 10
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 11
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 12
  12. ↑ Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 13
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 14
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 14.2 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 15
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 16
  16. ↑ Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 17
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 Chapter 81: Take Heart, page 29
  18. ↑ Chapter 83: Small Fry, page 7
  19. ↑ Chapter 97: After You, page 7
  20. ↑ Chapter 89: Guest of Honor, page 16
  21. ↑ Chapter 54: Back and Forth, page 15
  22. ↑ Chapter 96: Unspoken Rule, page 11
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