Chapter 133: First Impressions

One second felt like two. Two seconds felt like three. The moment itself just seemed to keep stretching to unforeseeable limits. It certainly was long enough for Irene to go about calmly reverting things back to how they once were. 

Shutting drawers, closing cabinets, Howard's table spick and span once.

She never really bothered to tell me just what the heck she was looking for rummaging around his desk and squinting narrow eyes at his bookshelf, but going by the way she was so frantic and urgent about it, could kinda guess it must be something pretty significant to the matter at hand.

Something tells me I'm about to find out what it was pretty soon.

The door slowly creaked open.

Stepping through came a wide smile, a wiggle of skinny fingers, and Jay's lanky self made a grand return, holding what looked like a thick brown ledger in his hands.

"Missed me?" He said, greeting us with cheer.

Judging from the silence he got back from us audience, not particularly, no. 

Irene was just about done playing the waiting game, abandoning all pretense of politeness, stomping a step forward, her eyes in a glare. "Jay. Howard now - where is the guy?"

"Here! Here!" A voice, wasn't Jay's, swung the slightly parted door wide open. "Didn't realize I was so needed, wow."

Compared to slouching, banal, boring Jay that stood right beside, the person that just walked in bloated the atmosphere with such confidence and pompousness in his stride, that it was verging on being aggravatingly overbearing, standing high and mighty at nearly a foot taller than Jay's already tall stature, permeating an air about him that wouldn't stop reminding me of a peacock fanning out its tail.

That stubbled, bespectacled, casually-dressed man from Amanda's blog has made a drastic turnover in appearance following the year since. He was barely recognizable through all the glitz and glamour - wearing a nice expensive suit, slicked-back wax-coated hair, and no stubble nor glasses in sight, it was as if I was looking at a completely different person.

But there was no mistaking that wide smile plastered across his face, that was the one thing from the photo left that remain unchanged. Howard Philips finally, in the flesh.

His ocean-blue eyes surveyed the room, his gaze meeting our own one by one, smiling wider with every passing face.

"You know, usually I don't really do these things unless there was an appointment made beforehand," He said, stepping deeper in. "This case, I'm willing to make an exception - Jay said it was pretty important, after all."

"No doubt about it," Irene muttered quietly, folding her arms close to her waist.

"So what's this, eh?" Howard asked, stretching his arms wide. "Another interview? Questions about our new game, is it? I already told the other guys I'll be keeping mum on any details. If that's what you're here for, I'm afraid I'm gonna have to disappoint."

He turned to Jay. "Jay, you know you didn't really give me any details here."

Jay raised his hands. "They didn't give any particulars as well, sir. All they claimed was that they needed to see you urgently. Friends of Amanda too…"

"Ahh, Amanda," Howard spoke longingly, staring blankly away at the ceiling so fondly. "Lovely girl, pretty girl too… been quite a while since I've last seen her. Do hope she's okay with everything that's going on. She doing good?"

That question he directed towards me, raising his eyebrows to their highest peak.

"Amanda's fine," I answered.

"Ah, good, good to hear," He nodded his head. "Very good. Tell her to come again soon, will you? I'm looking forward to her next visit."

I batted my eyelids, allowing myself one long blink and peek into the darkness that laid beneath - and like a windmill in a raging whirl, the magic that permeated, that enshrouded the room, the whirrings and buzzings all this time, it remained steady and strong. 

I opened them again to a view of Howard standing front and center, and Jay slinking along close behind him like an object fading into the background. 

Irene didn't like that. She turned to him. "Jay, leave the room please."

While the sudden frigidness in her voice caught him totally blindsighted, Jay kept a smile, though looking a tad more rigid than the last. "Uh, okay… why though?"

"Yeah, why?" Howard asked, his lips shaping into a bemused frown. "That's a little uncalled for, don't you think?"

Without skipping a beat, Irene delved a hand into her blazer and pulled out a bright gold badge portraying the symbol of absolute authority. "I'll be the judge of that."

