The Adventures Of Captain Dither: Can We Get a Reboot of Love Connection or Has That Already Been Done?
Captain Dither was flabbergasted. He grabbed his forehead and sat down in his chair, as if he had a headache. "Wait a minute..." He began. He didn't really know where to start. "That... that was you."
"Yup!" Nick beamed back. "I had you really going, didn't I?"
"I SPENT...!" Captain Dither cringed. He didn't mean to yell. "I mean... I spent the whole day waiting... I'm lucky I was able to publish a cat video for Miss Jay."
Nick chuckled. "I've been watching those. I always thought that Miss Jay's cat was cute. It's a shame that I never thought to do more than use them in company meetings."
"Maybe you got distracted by something." Captain Dither suggested. "I'm thinking of releasing a whole DVD of Miss Jay's cat and marketing it for children."
"Maybe." Nick said. "Awesome idea about the DVD. What else are you working on? If you don't mind my being nosy."
"Pshaw!" Captain Dither waved Nick away. "You aren't being nosy. Pfft. Without you. I wouldn't be here nor would I be running the place. Well..." Captain Dither's eyes rolled up, into the back of his head while he thought a minute. "My brother is a comedian. He performs under the name Harry Oatmeal. I asked him if he'd be interested in filming a comedy special here. And he said 'Yes." Captain Dither smiled to himself. "The first day he came to visit. Miss Jay brought him to my office."
Nick raised his eyebrows. "Miss Jay? She's incredibly shy with people she doesn't know."
Captain Dither nodded. He remembered his first day meeting Miss Jay. She seemed odder than her cat.
"How did she take to your brother?" Nick seemed genuinely curious to know.
"Oh, fine, I guess." Captain Dither shrugged. He still hadn't figured out all her quirks. He was too busy falling all over himself to be nice, charming, and not upset her. "Why do you ask?"
"I don't know." Nick smirked, remembering her. "She's just... Well you know. Miss Jay!"
"Yeah!" Captain laughed. "I know exactly what you mean. When my brother came to see me and check out the place, she dragged him here by the hand from wherever he had found her. Tch! The look on his face when he arrived was priceless!"
Nick closed his eyes to imagine it. He bit his lip and held his breath. It was all he could do to keep from laughing. "Where's your brother, now?"
"Working on his routine for the special." Captain Dither said. "We film it tomorrow morning."
Nick nodded his approval. There was a moment of awkward silence. Nick drummed his fingers on his knees. Finally, he broke the ice. "So.... about this personal assistant role?"
"Nick!" Captain protested and was stopped by Nick raising his hand.
"No." Nick shook his head. "As much fun as my joke was, I was being serious. I would like to be your assistant."
Captain Dither was about to protest further, but stopped. He could tell by the look in Nick's eyes that Nick was serious. "Ok." Captain Dither sighed in resignation.
"Good." In truth, Nick missed the old place. He missed Captain Dither and Miss Jay. He was glad that they were doing well. They were having fun. They'd had fun when Nick was running things. Nick missed the fun. He wanted to come back. "What would my duties be?"
"Um..." Captain Dither scratched the back of his head. He went to the notes he'd written for Cat Video. "Uh... I jotted this down for Cat Video." He handed Nick the piece of paper that he was working on.
"I see..." Nick took the paper. He glanced it over. "handle phones and deal with phone tag? Haha. That always annoyed me, too. I can do that. Schedule appointments? I can handle a schedule. I make my own schedule." Nick continued scanning the document. "Yes, I can type. Not sure how fast. I'd never thought about it, before."
"Neither have I." Captain Dither responded. "I thought I might have Cat Video help with typing up scripts and making copies."
"That sounds reasonable to me." Nick agreed.
A wicked grin spread itself across Captain Dither's face. "Would you like to try a typing test?"
"A what?" Nick echoed with a question of his own. He had never heard of such things either.
Captain Dither typed something into Google on his desktop. "This." He waved Nick around the desk to look at the screen.
