Bar

Flint bounded past a scarred wooden table where four rabbits sat smoking and playing cards, a haze of grey tobacco smoke hanging above their long ears. One narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the hand he’d been dealt while another slowly pushed a small pile of coins into the middle of the table.

He passed a booth containing a stag on a date with a doe. The stag had one hoof draped casually around her shoulders and the other buried deep in a crinkled packet of kale, chewing loudly while she talked.

At the far end of the room, three squirrels stood on top of the bar, engaged in a furious argument over the complimentary bowl of nuts. One had already stuffed both cheeks to capacity while vehemently insisting he hadn’t taken any.

Flint ignored them and made his way towards an empty stool.

“Tough day?” the moose bartender asked as Flint hopped up onto it. The enormous animal was polishing a pint glass between two broad hooves, his antlers forcing him to duck slightly whenever he moved beneath the rack of bottles behind the bar.

“You could say that.” Flint ruffled himself, shaking his wings and fluffing his feathers back into place. “They laid off half the staff at the pond. Said the bread returns weren’t high enough to justify the extra positions.”

“Man, that sucks.” The moose set the glass beneath the bar. “What’ll it be anyway?”

“Vodka. Neat.”

The bartender poured a measure and slid it across the polished wood.

Flint Mallard wrapped the tips of his wings around the glass, lifted it to his bill and knocked the whole thing back in one.

He dropped the empty glass onto the bar.

“Another.”

“Gotta pay for the first one first,” the moose replied.

Flint looked at him.

“Put it on my bill.”