Didn't even know she had her badge tucked underneath all that, especially with how neglectful and tipsy she had been prior to today. Guess the detective in her never left after all.

Irene again drifted her piercing gaze to Jay, nudging her head to the open doorway. "Jay, out now if you'd be so kind. Your boss and I need to have a little private talk with one another."

Jay needn't telling thrice, nodding his head at her in complete submission. "Right. Okay. Uh, Mr. Philips… I'll just go, uh… this ledger from finance… yeah, I'll go put it back."

Just like that, bye-bye went the lighthearted atmosphere, gone along with Jay, ledger tightly in his clutches, backing away out the door, shutting firmly close with a resounding click.

Irene with the badge took all of Howard's undivided - His staring keeping tethered to her own as he warily proceeded to walk the length of his office, settling down in his chair, shifting himself closer to the desk, elbows up and hands clasped against one another.

More perplexed than unnerved, he cleared his throat. "How can I help you, officer?"

It was times like these that I was glad I picked up Irene along for the ride, because the question and answer game was one I badly played, whereas she on the other hand was essentially a grandmaster playing in the kiddie league.

"You can start from the beginning," She said, stowing away her badge. "And do it without the pretense if you could, we already know."

Hearing that, Howard looked as if he just choked on his own saliva. "You… you do?"

"Didn't think you could hide it that easy, did you?"

"Aw man…"

"Time's ticking," Irene placed her hands on his desk. "Start talking."

Slowly, but surely, his haughty bravado came collapsing from within itself. First to go was that inflated sense of self-confidence, as he began to wipe buckets of swept from his forehead.

Suddenly he didn't seem too fond of Irene's burrowing gaze, and averted his own elsewhere, blowing a breath, his eyes shifting, looking then landing, sticking, batting disbelieving eyes to the Elf standing quietly off to the side.

Ash stared back.

Few moments, long moments, of nothing but those two, their eyes locked onto one another. Unlike Jay, unlike Mr. Santa-Beard guy, Howard did more than just marvel. His stare had more than just awe, more than just admiration.

Didn't really know exactly to describe it. But it was quite a profound thing to bear witness - together in a space so quiet and still, the creator and his creation.

And the creation took a step forward to her creator. "Answer her…" she spoke. "Explain it all."

I'm sure Ash had her own beef with Howard, her own questions that needed answering, but that's gonna have to wait its turn, for far more important things were at hand here.

Could see it in the widening of his eyes to hers, what they meant, 'Sounds like her too'... of course she does, why wouldn't she, Howard?

"Talk," I said, drawing myself closer from the right. 

Three against one now, Howard didn't seem to know what to do with himself, nowhere else to escape his eyes to, he started staring into his hands, slowly shaking his hand. 

"Don't you need a warrant first though, officer?" He said quietly.

"For what you did?" Irene nearly laughed. "Are you being serious?" 

"It was just one time."

"I don't care."

"But I wasn't hurting anybody," He said, staring back up at her, his eyes almost pleading. "I was just having fun with it." 

"Fun?" An echoing slam, and suddenly my hands were also spread flat out on his desk. I was boiling, seething… fun? Everything everyone went through… Ash, Ria, Adalia and so many countless others - that was all just fun to him?

Not having it. Wasn't having it.

There was a window in his office that offered a view of the city landscape - an empty barren blacken view… because fun, yes?

"Look out there, you look," I pointed a finger towards it. "Is decaying the city really your idea of a good time?!"

Howard trailed my finger, staring out into the city streets, it stared there for a moment before landing back on me. 

"What?"

I could have fuckin' strangled him. "What do you mean what?! You blighted the entire world!"

He's playing dumb, he's gotta be playing dumb. That's the only reason why he was staring at me so confused, the only reason why kept that dumbfounded look, why his lips were shaping out the last thing I wanted to hear from him.

"Dude, I have no idea what you're talking about."