(no subject)
Who: Isabelle Prescott (Aesop's Serpent) and Alex Chase (King Shahryar)
What: False accusations and emasculation, oh my!
When: Monday morning, April 7th
Where: JWT Advertising, Manhattan
Rating: PG-13 for sexual innuendo? I guess.
Isabelle: Isabelle was briskly walking back to her office from the agency conference room, her mind racing with various plots and plans of how best to land the potential client she had just met with. Anheuser-Busch was unveiling a new malt beverage - one of those disgusting and sickeningly sweet fruity drinks that was targeted at teenagers and young women - but obviously their standard advertising strategy of 'scantily clad women and dogs' was not going to work for this campaign. And of course they could not obviously target the teenage population, but they needed a strategy that would effectively reach that demographic without angering the mothers and anti-drinking crusaders. Something subtle, she thought to herself. Fortunately subtle was something she did quite well, which was part of the reason she was so often sought out for this particular type of campaign.
She was interrupted from her thoughts by the irritating sound of someone blowing their nose and she glanced around the office to see just who had decided to bring their diseased little body into the office. What she discovered was much worse. One of the account managers was sitting at her desk and crying. Not just crying, actually, the woman was full out sobbing. Well the last thing Isabelle wanted to do was actually attempt to talk to the crying girl, not even to yell at her to pull herself together. No, but she did have a fairly decent idea of just who might be the reason for the woman's hysteria and that was someone she could yell at. She walked even more quickly toward her office, stopping to stand in front of Alex Chase's desk and glower down at him. "Alex. In my office. Now," she demanded.
Alex: Alex's attempts to get to grips with the working world had not been easy but he was finally starting to manage. The complications of filing systems, and scheduling had come with ease with a smile directed at the right person, and now he was sat behind the monitor, attempting to manage Isabelle's umpteenth meeting of the following week, and to ram it into the organised chaos of her already-planned meetings. The scowl and the order were not unusual, but normally not delivered together. With a faint shrug of surprise directed at the well-meaning looks of enquiry from co-workers, he followed Isabelle obediently. "What's it this time?"
Isabelle: Isabelle was still glowering as she shut the door behind them, perhaps with a bit more force than was necessary. She went to sit behind her desk and took a moment to pick an idle piece of lint off her suit jacket before looking up at Alex, her irritation quite clear on her face. There had been rules, quite clearly established when he took the position and she had a fairly decent suspicion that he had already managed to break one of them, if the crying girl was any indication. And even if he wasn't responsible, she certainly was not above taking out her frustrations on the nearest available target, as everyone who worked for her knew full well. "Alex," she began, her voice calm in a way that certainly did not match the expression on her face. "One of my account managers is sobbing at her desk. Explain yourself."
Alex: Account managers; that was the set of desks to the left of the elevators, right? Or was it to the right of the elevators? Couple of pretty faces, one with a perm that made her look like an unfortunate poodle, but the other pretty one was all shiny white teeth and smiles; those were them, he was sure, the way any man would take note of faces he chose to remember. But what exactly he had do with one of them crying he was fuzzy on - the last female he'd had cause to make cry had been Tabitha, when he'd stopped her throwing food at him that morning.
"Sorry, can't seem to see where I fit into this," he said easily, with a polite if a little distant smile; not much else to say, he'd already learned that to make sudden movements only aggravated her further, and Isabelle's bark was nothing compared to her bite.
Isabelle: Isabelle's scowl deepened at his denial, or more accurately ignorance. She hated when she had to spell things out for people. And so far Alex had actually been working out to be a moderately competent assistant (about the highest compliment she was willing to give for any of her staff), which made his apparent breach of the rules all the more annoying. Of course she was well aware of his playboy tendencies from the compendiums, but she thought she had made it quite clear that she had better things to do with her time than deal with crying staff. "So you don't remember that one of the first rules I gave you was that there was to be no fraternizing with the women in my department?" she asked, raising an eyebrow as she leaned back in her chair and folded her arms across her chest. "Anne, the pretty blonde girl with the Julia Roberts smile? She's sitting at her desk sobbing and mumbling to herself about how she thought he really liked her." The last bit was spoken in a high pitched mocking tone that managed to quite fully convey Isabelle's disdain for the entire situation.
