It was half an hour to lunch and I had my head buried inside one of my machines trying to figure out why it was chewing up my sample pots. I had removed parts, which were laid out on my work station, and I was just about to disappear to my waist when I heard a voice from the door of my lab.

'you seem good at burying yourself in your work' I jumped, just managing not to clunk my head again.

I extracted myself from the machine and turned, only to find it was the incredibly handsome man from earlier. I had been daydreaming about him a little….

I saw that the others were stood outside the door, which he was carefully closing. *gulp*

'yeah, I love what I do, so I do it to the best of my ability' I said confidently. Hopefully hiding my shaky knees and heavy breathing.

'do you have a favourite test?' he asked, did he really want to know, or was he just being polite?

'my favourite thing is titration, but I don't get to do it manually any more' I told him, wondering if he would have a clue what I was talking about.

'I used to enjoy that too, my favourite was solvent extraction.' he replied, wow he knew lab work, he really was amazing. I just stood there smiling like a moron.

'Oh, I have to go, but I hope I'll see you later' he said as he opened the door and exited smiling.

I had to sit down, this was too much excitement for one day. I looked at my machine, it was going to have to wait, I needed to see Mel to find out what was going on with these people.

I left my little lab, to see the visitors with Mr Handsome at the back, being led down the corridor by Jim, my team leader. Again, Mr Handsome turned and waved, I waved back still in shock.

'Sookie, who is that!' Emily had just walked up to me after spotting me standing aimlessly in the corridor.

'I have no idea, but I intend on finding out' I told her. Just then Mel passed by,

'do you have a minute now?' I asked her,

'yeah sure, come on' she said, and we walked to her office.

I liked Mel, she was enthusiastic and boisterous. A bit like me I guess. We sat in her office and she sighed.

'that's not a good sign' I said.

'it is for you, just not for your department' she confessed, 'the visitors are from a rival company in California, we are buying them out and they want to see what we can do'

'and that's good for me how….?' I asked, intrigued.

'well… they are very impressed with our efficiency, and want a couple of members of staff to go back with them the re-train their staff' she said.

'oh' was all I could say.

'they want to come see you with a machine later, but after talking with me, they'd like to offer you one of the positions' she said, and waited for my reaction.

I could only sit there open mouthed. I tried to regain some composure.

'would you go if they asked?' she said, 'they are impressed with the volume of tests you know'

'I don't know, I guess so' I said, still shocked. 'I have nothing holding me here except my job'

'oh you'd still be employed by us, just on loan for a while' she didn't seem like she wanted to talk me into it or out of it. 'you can't tell anyone until they formally offer it to you, you understand'

'of course, how long would it be for?' I asked

'well… initially, it would be for 2 months' she said.

'wow, 2 months in California? Where would I stay?'

'they'd arrange that, you'd be their guest, so I don't know but you wouldn't have to worry about that'

'ok, then. I guess I'll wait and see if they ask me' I said.

'wonderful, which machine shall I bring them to later, about 2pm?'

'I'll be on the konelab at that time, I hope its working, one of them just caught me with my head inside the auto-titrator' I laughed.

I left her office in a daze, and walked to gather the gang for lunch. How the hell was I supposed to keep this under my hat? I guess the best way would be to forget about it.

I walked into the main lab where most of them worked,

'we should go to the pub' Steve was saying,

'yeah, I need a drink' added James,

'oh I don't know, the visitors are coming to my machine later' I told them, 'I don't want to be intoxicated when I'm trying to impress them'

'oh? And why would you want t impress them?' said Jenny from across the room.

'have you seen them? The tall one is really hot' I said, then I saw Jenny's face, and knew someone was stood behind me.

Thankfully it was only Julie, a team leader.

'I thought you might have that reaction' she said.

We stood and talked while the others finished what they were doing, apparently a lot of the female staff had a similar reaction upon meeting them.

I let the guys talk me into going to the pub, which turned out to be a really bad idea.

We walked into our usual haunt and I ended up face to face, well face to chest with Mr Handsome.

'hey there, again' he said, smiling down at me.

'oh, hey' I managed, just about holding my dignity together.

We went to the bar and got drinks, and went to sit outside, out of range of our management who were sat in the restaurant with our visitors.

'holy cow, five minutes peace…..' I muttered as we sat around a picnic bench.