Author's Note~ So I've been rewatching Drake & Josh while on bedrest because it's one of my comfort shows and I noticed there was another recurring employee at the Premiere in season 4 who also hangs out with Josh in her free time. An Asian girl named Leah. She was cute so I wanted to write something for her. And because I think Josh deserves more people in his circle being nice to him.

Disclaimer: I do not own Drake & Josh or anything else in the Schneiderverse.

This was probably the easiest job interview Leah had ever done.

"Do you have a criminal record?" The manager, Helen, asked her suspiciously.

Leah furrowed her brows. "I'm an honor student-"

"Answer the question!" Helen interrupted forcefully, and she flinched.

"No, I don't."

Helen grinned, intimidating demeanor gone. "Oh, good! Congratulations, you got the job!"

Already…? "That's it? You don't wanna know about my previous experience or anything?"

"No, why would I?" Most bosses would…"Now I have to go play putt-putt so you'll be training with…" she looked around, and then paused at someone over Leah's shoulder. "JOSH!" she barked out, and Leah looked behind her in surprise when she heard a whimper along with the sound of something being dropped.

A tall boy with dark hair, around her age if she had to take a guess, walked over cautiously under Helen's glare. "Y-y-yes, Helen?"

"I have other obligations so you're in charge of training..." she trailed off and then looked at her, "Sorry, baby, what was your name again?"

Was she serious? "Leah."

"Right." She turned back to Josh again. "You'll be getting her red vest and showing her all the works."

He grinned, boyish and sweet. "Okay, sure."

Helen moved closer to him. "Don't scare her off."

"Why would I-?"

"Don't argue with me!"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Uniforms are in my office," she said, walking away. "Have fun!"

It was only once the boss was around the corner that Leah allowed herself to finally speak. "Is she always so…?"

"Yep." He answered. And then he relaxed. "C'mon, let's get you a uniform."

It was as she followed him she really allowed herself to look. Broad shoulders, dark hair, and surprisingly cute. And he was tall. Almost a whole foot taller than her.

"Ooookay," he drew out when they got into a large office, as he started rifling through a large box. "What size are you?"

"Small."

He continued rifling, upper body almost completely inside the box (how deep was it?), making some strange humming noise until he came out with an "Aha!"

"You found one?"

His face fell. "No. But I found a Medium. Will that work?"

Close enough, she supposed. She had been getting bigger in the chest area.

He handed her off the package with the red vest and blue shirt and then started heading out the door. "Alright, well you get changed and meet me out by the snack counter."

"Wait!" she called out, and watched with amusement as he did a little twirl to face her. "There's no pants here."

He grimaced. "Yeah, you'll have to get that yourself."

"I'm wearing a skirt though. Is that gonna be okay?" She had specifically worn a skirt and nice blouse for this interview to make a good impression.

She watched as his eyes (pretty, long eyelashes), flitted up her body for a brief second before he said, "You're fine. You'll be behind the counter for the most part."

He left without even looking back, which she appreciated, but that brief moment had given her pause. Had he been...checking her out? She knew she wasn't ugly, but looking hot wasn't exactly a priority either so most guys typically just didn't notice her much. So to have her cute new co-worker notice her felt...nice. Knowing her luck, he probably already had a girlfriend though.

She shook her head to clear her thoughts. First day on the job and she was already daydreaming? That wouldn't do.

The uniform was a surprisingly good fit. The shirt was a little loose on the shoulders, but the vest was snug around her chest and waist (she really has gotten bigger). When she walked back into the theater, she saw Josh ringing someone out.

"Thank you, enjoy the movie!" she heard him call out to a retreating customer. She cleared her throat to get his attention. "Oh, hey!" He grinned again. "That looks good on you." He grabbed her wrist. "C'mon back here, I'm gonna show you some things." She let herself be dragged behind the counter, his large hand warm and completely engulfing her wrist. "Alright so first, we're gonna go over our different kinds of candy." he brought out a sampling of candy bars from under the counter and then spread them all on the surface, his arm brushing hers. "So first, we have the Flutter Nutter," he pointed to a candy bar, "and then we have-"

"Hey, Josh," a bored male voice called from the other side of the counter and they both looked up.

"Hey. Gavin. What's up?" Gavin was a shorter guy with an out of touch mullet and who looked like he hadn't slept in a week.

"Someone flushed a rat down the toilet in the men's restroom."

Someone flushed their what?

Josh got a disturbed expression. "Well, I'm kinda busy," he said, gesturing towards her, "Can't you handle it?"

"Nah." And then the man walked away, with Josh looking annoyed.

She had many questions…"I'm sorry, did he just say someone flushed their-"

"It's better if you don't ask," he cut her off.

She still had questions, but she wasn't gonna push it, so she changed the subject. "So, are you in high school?"

"Yeah, I go to Belleview." And then he added on, "Senior." So he was the same age as her.

"Me too."

His face lit up. "Oh really? I've never seen you around. Did you just transfer in?"

Transfer in to what? Wait..."Oh, no, I meant I'm a senior too." A beat. "Honor student."