Nick laughed and came around the desk. He read the instructions on the screen. "Seems straightforward, enough. What's a good typing speed, do you think, for an assistant?"
"Try the test and see." Captain Dither didn't want to spoil anything. Even though, after his dismal attempt, he still had no clue what a good typing speed was.
Nick cocked an eyebrow at Captain Dither. Then, he smiled and clicked the button to start the test. When he saw the first paragraph that he had to type he scoffed. "This is not serious." He stared at Captain Dither instead of typing in the box.
"You're wasting time..." Captain Dither warned, smiling.
"Right." Nick said putting his fingers to the keyboard. He hunted and pecked cursing himself under his breath every so often. Finally, at the end, he wiped his brow. He looked at his score and winced. 10% accuracy and 26 WPM
Captain Dither looked at the score, as well. He chuckled to himself. "Well, you're slightly faster than me." Captain Dither admitted. "But that accuracy.... oof!"
"Really?" Nick grinned.
"There's a button to print your score." Captain Dither explained. "Would you like to take it with you?"
"Ick!" Nick commented, making a face at his score. "Maybe not. I want to practice a bit and try again."
"Sure." Captain Dither smiled.
"So..." Nick fidgeted. "Do I get the job?"
"Hmmm..." Captain Dither smirked, pretending to think about it. "I guess." Captain Dither laughed at his own joke. "Do you think you might need a tour?"
Nick's eyes lit up as he remembered the situation, but reversed. When Captain Dither joined the crew. "I might." Nick returned the smile. "For all I know you've completely messed up the place." Nick stood up from the computer.
"Come on." Captain Dither moved to the door and held it for Nick. "I'll show you around." As Nick was exiting, Captain Dither grabbed his phone off the desk. "I was trying to order some food when you arrived. What do you like on your pizza?"
"Oh, you don't have to do that." Nick suddenly felt sheepish.
"Don't worry about it." Captain Dither comforted Nick. "You started me here...!" Out of nowhere, the phone in Captain Dither's hand started playing the song 'Alley Cat.'
Without looking at the caller ID, Captain Dither could tell it was his brother on the other line. He had assigned a special ringtone to his brother. Whenever he heard it he knew Harry was calling. "Hold on, Nick. I got to take this. Its my brother. He only calls if its an emergency." Captain Dither poked and swiped the screen. "Harry?! I can't hear you! Can you turn the music down?! What?!" Captain Dither shook his head. "WHAT!?" He put the phone on speaker. He could hear Peter Gabriel being played very loudly in the background. "Ok, I got you on speaker. What?!"
"Dave?! Its Harry!"
"I know! Go on!"
"It's Miss Jay! She's here and got one of those old fashioned boomboxes! You know the big ones from the '80s!"
"Yeah...?" Captain Dither was growing impatient and developing a headache from the music. At the mention of Miss Jay's name, Nick leaned closer to also listen in.
"I don't know what's going on!" Harry continued. "She just showed up with the boombox and started playing it loud outside my apartment! I'm not sure what to do? I don't want to call the cops on her. Can you come help?"
"Sure, I'll be right there." Captain Dither stared into his phone, perplexed. He glanced at Nick. He saw Nick nod in silent agreement. "I'm going to bring someone with me. He's known Miss Jay a long time. Maybe he can talk some sense into her."
"Got it!" Harry paused on the other end of the line. "Hurry! I don't know how much more of this I can take!" The other end of the clicked silent.
"What could have gotten into her?" Captain Dither posed the question to Nick.
"Sounds like she's been watching too much television, again." Nick shrugged. "Come on. We'd better take my car. It'd be faster that way. You'll have to give me your brother's address to plug into GPS."
"Yeah, no problem about that." Captain Dither replied, grabbing his coat and giving Nick his brother's address.
"By the way..." Nick pressed a button on his key-fob unlocking his car for Captain Dither to get in on the passenger side. "You ever ride in a BMW?"
Captain Dither felt himself sink in to the expensive leather seat. It was like sitting on a cloud. Captain Dither enjoyed the additional luxury of imagining possibilities for the future.