Alex: If he hadn't been in the middle of being reamed for something he hadn't done, Alex would've laughed; the spot on imitation of just about every naive girl who thought that a one night stand and a couple of sticky cocktails meant something was just about perfect and Isabelle's dry sense of humor was something he was only beginning to get a feel for. But then there was the 'unfair accusations' part to be dealing with first, and Alex's behavior mirrored Isabelle's own; arms folded tightly against his chest, eyes cool as glass and eyebrows arched.
"You accusing me with undue haste, Miz Prescott?" he asked, with icy dignity-put-upon, the Southern drawl injected with full sliding slick charm at odds with the clear annoyance written across his body language. "Because I hate to tell you, you got your panties in a knot over the wrong thing here."
Isabelle: While Isabelle was actually beginning to soften a bit in her insistence that Alex had to be responsible for the crying woman and ordinarily would have just banished him from her office with a short 'well don't do it again,' his highly inappropriate reference to her panties gave her an entirely new issue to be irritated with. Never mind the fact that she was accustomed to her staff just accepting whatever accusations she threw at them and apologizing as quickly as possible to get out of her war path. Truth be told, she was actually a bit caught off guard, although she fought to hide that as best as she could. "My panties are perfectly fine," she replied dryly, although the icy glare she was giving him quite fully conveyed her anger. "And I could do without any reference to my undergarments. I seem to recall that 'no misogynistic comments' was also on the list of rules that I gave you."
Alex: "I'm thinking that unfair accusations kinda offer a get out clause, seeing as I'm being yelled at for a whole 'nother rule of yours," Alex's regret for the 'panty-shot'? Totally non-existent; if the woman was going to pry unduly into his own (non-existent) sex-life, then she could handle one or two ribald comments, boss or no. While he was in the usual habit of quailing and agreement if it was deserved, a certain amount of justice refused to do so when it was unwarranted. "Fine, no referencing of your undergarments. Fine by me; wouldn't want to reference them even if I wasn't an employee." Biig shit-eating grin, all shiny teeth and sharp bite to it; no, Alex did not take kindly to being accused of it.
Isabelle: Isabelle stood from her chair and walked around to the front of her desk, leaning back against it as she positioned herself right in front of him, quite firmly in his personal space. It was taking just about every bit of willpower that she possessed to display just how furious she was at the moment, although undoubtedly some degree of her anger was quite apparent. She could always fire him, she reminded herself. If it had been anyone else in her employment, she certainly would - she'd fired for lesser offenses after all, but truthfully Alex was good at his job, at least better than anyone in the secretarial pool and it probably was not worth the hassle to try and find a new assistant. Still, she could certainly make him sweat for a bit. She decided against dignifying his last comment with a response - something about him missing out was decidedly inappropriate anyway - and instead went for her trump card. "Mr. Chase," she began, her voice deadly calm as she met his eyes with her steely glare. "Explain to me why I should not fire you on the spot?"
Alex: And there she had him, his balls in one of those executive-toy-cradles, hers to swing with because to be frank, he needed this job. Needed it the way he'd got used to a salary and daycare, and a boss who, if not an easy one to work for, looked better in a skirt than his previous one had, and who could turn down a good eye-line while working, when the only view outside was of a concrete alley-way? There was not much to do, aside from eat crow - although he could try it.
"You'd miss your morning coffee on your desk, and knowing you could order your assistant not to date your secretary pool?" he offered, all charm now, smile sliding into something warm, the sort of smile shot at women to make a curl of something melt low and deep, as easy as chocolate in warm hands. Alex played every card in his meagre hand, and if it stopped his boss firing him, well now. There was an added benefit of the hand he'd been dealt.
Isabelle: Isabelle actually had to resist the urge to laugh at Alex's sudden shift in demeanor and his attempt to charm her. She certainly was not one to fall for a charming smile, although the corners of her lips twitched into a half-smile of her own for a moment before she quickly reverted back to the role of stern authoritarian. It wasn't just the transparency of his act that amused her, it was much more the simple fact that she enjoyed bringing a man to his knees, if only metaphorically. Actually if he had really gotten down on his knees and begged for his job, she probably would fire him on sheer principle, but that was a different matter. Still, the question remained of just what to do with him now. Of course she would make his life difficult for a while, be a bit more demanding than usual and give him some unpleasant tasks to convey her annoyance, but for the moment she was starting to enjoy this game now that the table was in her favor. "And you think I couldn't find some other eager young assistant to bring me coffee?" she asked as she smoothed out her skirt with an affected nonchalance as if to thoroughly convey the fact that he was inconsequential to her.