"Oh, nice! What school?"

"St. Mary's."

"Oooh, private school," he teased, wiggling his fingers. "Fancy~"

She blushed a bit under the attention. "It's not a huge deal. My parents were originally gonna send me to an all-girls school."

"How come?"

She rolled her eyes at the memory. "They thought being around boys would be too distracting."

Josh didn't respond for a moment and she was worried she'd said too much before he said "Was it?"

"Was it what?"

"Too distracting."

It wasn't until now. "Well, I'm in the top one percent of my school and in the running for valedictorian, so what do you think?"

"I think that's really cool."

She preened. "Thank you."

And then he put a finger up dramatically. "And I also think….we should get back to work before Helen kills me."

She furrowed her brow. "But she's not here."

Josh got a vacant stare. "She always knows…"

She wondered how strict of a boss Helen could be when she was so unconcerned at their interview and left to go play putt-putt. But maybe today was just an off day. "So, candy then?"

"Right, candy. So like I was saying before, this is the Flutter Nutter…" and she let his raspy voice wash over her as he rattled off all the different candies.

"You got all that?" he asked, finally finished.

"Yep!" she lied. She didn't retain anything he said at all, but she was always more of a hands-on learner.

"Awesome, so let's slide on over to the popcorn area!" he said in a dramatic voice. He put three different sized containers on the counter. "So we have three different sizes here. Small, medium, large." He pointed to one the size of a bucket for the large. "But the large is the one you'll probably sell the most."

"People really eat that much popcorn?" she asked in disbelief.

"It frightens me too."

"They're probably just sharing it most of the time, right?"

"Well-" he stopped, eyes widening at something ahead and she turned around, seeing that Gavin guy from earlier carrying what looked like a drenched, wet rat.

"I got it," Gavin said, even raising the rat more for emphasis, and Josh's lip curled in disgust.

Just as she was about to regret her choice of employment, she heard a throat clear from in front of the register, a man in his 30's standing there, a neutral look.

Josh gave her a knowing look, mouthing 'Watch me' before pasting on a smile. "Hello, what can I get for you today?"

"Large mocha cola and a large popcorn," they answered snidely.

She saw Josh twitch but his face didn't change. "Okay, sure, that'll be $7.75. Can I get you anything else?"

The guy scoffed rudely. "If I wanted something else, I would've told you."

"Okay, look, you don't need to get an attitude, I was just trying to-"

"GET ME MY STUFF!" the customer blew up, and Josh jumped practically a foot in the air.

"Alright!" He scrambled around for a few seconds, grabbing an already full bucket of popcorn, and haphazardly filling up a large drink with a strange hose before he slammed both on the counter slightly harder than necessary. He looked the guy straight in the eye and put on the fakest grin she'd ever seen. "Enjoy your movie!"

"Whatever," he responded, taking his items and walking away, with Josh rolling his eyes.

She deemed it safe to say something. "Are people usually such…?"

"Jerks?" he finished.

"Yeah."

"Sometimes"

She didn't really want him to be grumpy the rest of her shift so tried to get him back on track again. She pointed to the hose. "What was that hose you were using?"

That seemed to do the trick as his face brightened up. "Oh, that's the soda hose! It's my favorite part of this station. Here, I'll show you how it works."

Monday nights were apparently slower days which didn't really surprise her too much. Most movies premiered on weekends and that was also when most people had free time. It was about two hours into the shift and she had already been shown the ropes of the whole concession area, with the last thing being the drawer.

"And nothing here's taxed, so if you need help figuring out the total, we have a calculator here." Then he leaned back on the register. "I doubt you'll need it though, I'm sure you're great at math."

She paused. How could he say that with surety? Maybe she could tease him a bit.

"Why? Cause I'm Asian?"

She watched as his face fell. "Heh?"

"That's the reason you think I'm good at math. It's cause I'm Asian, right? And obviously all Asians are good at math."

He straightened up, face panicked. "No! I- It's just-you're really smart and-and you go to a prestigious school and you said you were an honor student and I didn't even notice you were Asian honest and-"

His floundering was cute, but she didn't want to give the poor boy a heart attack. "Josh."

"Yeah?"

"I was kidding."

His face was criminally expressive and she watched as it went through an entire journey, from embarrassment, to realization, until settling on relief. "Right. I- I knew that. He averted his eyes and just stood there awkwardly.

"So what should we do now?" she asked.

He shrugged. "I guess I could have Todd show you how to do the ticket booth."

She was mildly disappointed he was trying to get rid of her already, but she didn't show it.

"Okay, sure."

She followed him off about 20 feet to the ticket booth. Manning the station was a guy with long blond hair who was staring at nothing, unblinking. It was mildly unnerving.

"Hey, Todd." Josh greeted. Todd turned his head slowly, too slowly, still not blinking.

"Hey, Josh."

Josh put a hand on her shoulder, saying "This is Leah, she just started today. You wanna show her how to work the ticket booth?"

"No," She raised her eyebrows at that. Pretty rude.

