Heh. This is supposed to be kind of parody-ish. I'm just having a bit of fun. It's a P&P with another storyline thrown in. I may have lied about the number of chapters, but they will all be shorties (like this one) that are less than 1000 words.

This story is going to seem very different than my normal style. That's because it is a comedy, and comedies are my true love. I, unfortunately, haven't written one in a long time but I figured I should get back to my roots.

Pride and Prejudice: Abbreviated and Un-fabricated

A short first chapter that's hardly long enough to be considered a chapter and so will thereby henceforth be dubbed a "part"

"Her résumé is tolerable, but not reasonable enough to tempt me."

I had to suppress a chuckle. Did he honestly say that?

"Did you honestly say that?" Adam Shuster asked with raised eyebrows and once again I was chuckle suppressing. They both, Adam and the dark-haired one, look at me and stared. Oops. I should really work on my chuckle-suppressing. Turns out, I'm dreadful at it.

Adam smiled back and let out a lighthearted giggle of his own; I loved Adam already for the mere fact that he giggles like a six year old girl with pig-tails and a stuffed animal named "Professor Wallace Tremor III" (equipped with a British accent). The dark haired one stared at me murderously. He seemed quite miffed; perhaps because I forgot to include "has a tendency to chuckle at inappropriate times" on my "tolerable" résumé.

Adam leaned closer to the "dark side" (a.k.a Danny Dardy) and tried to speak in a muffled voice. Don't they know that "muffled voices" hardly live up to their name? (Duh! That's why J.K. Rowling invented the muffliato charm.) And that I could hear every word they said?

"I like her. She seems fun." Adam protested.

Danny was a bit harder to understand. I caught the words, "hardly," "teddy-bear," and "unqualified." I kind of smiled and spent the next thirty-six seconds wondering how the word "teddy-bear" snuck in there. Perhaps the scary Danny had said I was "as cuddly as a teddy-bear," or "as snug-able as a teddy-bear." Nah, that hardly seems plausible. "Snug-able" isn't even a word. "Snog-able" is, I think. "Snack-able?" "Shag-able?" "Stagger-able?"

"Danny!" Adam is almost as good as whining like a six year old girl with pig-tails and a stuffed animal named "Professor Wallace Tremor III" (equipped with a British accent), as he is at giggling like one. "You picked our last secretary! I get to choose this one!"

This time I caught the words: "separate," "two," "secretaries," and "slick-able;" although it's quite possible I imagined at least one of those words. "Sing-able?" "Sting-able?" "A ring-ring-ring-able?" By this point I'd accidentally un-suppressed another chuckle and they were both looking at me again.

It was but two seconds later that Adam was shaking my hand vigorously and proclaiming that I had the job while conspicuously avoiding the eye contact of his brooding partner. (No. Not life-partner. Although… it is a funny thought.) I was almost as excited by this idea as Adam seemed. After all, it's not everyday that a girl gets hired to be the secretary for two of the partners in a company that is known for doing absolutely nothing. Dardy and Co.? Ha! More like Dodgy and Co.!

"When do I start?" I asked with a triumphant smile. This was a fairly coveted job and, even though I knew it was a ridiculously menial occupation, I was excited about beating the three other girls that had applied.

Danny glared daggers at me. One punctured my eye and caused me to go temporarily blind, but I recovered quickly.

"What's today?" Adam looked at his watch. "How about tomorrow?" I found this action a bit odd. Who checks their watch for the date? Very suspicious…

"Are you absolutely mad?" Danny was speaking again, but for some reason it was still in a muffled voice and I'd really only heard the words, "you" and "mad." In truth, the rest was embellishment.

Adam nodded once. "Of course!" he said to his best friend. "When have I never not been wrong?" The triple negative threw me for a loop. As did the door closing that happened just a few seconds after Adam's statement. Talk about a face-breaking clue that my meeting was over… or perhaps Adam had merely forgotten I was there. This seemed quite likely.

"The girl's an absolute, but bloody brilliant, lunatic!" I heard Danny's muffled voice through the, obviously, horribly insulated walls. Or at least I heard part of that. I threw in a few choice words where I felt they were needed.

"Good!" Even through the wall, Adam's voice was as cheery and loud as ever. "She'll fit in well here then!"