Chapter 3:
By Koko bandit
The next morning, the day started as usual for the Bluth family. Michael was the first awake and donning his robe went downstairs to put on a pot of coffee. Upon entering the kitchen, he found Alice reading a large book on the kitchen island. Without looking up, she took a sip from her freshly brewed coffee.
"G'morning."
"Good morning! I must say, I'm in amazement right now. I think this is the first time I've witnessed another adult awake at this hour, not to mention reading, and the coffee is made. It's only six in the morning and I'm already impressed!" Michael helped himself to a cup of coffee, and was pleasantly surprised to find it delicious.
"I need to finish some chapters before class tonight and with yesterday being so hectic and today my first day of work…"
"Say no more. I'll square away some time for you at work to finish your assignments." Michael promised.
This proved to be more than difficult than he had hoped as Alice's assistance at work alleviated the weight of the minor but hassling daily tasks and finally gave him the leisure to work on the proposal that had been backed up for months. With a new secretary intercepting the nearly quarterly visits and phone calls from annoying peddlers, mostly Gob, Michael was free to work without interruption and felt compelled to revel in the unusual peace and quiet of the work day. As the day wore on, he began to feel compunction at breaking the promise he'd made to Alice in the morning and picked up the phone to call her into his office. Gob was already on the phone.
"—don't worry about him, it'll be fine. Just one dinner is all I'm asking, a romantic candle lit dinner, and I promise…"
"Sorry but I don't think so. On top of work and classes and so many other factors… I don't think it's a good idea--." Alice trailed off.
Michael interrupted dryly, "It's an awful idea. Gob, I thought we talked about this…"
"Michael!" Gob's mind raced, "I mean good, Michael! What, you thought--? No, no, I meant the dinner for us…"
"The romantic candle lit dinner is meant for us?" Michael sounded unconvinced.
"No, of course not, that's disgusting! Obviously, I dialed the wrong number, Michael, I meant to call our mother."
"And that's not disgusting. Listen Gob, I would appreciate not being lied to, I see what you're trying to do here."
"I'm not trying to do anything. You think you have me all figured out, don't you Michael? Well, let me tell you something, you wouldn't know the first thing about me! I couldn't be less interested in your damn secretary!"
"You couldn't be more interested, you mean. It's that game dad played with us when we were younger all over again, isn't it? When he gives you something you don't want it, but when he takes it away you can't wait to get it back, and when he gives it to me, we fight over it. Well, we're not young anymore and I'm not playing these games. I said Alice is off limits while she lives with us, and that's that, also Alice could you please come into my office after you cut short your conversation with my brother?" Michael hung up the phone and went back to his proposal. After a few minutes, Alice knocked and stepped into his office.
"Please have a seat."
Sitting on the black leather couch in front of Michael's desk, she looked past him at the window overlooking the darkening sky. Her unopened books were tucked underneath a pile of unopened letters and newly typed addendums on her desk, and she itched to get started on her reading. Remembering it was Michael who promised her a study break, she hoped he would be true to his word and squirmed silently as he began to lecture her on office rules.
"I know I went over this about a hundred times today," he had, "but there are no personal calls during hours of business. What if an important client calls and the line is busy because you're talking to a potential date. It's unprofessional."
"It's not like I had a choice. Your brother, Gob, is really persistent. That was the eleventh call he made today." Alice frowned, angry at the unjust accusation.
"Yeah, that sounds like Gob. Alright, well, I'll talk to him." As Alice expectantly stared at him, Michael, thinking she was waiting for positive reinforcement said, "And, you're doing a great job! Really great. Keep it up."
"No… I still have some unfinished schoolwork I'd like to finish…"
"Oh right! Of course, I promised this morning—you know what, why don't you finish mailing those letters and faxing out those addendums and take that break!" Feeling extremely proud of himself, Michael returned to his work as Alice closed the door and returned to her desk.
As evening approached, Michael gathered his things to leave the office for the day. Upon passing the front desk, he found Alice surrounded by piles of closed letters sticking each with stamps.
"What are you still doing here? I thought you would have left for that study break by now." Unbeknownst to Michael, the month that Lindsey or Tobias, neither did much in the way of work, had been secretary was also the month that a ridiculous amount of letters had been allowed to pile up, so the task he'd offhandedly given to Alice was more time consuming than expected.
New to secretarial work, Alice mistakenly thought the backed up amount of work was the norm and to avoid looking slow on her first day of work, lied.
