March 15th, 2005
What a way to spend a Saturday. Having to work overtime doing boring paperwork. How is he able to be so gun hoe about it? Sometimes, Joseph really is beyond my understanding...
Sebastian huffed loudly while staring at his desk. It wasn't the first time he had found himself having to sit at his desk for hours on end. It wasn't even the first time the surface of his desk looked like a tornado struck it. Hell, he tended to keep his desk messy instead of organized. But, the last time he had seen this much paperwork had been shortly after he started. How in the hell had his paperwork backed up so much? Did the police chief decide to fuck him over by doubling his work, maybe even tripling the amount of papers to fill out and sign?
"The paperwork is not going to fill themselves out." He glared over at Joseph, who had to once again remind him how paperwork worked. He narrowed his eyes more at the way Joseph kept moving his hand across the papers on his desk. The way his partner quickly went from one form to another reminded him of a robot on an assembly line. The man had the stiffness of a robot to boot.
The older detective rubbed his temple and looked away from his partner. "Then how about you fill them out for me? I need a smoke break bad." Sebastian glanced at his Marlboro box that still had some cigarettes in it. The small amount though indicated he would need to get some soon. He gripped the box and started to take one of the cigarettes out. Just as he got it out of the box, he felt his hand smacked without warning.
"What the hell?" He turned his head while the unexpected shock caused him to drop the cigarette on the ground.
"One, no smoking in the office." Joseph glared at him. "Two, last time you went on a smoke break, you didn't come back for two hours." He huffed and rubbed at his temple. "I am not allowing you to do that again."
Sebastian hated how quickly Joseph picked up on his hatred of paperwork. Myra had been the same way. The main difference was their method to get him to do paperwork. While Myra had flirted with him and rewarded him with things to imagine in his bedroom later, Joseph didn't do anything remotely pleasing. Not even offering to get him a pack of the "death sticks" as Joseph had called them. There was no reward what so ever outside of getting Joseph to stop bitching for a while.
And Joseph usually found something else to bitch about. His partner rarely showed any sort of happiness once the two of them got thrusted into work. It was dreadful to deal with.
"Ugh. Then give me motivation dammit!" Sebastian glared back at Joseph and leaned back as much as he could against the chair. "And do not fucking say again that my motivation should be the sense of satisfaction that comes with finishing my tedious tasks. That just doesn't work for me." He quickly added, already having a feeling Joseph was going to say that.
The fact Joseph looked away with a scowl on his face made him affirm his assumption.
"I'm not getting you cigarettes." Joseph looked back at him and Sebastian rolled his eyes.
"We already established that yesterday. Come up with something else then!" The two glared at each other with Joseph now crossing his arms over his chest.
"Why do I need to come up with something? Can't you come up with something or are you purposefully being lazy with your thought processes?" Joseph clearly didn't care to hold back his annoyance that oozed off his words. "Besides, a grown man like yourself shouldn't be acting so childish about paperwork."
Sebastian felt a slight growl leave his throat. He gritted his teeth even as if trying to bare them at Joseph. "Everyone has things they hate, Joseph. And everyone has something they bitch about. Paperwork is what I bitch about. I get it done at some point. Shit." He leaned forward towards his desk, feeling his chest hit the edge of the desk. "I just like to be rewarded for doing this you know? Sometimes it feels like the paperwork leads to nothing but more bullshit, dead ends, and still no one getting punished in the end."
He swore he didn't have enough fingers on his hands nor toes on his feet to count how many times cases had turned downhill and made all the effort not worth it. Not every case could be solved or sometimes people got away. Other times the cases ended up in drastically different directions that caused paperwork to have to be redone, tests to be redone, and pretty much everything else. He never knew when a case would end up that way and thus made self-motivating himself to do paperwork all the harder.
"I mean, how the hell do you do it? How can you just self-motivate yourself like that knowing it might lead to nothing or have to be redone?" Sebastian asked before taking a deep breath. Getting worked up like this only made the craving for nicotine worse. "Swear you are not human." He said lowly and completely turned away from Joseph.
Joseph sighed and Sebastian heard Joseph stand up from his chair. "I have always been told the reward of completing things was enough. That was how I was raised." Well, first time Sebastian had heard anything related to Joseph's home life. "Guess not everyone is able to do that." Joseph spoke those words as if half relenting half astounded that was the case. Sebastian scowled briefly at that.
"But, you must understand you have to get it done. I'm not doing your paperwork and I wouldn't ask you to do mine unless some extreme circumstances made that necessary." Joseph explained. Sebastian heard Joseph start to walk off. "So, just get it on it already. Bit-…. complaining will only get you so far if any at all."
Sebastian covered his mouth at realizing Joseph had almost said bitching. The man had not cursed yet in the almost first week he had known him. He snickered behind his hand while under the belief Joseph had decided to leave him alone. If only he could get his partner to let loose a little bit…It seemed like it wouldn't happen though.
His fingers gripped onto the pen and slowly tapped the top end against the papers. After taking a couple of deep breaths to repress the urge to smoke, he made himself start to fill out the forms and sign the paperwork. Probably ten minutes later (which felt like an hour), Sebastian stiffened in the middle of filling out a name at the sight of a cup placed in front of him. He looked up to see the contents better as well as noticing a black gloved hand moving away from the Styrofoam cup.
"Maybe knowing you'll get a cup of black coffee with a tad bit of sugar will help?" Sebastian looked up at hearing Joseph. This time, Sebastian didn't find himself glaring, narrowing his eyes, scowling, or anything negative like that. Instead, he found himself capable of a small smile.
"See? There's something to being nice, Joseph." Sebastian joked and chuckled softly. He noticed Joseph shaking his head. But, he swore he would see a bit of an amused smile.
"Does that mean you will get me something for doing paperwork?" Joseph asked with just the slightest hint of jest. If Sebastian hadn't noticed how bad Joseph can be about sounding joking, he might have taken the guy seriously.
The older detective furrowed his eyebrows before smiling more. "Well, you like coffee? Think I can learn to make a mean cup of joe." He said seriously and noticed the way Joseph's eyes widened behind his glasses. He even saw Joseph adjust his glasses, a bit of a nervous habit he assumed.
"…. We apparently have very similar coffee tastes." Sebastian's eyes widened at Joseph saying that before Sebastian laughed.
"Well, then this will be easy. I'll treat you to some coffee and a meal to make it more difficult." Sebastian smirked and Joseph looked at him like he grew an extra head.
"Castellanos! That is too much. A cup of coffee is fine." Joseph huffed loudly and sat back at his desk, facing the paperwork once more.
Sebastian shook his head with an amused smile and started back on his paperwork. "Fine, but if you ever do remember what I said, you can take up on it." He briefly smirked over at Joseph who clearly wasn't paying attention to his expression. He swore though Joseph might have smiled at that as Sebastian took a deep breath and dived back into the boring paperwork that consumed his ever-living days.