Alex: "No," flat out and blunt. "They're shit scared of you. Going with 'Dragon Lady' as less than complimentary, even for you, Miz Prescott," still with that same grin, the cheerful lift to his voice and full on drawl, but slightly more careful than before. "Pay's better than the pool, but say your name in that place and it's like Candyman, people faintin' all over the place. I don't think you could find one of 'em happier now that the assistant position is occupied. They take bets; nervous breakdowns before the age of forty; money's riding on whoever assists you doing it by thirty. So nope, no one desperate enough to do it in-company aside from me, and if you hire out of house, you run through the next lot. I'm not going to get PMS, cry at my desk, or sulk in the female passive-aggressive style. I got a problem, I say so upfront - like accusing me of bad play with your girl Anne? I have a problem with that, particularly as my word is solid. So you want coffee, or are we going to stand here all day and pretend you don't have my balls in a vice?"
Isabelle: While most women would probably be offended at the news that they were considered the terror of the office and the secretarial pool was gossiping about them behind their back, for Isabelle it was a source of pride. She believed in instilling a healthy amount of fear in her underlings after all. And more importantly, Alex was right about his own qualifications. She appreciated his directness and the fact that he didn't bring his personal life or any degree of temperamental whining into the office. Truth be told, he had actually just garnered a fair amount of respect from her, something that was not easy to accomplish. She gave him a brief nod of acknowledgment as she relaxed slightly and dropped the role of high inquisitor. "Fine, I take you at your word that you are not responsible for Anne's sudden bout of hysteria." She would never apologize for her accusations, but she could at least acknowledge his innocence. "But deal with her for me. Without flirting with her. If she's still sobbing just send her home or something," she instructed with an airy wave of her hand. She didn't really care how Alex dealt with her, but she had a serious aversion to snot-dripping noses.
Alex: "Done and done. Anything else?" Now he was away from 'the righteous innocent' position, Alex couldn't care less what happened next, so long as he escaped Isabelle's office with his skin intact. Wouldn't put it past her to be vicious just for kicks on the way out.
Isabelle: "Don't forget the coffee," Isabelle added as she moved back to sit at her desk and went to check her email. "Oh, but Alex?" she added quickly, before he had a chance to leave. "I do rather enjoy the reports of just what the rest of the office is saying about me. Useful information along those lines is always appreciated." She gave him the faintest hint of a smile before turning back to her computer and burying herself in her work.
What: False accusations and emasculation, oh my!
When: Monday morning, April 7th
Where: JWT Advertising, Manhattan
Rating: PG-13 for sexual innuendo? I guess.
Isabelle: Isabelle was briskly walking back to her office from the agency conference room, her mind racing with various plots and plans of how best to land the potential client she had just met with. Anheuser-Busch was unveiling a new malt beverage - one of those disgusting and sickeningly sweet fruity drinks that was targeted at teenagers and young women - but obviously their standard advertising strategy of 'scantily clad women and dogs' was not going to work for this campaign. And of course they could not obviously target the teenage population, but they needed a strategy that would effectively reach that demographic without angering the mothers and anti-drinking crusaders. Something subtle, she thought to herself. Fortunately subtle was something she did quite well, which was part of the reason she was so often sought out for this particular type of campaign.
She was interrupted from her thoughts by the irritating sound of someone blowing their nose and she glanced around the office to see just who had decided to bring their diseased little body into the office. What she discovered was much worse. One of the account managers was sitting at her desk and crying. Not just crying, actually, the woman was full out sobbing. Well the last thing Isabelle wanted to do was actually attempt to talk to the crying girl, not even to yell at her to pull herself together. No, but she did have a fairly decent idea of just who might be the reason for the woman's hysteria and that was someone she could yell at. She walked even more quickly toward her office, stopping to stand in front of Alex Chase's desk and glower down at him. "Alex. In my office. Now," she demanded.
Alex: Alex's attempts to get to grips with the working world had not been easy but he was finally starting to manage. The complications of filing systems, and scheduling had come with ease with a smile directed at the right person, and now he was sat behind the monitor, attempting to manage Isabelle's umpteenth meeting of the following week, and to ram it into the organised chaos of her already-planned meetings. The scowl and the order were not unusual, but normally not delivered together. With a faint shrug of surprise directed at the well-meaning looks of enquiry from co-workers, he followed Isabelle obediently. "What's it this time?"
