Ready...AIM...Fire!

[Kosheh]

best line because I still imagine hatty as the announcer and it stems other ideas for fking amazing mental fictions
[5:49:58 PM] Hatty Hattington: bbt2
[5:500 PM] Tennis Ball: inb4 new bestselling fanfic
[5:501 PM] Hatty Hattington: [unrelated personal thing]
[5:504 PM] Tennis Ball: 50 shades of hatty
[5:50:48 PM] Hatty Hattington: YOU DID NOT JUST FUCKI
[5:50:57 PM] Hatty Hattington: SDSDFHGGHJESAJGSSADSDFDG
[5:51:00 PM] Tennis Ball: : )
[5:51:07 PM] Hatty Hattington: adsfghashddgfhnjh
[5:51:13 PM] Hatty Hattington: dhksdfasasd,cvv

I stand rather shakily trying to suppress my nerves. Gathering up my satchel, I abandon my glass of water and make my way to the partially open door.

"You don't need to knock - just go in." She smiles kindly.

I push open the door and stumble through, tripping over my own feet, and falling head first into the office.


Double crap - me and my two left feet! I am on my hands and knees in the doorway to Mr. Hattington's office, and pale hands are around me helping me to stand. I am so embarrassed, damn my clumsiness. I have to steel myself to glance up. Holy cow - he's so young.

"Miss Zadaben." He extends a long-fingered hand to me once I'm upright. "I'm Hatty Hattington. Are you all right? Would you like to sit?"

So young - and attractive, very attractive. He's tall, dressed in a fine brown suit, white shirt, and a red ascot snugly wound about his neck with an unruly tall, dark top hat and beady black eyes that regard me shrewdly, tears running down his cubic face. It takes a moment for me to find my voice.

"Um. Actually - " I mutter. If this guy is over thirty then I'm a monkey's uncle. In a daze, I place my hand in his and we shake. As our fingers touch, I feel an odd exhilarating shiver run through me. I withdraw my hand hastily, embarrassed. Must be static. I blink rapidly, my eyelids matching my heart rate.

"Miss Zadaben is indisposed, so she sent me. I hope you don't mind, Mr. Hattington."

"And you are?" His voice is warm, possibly amused, but it's difficult to tell from his impassive expression. He looks mildly interested, but above all, polite.

"Mighty Jetters. I'm studying Pixelart Techniques with Zac, um... Zebes...um... Zadaben at the VG Resource."

"I see," he says simply. I think I see the ghost of a smile in his expression, but I'm not sure. "Would you like to sit?" He waves me toward a white leather buttoned L-shaped couch.

His office is way too big for just one man. In front of the floor-to-ceiling windows, there's a huge modern dark-wood desk that six people could comfortably eat around. It matches the coffee table by the couch. Everything else is white - ceiling, floors, and walls except, on the wall by the door, where a mosaic of small paintings hang, thirty-six of them arranged in a square. They are exquisite - a series of mundane, forgotten objects painted in such precise detail they look like photographs. Displayed together, they are breathtaking.

"A local artist. Gorsal," says Hattington when he catches my gaze.

"They're lovely. Raising the ordinary to extraordinary," I murmur, distracted both by him and the paintings. He cocks his head to one side and regards me intently.

"I couldn't agree more, Miss Jetters," he replies, his voice soft and for some inexplicable reason I find myself blushing.