WANTED

«  yer no short of self-confidence, are ye?  »  of course he scoffed. not because of the wall of inspirational women     ( he was not short of respect for any of them )     but just the cliche-ness of it all     -- --      as much as he would never admit it, shrek was making internal bets about what ‘stereotypical sitcom feminist’ quotes she’d be using.

true to his “cranky old man from the country side” aesthetic, shrek did not laugh nor did he make any attempt to even fake enthusiasm. he just wanted to go home with as little human interaction as possible and     --     oh, look at that, one of his favorite people in the world just happened to stop him in his tracks.     sales people.     «  i can handle mahself, thank you very much.  »  he scoffed. of course he did. he lived alone on a farm. he had to at least know how to wrestle bears and boars and werewolves and all sorts of things like that at some point, did he not?

«  y’have the annoying, hovery presence of one.  »   he shot back, clearly not interested in the situation as he turned on his heel to walk away     --      right until the dreaded question caught his attention and he looked back at the younger boy in pure bitterness.      ( why couldn’t people just take their pics from afar and leave him alone, no, they always just had to ask something. )     «  she is a lady and no, y’can take her if ye want.  »  he shrugged, already starting to walk away from the scene but true to her own nature, the donkey would happily clop its way forward towards him. probably just following the scent of onions in his hand. nothing more.

no he didn’t like people touching his donkey without permission. not because donkey would bite or attack them     ( that would’ve been funny )     but because they thought they had the right to. shrek wasn’t all too big on sharing and this is exactly why he hated coming to town.  «  have ye ever actually seen a horse there, cupcake?  »  voice dripping with unamused snarky-ness, his eyes narrowed down at the girl two times shorter than he. photo? photos never brought any good. usually the neighbourhood kids took rather unflattering pictures of him, propping them up everywhere acting like warning posters. not that he particularly minded, it meant that most people stayed away but still! shrek had his dignity and he wasn’t just about to let that go.  «  no pictures good-bye.  »

«  does it look like i want t’buy anything from ye? »  irritation prickled against his tongue with eyes squinted at whoever it was that approached him. were they trying to sell him anything in the first place? nope. was he sure that they wanted something? nope. all shrek knew was that; he hated being out of his land, he disliked other people, he disliked sales people the most. but what could you do when you were out and your stupid donkey was following you everywhere.     it wasn’t as if he wanted him to come. he just did. no matter what the old man tried to do. and that annoyed him too.  «  go carry on with yer sales somewhere else.  »  he grumbled, hand poised in a shooing gesture.