Isabelle: Isabelle was still glowering as she shut the door behind them, perhaps with a bit more force than was necessary. She went to sit behind her desk and took a moment to pick an idle piece of lint off her suit jacket before looking up at Alex, her irritation quite clear on her face. There had been rules, quite clearly established when he took the position and she had a fairly decent suspicion that he had already managed to break one of them, if the crying girl was any indication. And even if he wasn't responsible, she certainly was not above taking out her frustrations on the nearest available target, as everyone who worked for her knew full well. "Alex," she began, her voice calm in a way that certainly did not match the expression on her face. "One of my account managers is sobbing at her desk. Explain yourself."
Alex: Account managers; that was the set of desks to the left of the elevators, right? Or was it to the right of the elevators? Couple of pretty faces, one with a perm that made her look like an unfortunate poodle, but the other pretty one was all shiny white teeth and smiles; those were them, he was sure, the way any man would take note of faces he chose to remember. But what exactly he had do with one of them crying he was fuzzy on - the last female he'd had cause to make cry had been Tabitha, when he'd stopped her throwing food at him that morning.
"Sorry, can't seem to see where I fit into this," he said easily, with a polite if a little distant smile; not much else to say, he'd already learned that to make sudden movements only aggravated her further, and Isabelle's bark was nothing compared to her bite.
Isabelle: Isabelle's scowl deepened at his denial, or more accurately ignorance. She hated when she had to spell things out for people. And so far Alex had actually been working out to be a moderately competent assistant (about the highest compliment she was willing to give for any of her staff), which made his apparent breach of the rules all the more annoying. Of course she was well aware of his playboy tendencies from the compendiums, but she thought she had made it quite clear that she had better things to do with her time than deal with crying staff. "So you don't remember that one of the first rules I gave you was that there was to be no fraternizing with the women in my department?" she asked, raising an eyebrow as she leaned back in her chair and folded her arms across her chest. "Anne, the pretty blonde girl with the Julia Roberts smile? She's sitting at her desk sobbing and mumbling to herself about how she thought he really liked her." The last bit was spoken in a high pitched mocking tone that managed to quite fully convey Isabelle's disdain for the entire situation.
Alex: If he hadn't been in the middle of being reamed for something he hadn't done, Alex would've laughed; the spot on imitation of just about every naive girl who thought that a one night stand and a couple of sticky cocktails meant something was just about perfect and Isabelle's dry sense of humor was something he was only beginning to get a feel for. But then there was the 'unfair accusations' part to be dealing with first, and Alex's behavior mirrored Isabelle's own; arms folded tightly against his chest, eyes cool as glass and eyebrows arched.
"You accusing me with undue haste, Miz Prescott?" he asked, with icy dignity-put-upon, the Southern drawl injected with full sliding slick charm at odds with the clear annoyance written across his body language. "Because I hate to tell you, you got your panties in a knot over the wrong thing here."
Isabelle: While Isabelle was actually beginning to soften a bit in her insistence that Alex had to be responsible for the crying woman and ordinarily would have just banished him from her office with a short 'well don't do it again,' his highly inappropriate reference to her panties gave her an entirely new issue to be irritated with. Never mind the fact that she was accustomed to her staff just accepting whatever accusations she threw at them and apologizing as quickly as possible to get out of her war path. Truth be told, she was actually a bit caught off guard, although she fought to hide that as best as she could. "My panties are perfectly fine," she replied dryly, although the icy glare she was giving him quite fully conveyed her anger. "And I could do without any reference to my undergarments. I seem to recall that 'no misogynistic comments' was also on the list of rules that I gave you."
Alex: "I'm thinking that unfair accusations kinda offer a get out clause, seeing as I'm being yelled at for a whole 'nother rule of yours," Alex's regret for the 'panty-shot'? Totally non-existent; if the woman was going to pry unduly into his own (non-existent) sex-life, then she could handle one or two ribald comments, boss or no. While he was in the usual habit of quailing and agreement if it was deserved, a certain amount of justice refused to do so when it was unwarranted. "Fine, no referencing of your undergarments. Fine by me; wouldn't want to reference them even if I wasn't an employee." Biig shit-eating grin, all shiny teeth and sharp bite to it; no, Alex did not take kindly to being accused of it.
Isabelle: Isabelle stood from her chair and walked around to the front of her desk, leaning back against it as she positioned herself right in front of him, quite firmly in his personal space. It was taking just about every bit of willpower that she possessed to display just how furious she was at the moment, although undoubtedly some degree of her anger was quite apparent. She could always fire him, she reminded herself. If it had been anyone else in her employment, she certainly would - she'd fired for lesser offenses after all, but truthfully Alex was good at his job, at least better than anyone in the secretarial pool and it probably was not worth the hassle to try and find a new assistant. Still, she could certainly make him sweat for a bit. She decided against dignifying his last comment with a response - something about him missing out was decidedly inappropriate anyway - and instead went for her trump card. "Mr. Chase," she began, her voice deadly calm as she met his eyes with her steely glare. "Explain to me why I should not fire you on the spot?"
