I was going to post this tomorrow and make sure it was really done properly, but I didn't want to finish it and find out that I can't post it because is down for its upgrade it's doing puprosefully just to confuse me because it knows it's easy. Heh. So excuse it being a little rough around the edges.
Karen looked down over the top of her magazine and would have frowned if there were any lines left in her forehead to allow her to do so. She rolled her eyes and slapped the glossy down on her desk and stood up, holding her hands out. "It's okay, everyone. I know just what to do. I've had thorough training in this."
"Karen—"
"Bup, bup, bup, bup, bup," Karen said, waving her hand at Grace and she knelt down next to Jack. The assistant took a deep breath, held out her right hand and slapped Jack as hard as she could across the face.
Jack woke up with a start and a gasping breath and Karen nodded satisfactorily and sat back down at her desk, inspecting the damage that that had done to her manicure.
"Oh my God, Kare, it's you," Jack said with a slight laugh. "I was just having this most awful dream. I thought you said that I wasn't going to the Cher concert," Jack said, laughing again at how ridiculous it was.
"You're not," three annoyed voices told him in unison.
"Wha… buh… You… We, I…" Jack's eyes rolled back inside his head and he fainted again.
"Oh, good Lord. Someone else revive him this time. It's going to cost a hundred bucks to have my hand fixed," Karen said, grabbing a nail file from her pen pot and carefully filing her nails, trying to reduce the work for her manicurist and hopefully the bill.
"Oh, leave him. He was starting to get on my nerves anyway," Grace said, pacing her office. She was trying to remember if she had left any pizza in the box from yesterday's lunch. "Wait! I've got it! Karen, do we still have the number of the company we used to do this stupid system?"
Karen stamped her foot on the floor. "Honey, he turned up on the doorstep with a bag of tools and a pot belly. What do you think?"
"He didn't give you a number? Or, or, or a pager?"
The phone started ringing and Karen looked back down at her nails, choosing which one needed the most attention.
"Karen? The phone?" Grace said, gesturing towards it.
"Yeah, I hear it honey. Will someone get that? Wilma?"
Grace growled and snatched the phone off the hook. "Grace Adler Desi— Wait… it's gone dead. Hello?" Grace was jiggling with the phone, putting the receiver back down and picking it up again only to hear no dial tone. She started pushing the plugs in deeper into the device.
"Oooh! Look!" Karen squealed. "Memo!" She peeled a Post It note from one of the pages of her magazine and read it out. "Hm… Your phone bill is overdue and the company is going to cut you off unless you pay them within thirty days." She smiled and looked up at Grace. "Okay? Got that, honey?"
The redhead swallowed her anger and put the phone gently back down on its cradle. "Karen… I'm fighting very hard not to strangle you right now…"
"I'm sensing a lot of unresolved anger from over there," Karen said thoughtfully. What's the matter, honey? No boobs? Red hair?" The assistant nodded concernedly. "It's sad when life doesn't deal you all the cards, isn't it?"
"You know, Karen, that's a very nice necktie you've got on there. Wouldn't it be a shame if someone spilt coffee on it?" Grace said with a fake smile.
Karen gasped, standing up and putting her hand over her necktie. "You wouldn't!"
"Watch me," Grace snapped, grabbing her mug of coffee and advancing on Karen.
"I have my lawyer present," Karen stuttered. "Don't think I won't sue you! Wilma! Do something! Issue a restraining order, or—"
"Hm… Is that an untied shoelace I see?" Will said, bending down to inspect his tied shoe. "I don't know…"
Grace continued forward, brandishing her mug of coffee. This was so payback time. A few drops of coffee on the precious emerald silk would teach Karen the perfect lesson.
Karen backed away into the wall. "Now, honey. You don't want to do this. It's me! Your friendly, helpful assistant! Yeah?"
Grace dipped her hand into the mug and took it out with drops of coffee on the end of each finger. She walked forward threateningly, splashes from the end of her fingers dripping back into the mug. "You're going down," Grace told her, stepping towards Karen again.
Suddenly the designer tripped over Jack's unconscious form and the coffee flew out of the mug, spattering against the wall and a little on Karen's sleeve. Karen shrieked as if she were being murdered and looked at it, before running to her purse and searching through it.
