AN

unedited ! I apologize ! READ, comment, vote, enjoy ! <3

Mal POV

After the janitors closet episode was over, I rolled out of the bed, pulling on my jeans and dress shirt, shoving my shoes back on, and slipping out of the room.  Glancing at my watch, I realized I had about ten minutes left of lunch.  About enough time to run out and grab a coffee, if I ran.  And didn't get lost.  I sighed heavily and made my way in the opposite direction of the office.  About a couple hundred meters down the hall, the smell of cooking food drifted into my nose.  I took a few deep sniffs, and turned to follow the scent down another hallway.  I passed the room I remembered as Annies.  Wait... Annie? Aimee? Ainee? Analee? That was it, Analee.  It didn't really matter.  I was hoping that today would be the last day I had such an unfortunate run in with the girl.  No run ins with her at all would be cool too. 

The aroma of the food I pin pointed as spaggehti led me into a large, spacious marble and tile, black and white kitchen.  The woman I had met erlier, when I had first come to the house this morning, Lindy, I believe, was standing in front of the stove.  I was so distracted by the food she was cooking in front of her, that I almost missed the petite, black haired woman sitting on the counter to my left. Analee. Great. Please note sarcasm.

"Oh! Hello Malcolm!" Lindy spun to face me with a wide smile.  She was a rather beautiful woman, for someone who was nearing her fifties.  I couldn't see the resemblance between the two of them, actually, which was surprising.  They couldn't be more different.  Analee was trim, tall and athletic looking, with long black hair and purple eyes, while Lindy was shorter, blonder, with bright blue eyes.  Come to think of it, I think it was mentioned in the office that she wasn't Lindy's real daughter. Hmm. Interesting.

"Hello? Anyone in there?" I snatched the pale hand that was waving in my face and tossed it away immediatly.

"I'm very sorry, I'm just tired." And hungry, I added silently, gazing at the pot on the oven in sadness.  Before I knew it, Lindy was shoving me towards the large oak table, and placing a plate of food in front of me.  I inhaled, feeling my stomach grumble, and reached for the silverware.

"What, no thank you?"  The smug voice came from behind my shoulder, and I looked up to see Analee smirking at me.  I shrugged.

"Oh, don't bother the poor boy Analee, he's had a long day.  I'm going to give George a call and ask him to give Malcolm the rest of the day off to get situated.  That is, of course, if you approve.  Malcolm?"  I nodded with a mouth stuffed with food, and swallowed in one giant gulp.

"That would be much appreciated ma'am."  She smiled and waved, swooping out the room, humming as she went.  I returned to devouring my meal, attempting to ignore the piercing eyes that were trained on the back of my skull.

"You know, no matter how hard you stare, daggers aren't going to magically come and kill me."

"Thanks for the heads up," she growled.  I could hear her footfalls coming towards me and I smirked, scarping the last bits off my plate.  I knew she couldn't resist me.

"Hey babe, I'm free for the afternoon, you wanna help me break in me room?" I asked, turning to wink at her.  She glared at me, and before I could catch what was going on, her hand snapped out and met my cheek forcefully.

"Not only have you ruined my morning, but because of your idiocy, I have to spend the rest of the day with you."

"I like you, you're fiesty."

"I don't like you, you're a jerk."

"Hm, well this jerk gets to spend the rest of the afternoon with you babe, so smile.  Most girls would kill to be in your spot."

"Yeah?" she laughed, and I turned to face her.  "Well, sure I'd kill. I'd kill you. Now if you'd excuse me.." She stood up from her seat, and slammed it into the table, causing me, and probably every other person within hearing distance to wince.  "Malcolm?"

"Yes?"  I asked, standing to take my dishes to the sink.  She folded her trim, bare arms across her chest, and levelled her gaze on mine. 

"Fuck. Off."