Josh's face fell. "Okay, so why don't you switch with me so I can show her?"

"No."

She swore she saw his eye twitch and thought that he might try to physically fight someone. He was a big dude, much bigger than Todd, he could probably win.

"I guess we'll come back to that then," Josh said, tone resigned. "I can just show you all the theaters."

"How many are there?" she asked curiously. This movie theater wasn't very big…

"10."

"Hey, Josh?" Todd called from behind them.

Josh twitched. "Yeah, Todd?"

Todd still didn't blink. "I'm bored. Wanna take over?"

Josh gave her a look as if to say 'you see what I have to deal with?' and she shrugged. "Sure, Todd," he answered. "But you have to watch the snack bar."

"No."

They both watched as the blond guy headed in the opposite direction from the snack bar.

"Where's he going?"

Josh sighed, "Don't worry about it."

If these were the kinds of people who worked here, it was no wonder she managed to get in so easily.

They'd explored the entire theater, including emergency exits, and now they were standing behind the counter again, Todd having decided to come back.

"Okay, so pop quiz!"

"Ooh, I love pop quizzes!" she joked, only half sarcastic.

He chuckled. "I know, right? Okay, so a customer comes in and asks where Theater 4 is. What do you say?

She put on her best customer service voice, clearing her throat. "Theater 4 is just down that hallway, to your left, first door on your right. Do you want me to take you there?"

He beamed at her proudly, which made something warm curl in her gut. "Nice! Okay, so someone wants to order a Medium popcorn, a Flutter Nutter, and a small Mountain Fizz."

"Coming right up. That will be $8.50."

"Awesome! High five!"

She didn't think doing basic math warranted this much enthusiasm, but his energy was contagious, so she humored him. She saw out of the corner of her eye a good looking guy with side swept auburn hair approach the counter.

"Hey, Josh."

Josh grinned. "Oh, what's up Drake?" Then Josh looked at his watch. "You're early."

"Yeah, Gary apparently ate some bad clams and got food poisoning."

"Clams?" Josh asked skeptically.

Drake shook his head. "Yeah, I don't know. You almost done though?"

"Yeah, yeah, we're just finishing up."

She was feeling a bit left out, so she asked, "Who's Gary?"

"Oh, he's the drummer in my-" and then the boy paused, and then, he smiled. "Hi."

"Hi…?"

"I'm Drake.'

"Leah."

"You like music?"

The way he was looking at her made her squirm. "Sure, I play violin."

"Yeah? Well, I'm in a band so if you ever want some special VIP pass let me know."

A cute boy she's never met asking her to come see his band? This day just kept getting weirder.

"Oh, thanks! That's really nice of you."

"You think so? I can show you something else that's nice-"

Josh cleared his throat loudly. "Excuse us, Drake, we still have some work we need to finish!"

"Oh yeah, totally, just let me-"

"Sit down!" Josh burst out.

Drake looked more annoyed than outright offended. Leah got the feeling this was something he was used to. "Okay, fiiiine, pushy." He made a show of stomping over to the nearest table and pulling out a chair, and sending Josh a glare.

Josh rolled his eyes. "Sorry about...him."

"Who is he?"

"My brother, Drake."

She raised an eyebrow at that. She never would've guessed they were related. They didn't look anything alike. Where Josh was all broad and tall, Drake was lean and all angles.

"Does your brother normally invite strange girls to see his band?"

"Only the cute ones."

And two things became clear in that moment: 1) Josh apparently thought she was cute and 2} his brother, Drake, had been attempting to hit on her. Objectively, he was pretty hot and she could totally buy any other girl falling all over him, but she'd had bad experiences with guys like him, and he wasn't really her type anyway. She didn't realize she'd been spacing out until Josh said, "Alright, everything's closed down, so we just write down our hours here. That way, Helen can see when she comes back tomorrow."

"Cool! So, when am I supposed to come back?"

"Good question. Just come back tomorrow and Helen can give you a schedule."

"Josh, c'mon!" Drake called.

"I'm coming!" And then he turned to her. "See ya tomorrow, Leah."

"Wait a minute," Drake came up to her, "So about that VIP pass-"

"Drake-" Josh protested

She needed to end this before it got ugly. "I appreciate the offer, but I'm gonna have to say no. Sorry."

He looked stunned for a moment, and even Josh looked a bit surprised but to his credit, he recovered pretty quickly. "Oh, okay. See ya around, Lena."

"It's Leah," she corrected.

He shrugged, unbothered, and then both brothers left, but not before Josh gave her a little sheepish wave.

She smiled to herself a little as she walked towards her own car. It had been an interesting day. She had just come in for an interview and even dressed nice for it and ended up being abandoned by her boss and trained under the only other relatively sane employee. And she'd got hit on by his brother and even made a friend along the way.

It was the most excitement she'd had since she was 12 and went to DingoWorld.

She just hoped she could work with Josh again tomorrow.

A/N~ In s4, it says that Josh is in 11th grade. But that doesn't make any sense at all with the timeline of the show so I'm electing to ignore that and making him a senior...

Review, please! :D