"I guess I got so caught up in it. I completely forgot about my assignment."
"Well, as I always tell George Michael, school should always be top priority. Slackers now are slackers later in life, am I right?" Michael received only blank stares from Alice, and he continued, "But I guess I can understand better than anyone the love of an honest days work. Wow, I didn't know you were so enthusiastic! I was going to wait until you had the rhythm down with your schoolwork and classes, but seeing you're so eager, I'll make sure to increase your responsibilities tomorrow."
"Thank you." Alice miserably gathered her things to leave for class. She was infuriated, frustrated, and anxious for class but tried not to show it.
"Need a lift to class?"
Deciding a ride would cut her commute to class in half, hopefully giving her the time needed to do some serious speed reading and finish her assignment, Alice accepted.
"We'll be taking the staircar, it'll take a while, but don't worry we'll get there eventually."
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
Meanwhile, on the other side of town, another Bluth family member was currently on the verge of an artistic breakthrough. Tobias Funke had found work with a local acting company playing a minor character in a production of Annie complete with only four lines. As luck would have it, the actress in the part of Annie had dropped out due to salary conflicts and after his attempt at donning prosthetics, a small dress, and a falsetto to fill the part of Annie had failed he decided on another route to impress the director for a larger part in the play.
He'd received an anonymous tip from one of the actors in the troupe of the whereabouts of the singer/actress/reality star Whitney Houston. Deciding that Whitney in the role of Annie was the greatest interpretational, artistic revelation and that the director would also be impressed by his connections with the great star, Tobias decided to seek her out and offer her the part.
The tip led him into the deepest bowels of the illegal underground drug circuit and Tobias found himself on a darkened street corner littered with used hypodermic needles.
"Hmm… this is more difficult than expected. Well, I shan't be discouraged! As Annie sings, the sun will come out tomorrow, you bet your bottoms that tomorrow, there will be suuuuun--." Tobias's singing had caught the attention of a few of the locals.
"You're scaring away my customers." A poorly made up transvestite with a messily placed red wig and yellow pleather mini skirt barely covering his unmentionables stalked towards him.
"Oh, hello, miss. Well, as fate would have it, you shall have to be my Annie. For the time being anyway."
"What are you on? Get lost."
"Oh, where are my manners? My name is Tobias Funke, I am an actor," the 'woman's' eyebrows raised in surprise.
"You don't look like an actor."
"Well, I am. One in great need," her eyebrows rose again, "for you see, I am in need of your services." Tobias dramatically swept the ground in a bow.
"Why didn't you say so from the beginning? I charge 30 by the hour, but for you buddy, 40 dollars."
Tobias faltered, he hadn't expected he'd need to expend money on this trip, yet decided to tap into his wife's secret stash of cash. After all, this was a matter of artistic emergency.
"That's a pretty penny," Tobias chuckled, "but nothing a trip to the ATM won't prove surmountable."
"Alright. Let's get going already."
A block and a half later on the darkened street, sirens flagged Tobias and his friend down and to his surprise Tobias found himself pressed to the pavement.
"Is this some sort of role playing?" Tobias mumbled from the floor.
"No, you stupid bleep you're under arrest, I'm an undercover cop!" Tearing off the cheap wig, Officer Cooper yanked the stunned Tobias off the ground and against the police car.
"You're a man!" he was astounded.
"Get in the damn car!"
As the Bluth company staircar veered around a sharp corner barely missing a few stray pedestrians, Alice dug her fingernails into her hands. Her class began in less than half an hour and they were still a good distance away. She'd tried to work in the car but Michael had been going on for the whole of the car ride about the ethics of hard work, using it as a smokescreen to insult his family's laziness without actually coming off as self righteous. He was interrupted as his cell phone rang. It was Tobias.
"Sorry, I need to take this."
Alice nodded relieved, and opened her book to the dog-eared page.
"What? Not again! This is getting ridiculous. Can anyone in this family go a week without jail time or lawsuits! Just stay put—I'll be there in a few minutes, I'm right by the courtroom. We don't need the press getting wind of this, the faster you're out of there the better."
Snapping his phone closed, Michael guiltily turned towards Alice.
"I'm sorry Alice, this is an emergency. My brother-in-law is being held in custody, and look, we're right near the police station. It'll only take a minute, I promise."
With a tight smile, Alice gave him a rigid nod and stared down at her book in desperation.
Making a right towards the station, Michael dialed Barry's number into his cell while driving down the all-too-familiar path.