Alex: And there she had him, his balls in one of those executive-toy-cradles, hers to swing with because to be frank, he needed this job. Needed it the way he'd got used to a salary and daycare, and a boss who, if not an easy one to work for, looked better in a skirt than his previous one had, and who could turn down a good eye-line while working, when the only view outside was of a concrete alley-way? There was not much to do, aside from eat crow - although he could try it.
"You'd miss your morning coffee on your desk, and knowing you could order your assistant not to date your secretary pool?" he offered, all charm now, smile sliding into something warm, the sort of smile shot at women to make a curl of something melt low and deep, as easy as chocolate in warm hands. Alex played every card in his meagre hand, and if it stopped his boss firing him, well now. There was an added benefit of the hand he'd been dealt.
Isabelle: Isabelle actually had to resist the urge to laugh at Alex's sudden shift in demeanor and his attempt to charm her. She certainly was not one to fall for a charming smile, although the corners of her lips twitched into a half-smile of her own for a moment before she quickly reverted back to the role of stern authoritarian. It wasn't just the transparency of his act that amused her, it was much more the simple fact that she enjoyed bringing a man to his knees, if only metaphorically. Actually if he had really gotten down on his knees and begged for his job, she probably would fire him on sheer principle, but that was a different matter. Still, the question remained of just what to do with him now. Of course she would make his life difficult for a while, be a bit more demanding than usual and give him some unpleasant tasks to convey her annoyance, but for the moment she was starting to enjoy this game now that the table was in her favor. "And you think I couldn't find some other eager young assistant to bring me coffee?" she asked as she smoothed out her skirt with an affected nonchalance as if to thoroughly convey the fact that he was inconsequential to her.
Alex: "No," flat out and blunt. "They're shit scared of you. Going with 'Dragon Lady' as less than complimentary, even for you, Miz Prescott," still with that same grin, the cheerful lift to his voice and full on drawl, but slightly more careful than before. "Pay's better than the pool, but say your name in that place and it's like Candyman, people faintin' all over the place. I don't think you could find one of 'em happier now that the assistant position is occupied. They take bets; nervous breakdowns before the age of forty; money's riding on whoever assists you doing it by thirty. So nope, no one desperate enough to do it in-company aside from me, and if you hire out of house, you run through the next lot. I'm not going to get PMS, cry at my desk, or sulk in the female passive-aggressive style. I got a problem, I say so upfront - like accusing me of bad play with your girl Anne? I have a problem with that, particularly as my word is solid. So you want coffee, or are we going to stand here all day and pretend you don't have my balls in a vice?"
Isabelle: While most women would probably be offended at the news that they were considered the terror of the office and the secretarial pool was gossiping about them behind their back, for Isabelle it was a source of pride. She believed in instilling a healthy amount of fear in her underlings after all. And more importantly, Alex was right about his own qualifications. She appreciated his directness and the fact that he didn't bring his personal life or any degree of temperamental whining into the office. Truth be told, he had actually just garnered a fair amount of respect from her, something that was not easy to accomplish. She gave him a brief nod of acknowledgment as she relaxed slightly and dropped the role of high inquisitor. "Fine, I take you at your word that you are not responsible for Anne's sudden bout of hysteria." She would never apologize for her accusations, but she could at least acknowledge his innocence. "But deal with her for me. Without flirting with her. If she's still sobbing just send her home or something," she instructed with an airy wave of her hand. She didn't really care how Alex dealt with her, but she had a serious aversion to snot-dripping noses.
Alex: "Done and done. Anything else?" Now he was away from 'the righteous innocent' position, Alex couldn't care less what happened next, so long as he escaped Isabelle's office with his skin intact. Wouldn't put it past her to be vicious just for kicks on the way out.
Isabelle: "Don't forget the coffee," Isabelle added as she moved back to sit at her desk and went to check her email. "Oh, but Alex?" she added quickly, before he had a chance to leave. "I do rather enjoy the reports of just what the rest of the office is saying about me. Useful information along those lines is always appreciated." She gave him the faintest hint of a smile before turning back to her computer and burying herself in her work.