Title: What Time Is It?
Summary: Because even Saitou can't be infallible all the time.
Word Count: 288
He makes the mistake one day of saying "Time for Chiisai" instead of "Time for lunch."
Naturally, this gets him some weird looks from his coworkers.
"Time for what?" Okita asks, baffled.
Fuck, Saitou thinks.
"Nothing," he replies. "I meant lunch."
"Dude, 'lunch' sounds nothing like 'chiisai'," Okita says. "Not even old guys with hearing aids could confuse those two."
"They are pretty odd words to confuse," Kenshin agrees.
Oh just what I need, is Saitou's sour thought at this turn of events.
"I didn't confuse them, halfwits," he testily returns. "I just said the wrong word."
"Because you confused them."
"No."
"Then?"
"Then what?"
"Then why'd you say chiisai instead of lunch? And by the way, that makes no friggin' sense at all."
"I was thinking of something—" (Someone) "—else."
"Something chiisai," Shinomori pipes up.
Great, now all the idiots are in, Saitou wearily thinks.
"Yeah, sure," he says dismissively, rising.
"What?"
"What what?"
"What's chiisai?"
Actually, it's who—not that that matters, since I have no intention of telling you, Saitou says to himself. The hell I will—I'll give up smoking first.
"Nothing."
"Then what the hell—"
"Okita, go to lunch before I kill you," he snaps, and Okita pouts at him.
"You're no fun," he mutters.
"Tough shit—get lost." Saitou orders, picking up his hat and jamming it down onto his head before leaving the cramped little office they share.
"Gods above," he mumbles. "Like working with an office full of gossipy women."
He makes a mental note to never announce what it's time for ever again—the aggravation of a second slip-up will probably result in a murder (Okita's), and that's more paperwork than he cares to deal with.