Analee POV

He was dropped at birth.  That's the only excuse for this.  How could someone be so stupid? I mean, hitting on me once, sure, why not.  But I figured he would have realized after I kicked him, or after I told him to leave me alone, or maybe even after  I walked in on him and the resient prostitute having a go at it in the closet.  But apperantly, it only made him think I'd want him even more.  It's not like I was the only girl out there who would reject him... right? I mean, there's like 3 billion girls out there, it's not like he wouldn't of ever been rejected by someone. 

I groaned and face planted onto my comfy royal purple bed spread.  Moms word was law.  If she found out that I didn't help the new guy settle in, then I'd be in serious trouble.  She'd probably ground me from Samantha's party next week, or take my phone, or, *gag* force me to spend "quality" time with my brothers.  This quality time typically involved a rowdy game of football, in which I was the ref, and could never call anything that wouldn't get me in trouble.  Or maybe this time it would be a game of COD, in which I would be the food lady, and the clean up lady, and the set up lady, and the phone lady, and the doorbell lady, and the chore lady... UGH.

I flipped over onto my back, facing the black ceiling of my room.  It had taken me monthes to convince my dad to help me paint it, and my mom to let him let me.  I wanted to have the night sky on the ceiling of my room, and the night sky was black, so I figured the choice was obvious.  A couple weeks later, Luke and Teegan had snuck into my room while I was at dance, and decorated my ceiling with glow in the dark star stickers.  I loved it. 

Dammit, that reminds me.  I needed to shop.  Don't ask me how I got to shopping from stars, it was probably the same way that I got to stars from the idiot that was downstairs.  I had a very small attention span.  Oh well. Anyways, back to... right, shopping.  Samantha's party was this friday, and it was sure to be a huge blow out.  Meaning I needed a new outfit to fit the occasion. 

Growing up with four brothers left me as quite the tom boy all through elementary school.  Actually, up until last year, I was still a major fashion-fo-pas.  That was, at least, until Samantha Evans came to school.  She was tall, with flaming red hair, and the same fiery personality to match.  She managed to somehow draw me out of my major boy-ish shell, and turned me into someone who actually liked to shop.  It was alarming. 

To be honest though, it didn't happen without a ton of work.  And fighting.  And blackmail.  And bribary. And threats.  And a little bit of backstabbing help from my own mom.  But it happened.  And it scared the shit out of my brothers.  They spent the rest of their highschool years threatening boys to back off, and beating up anyone that didn't.  Not that I minded, most of the guys at my school were pigs.

Oh goodness. And I'm off topic again.  Actually, I don't even know what the topic originally was. Oops. I rolled my shoulders and slowly shut my eyes.  Might as well get some sleep before I face my doom.

Mal POV

To say I was exhausted would be an understatement.  George, the head lawyer, boss of my boss (Marc), loaded me up to my shoulders in cases.  The first case was probably the worst, having to do with an abusive husband and his wife -who was filing the suit against him- and his three abused kids.  That was a definite starter, something that needed to be dealt with immediatly.  University teaches you all of the technical aspects of this job, but you needed to use your own common sense and your head to do it right.

Marc laughed when he saw me, seated in the far corner of the room, with case files spread out around me.  He had set down a coffee, winked, and told me "George must like you" whatever that meant.  I understood later on when I realized that George only gave heavy duty cases to those that he knew could win them.  It made sense, obviously.  But what didn't make sense was why give the new guy the heavy cases, while giving Brian, the 42 year old lawyer, the traffic charges.  

Not that I was complaining.  I had a lot of work on my plate, and a lot of late nights, but I could handle it.  If I somehow managed to pull it all off, then I could probably secure my job in the office, so once I graduated Uni, I'd have a proper, full time job. 

Lindy had saved me from another long six hours of reviewing case files, and passing some off to Brian, others to Marc.  It would've helped me if I could've spoken with George, but he was out all day, and there at lunch.  Except that I was... previously occupied at the time.  I did, however, find a post it note on my seat on the floor that was a lovely message from that secretary.  Her name wasn't important, there were plenty more where that came from.  I lifted the case files into my arms, and headed out down the hallway to my room, which was right across from the lovely new pain in my ass. 

Yay.