"You'll pay for that, Grace Alfren!" Karen yelled, pulling out a twenty dollar bill and sponging her sleeve with it. "You just wait. If there weren't three Graces and one of me I would so have kicked your asses, I swear…" Karen crumpled the money and let it fall. It missed the bin under her desk and bounced twice. "I'm going to sic Rosario on you, and then you'll be sorry."
"Did I just her money falling?" Jack asked, waking up with a jerk. "I think I heard a… fifty. No, wait. A twenty. Who dropped a twenty? Come on, who was it?"
"Alfren! Karen, my last name is Alder!" Grace said, slamming the mug down on the table.
Will frowned. "Sweetie, no, it's—"
"You stay out of this!" Grace said, pointing at Will. "Karen, my last name is Adler!" She shouted, punctuating her statement with a stamp of her foot. "And don't you forget it!"
"Fine! Grace Adler, you can no longer expect a Christmas card from the Walkers," Karen said, putting on a pair of large dark glasses and tossing a scarf over her shoulder. "Now, if you excuse me, I have to drop my jacket off at the drycleaners before my facial."
"Karen, the door's locked," Will reminded her flatly.
Karen stopped trying to open it and sagged in disappointment, pouting. "Oh, right. I'm stuck with you freaks…" She blew out a breath through her lips and rested her head on her hand, deliberately not looking at Grace. "I know! Who wants to play a game?"
Jack got up off the floor and started jumping up and down. "Ooh! Me! I do, Kare! Pick me! I'm the smartest and prettiest one here! Pick me!"
"Okay, Jackie. See if you can get this one." Karen looked around the room and then said, "I spy with my little eye, something beginning with… 'F'."
"'F'…" Jack said, looking around and tapping his lips with his index finger. "Hm… 'F'… You really picked a toughie, Kare…" Suddenly he stabbed his finger at Grace. "WAIT! I KNOW! FUSCHIA IS NOWHERE NEAR GRACE'S COLOUR AND YET SHE WEARS IT ANYWAY!" He reeled off quickly, his eyes alight.
"Well done!" Karen squealed, applauding. "Now, quick. Do one for me."
"Hm… Well… Okay. I spy with my beautiful little eye surrounded with freshly permed eyelashes … something beginning with… 'L'."
"'L'… Hm… L… Let me thi- WAIT! LARGE-ASSED QUEEN WITH IMITATION ITALIAN SHOES!"
"YAY! You got it, Kare!"
"These are genuine!" Will seethed, jabbing a finger at them, but his protests were lost as Karen and Jack touched stomachs in the middle of the room, jumping around so much that Karen's sunglasses slipped off her nose and hung precariously from her ears.
The assistant readjusted her eyewear with dignity and sailed back over to her desk, where she crossed her legs and cleared her throat; picking up a magazine from her in tray and flipping open the front cover.
"Oh, you're so amazing, Kare…" Jack said fondly with a sigh, sitting down next to Karen's desk.
"I know, Jackie. It's not easy looking into a mirror every morning and having to accept that. People assume it is, but…"
"I should be at work right now," Will grumbled miserably, sliding back down the wall and flicking imaginary lint off his new shoes.
"Yeah, and so should Grace," Karen said, looking up. "Get to work. This company doesn't run itself, you know." She turned to Jack. "You just can't get the staff, can you?"
"Mmm… Is this bitterness I'm sensing after you had to fire Maid Two — the boss-eyed one?"
"I don't know, honey. It was just such a shock, waking up in the morning and seeing that."
"Oh my God, I know Kare. I mean, why did she think that roses would be appropriate stand-ins for orchids? Pscht. I mean hello? Which planet are you from?"
"I don't know. It's some cheap one. She used to think she was getting paid so much money… She's the only one who would slave for a dollar fifty an hour and she sent it all to help her mother…" She put on a thick, indistinguishable accent. "Oh, but mees Karun. Mah mother, shee needz za medicun."
"Will, give me your cell," Grace said as Jack and Karen shrieked with laughter.
"What's wrong with yours?"
"I don't want to pay the bill on mine," Grace duhed, holding out her hand. Will rolled his eyes and dug it out of his pocket and handed it to her.
"If I can call the enquiries service, maybe they can find the guy."
Will shrugged. "Good enough for me."
I'm actually having trouble figuring out where this is going to go. Suggestions are most welcome.
Sundown: - Thank you for still being here to review this! It means a lot to me that you had the patience to stick with me.