Alec's coming over for dinner!

Newspaper nerd gets an offer he can't refuse...

Each day, Alec sat at the same desk and worked with a dedication and work ethic that made the rest of the staff look like a bunch of lazy slackers. He worked hard on his enigma and making sure that every word and syllable fit perfectly into the colossal masterpiece that he was designing. A single mistake could result in hours of revisions and Alec would never allow that happen. Pretty soon, many people in the newsroom learned to pretty well leave nutty little Alec alone when he was in the zone and hard at work. He also never left his desk, not even for lunch. The only things Alec would consume from nine in the morning until his deadline at five in the afternoon was a twelve pack of Coca-Cola and a box of ten granola bars that he re-supplied every morning on his way to work. He came into work everyday dressed in a dark blue dress shirt, black dress pants and the same red tie that still had a stain of sauce on it since last year�s office barbeque. Whenever Alec finally finished his work and submitted it into the editors for print, the first thing he would do is bolt for the bathroom and relieve himself of the liquids he was filling his bladder with for the past eight and half hours. Yet one fine Thursday afternoon, just as Alec was getting back to his desk after submitting his work and relieving his bladder, something happened that he didn�t expect.

"Hey Alec, can I speak to you for a moment."

"Yeah," Alec responded as he cowered over assuming that he was in some sort of trouble, "Can I help you with something, Ms. Wilson?"

"You can, Alec." Ms. Wilson said as she walked over to meet him halfway across the room, "I am going over to my parents place for dinner tonight. They expected me to introduce them to my new boyfriend, but thanks to his inability to keeps his hands to himself, we're no longer an item."

"So what do you need me for then?" Alec said a little relieved that Ms. Wilson wasn�t going to yell at him for stealing pens from the storage room again.

"I was wondering if you wanted to take his place at dinner tonight. You get a free and very fantastic meal to eat, and I don�t have to be lectured or worse... set up with any number of losers that my parents feel are 'perfect' for me. So what do you say?" Ms. Wilson asked as she gazed into Alec'a eyes, trying to figure out what was going through his functioning yet inferior brain.

"Why me?"

"Because if I asked any other guy in here, they would take it the wrong way and assume that I really do want to go out with them. You know for a fact that I am only offering you a homemade meal, good company. I might even toss in few boxes of pens if you�re a good boy at the table tonight."

As much as Alec hated to eat with a lot of people watching, the idea of a home cooked meal sounded a little more appealing than his cooking, which was flat out awful. He was also running out of pens, "All right, Ms. Wilson." He suddenly blurted out, "When and where?"

"Right now, and you can call me Angela. I don�t think this would work very well if you called me Ms. Wilson at dinner, would it?" Angela retorted as she grabbed her coat, "We�ll take my car. Grab your coat and we�ll leave in a few minutes."

The drive out was quiet and very restrained, as Alec was content to look at all the fancy houses that were lined up on the street. The massive structures looked like a line of soldiers waiting to be inspected by an Admiral, standing tall and ready to look their best. As the car finally pulled into the drive after being on the road for about forty-five minutes, Angela basically gave him some last minute instructions. He was to eat, act polite and just pass all questions onto her so that she could lie and bullshit as much as she wanted to about their imaginary relationship. Alec didn�t care and agreed as he stepped out of the car and walked over to the door. Once inside, he could tell that it was a huge dwelling, one that made Alec�s poor little downtown apartment look like a rat hole, but at least it was his rat hole. As he strolled into the enormous house, Angela�s parents came out of the living room to greet them both.

"It�s very nice to meet you Alec." Angela�s mother said with a wide grin.

Alec smiled back, and tried to think of the most polite thing he could say: "When do we eat?" he suddenly blurted out.

"A man with a strong appetite!" howled her father with a smile, "A man after my own heart. When do we eat, Martha?"

"It�s ready now, I was going to wait but if everyone is hungry I guess we could start now." She said as they all walked into the dining room. Alec couldn�t help but see Angela�s small grin, as she was happy to see things were moving quicker than she had anticipated. They all sat down at the table as the first course was being served. Alec cleaned through the small seafood salad rather quickly. He liked fish and other stuff that came from the sea, but this was the first time he ever ate it with lettuce. The next course was Lamb chops, that was served with a variety of small sides of vegetables. As Alec was chewing on a piece of Lamb, that is when Mr. and Mrs. Wilson started to speak.

"So..." she said with a casual ton as she turned to face Alec, "Do you work at the newspaper with Angela?"

Alec paused for a moment and then spoke when he finished with what he was chewing, "Yes Ma'am." He replied as politely as he could before taking another big bite out of what was on his plate.

"What kind of work do you do for the paper?" Martha inquired, as she was eager to hear what the young man did for a living.

"He works on a very challenging and thought provoking part of the paper, mother." Angela said as she finally joined the conversation.

"Really!" her father replied as he seemed more interested, "What part of the paper would that be? The Editorial?"

"No, Sir." Alec answered as he paused for a moment, "I actually write and assemble the Crossword Puzzles for the newspaper."

Both Martha and her husband sat at the table in silence, as they really didn�t seem to have a response to the information they was just passed their way. Alec resumed eating his Lamb chops as he was really surprised by how good they were. They resumed with idle chit chat later on when dessert was served but managed to get through the meal rather quickly as they didn�t want to seem impolite or rude merely because of what Alec did for a living. Angela then ended the night as she said that both her and Alec had to be in early for work the next day. Both of her parents were very polite as they could be as they walked their guests to the door and saw them out. As the car pulled away, Angela was more than pleased that her parent's third degree of their relationship was torpedoed by his profession. She told Alec that she would give them a story of their apparent breakup a week later to end the fiasco.

Alec on the other hand managed to get a lot more out of the bargain. He got to eat an incredible meal, and even got his hands on a dozen boxes of pens from Ms. Wilson for doing so well. Things seemed to be going rather well until he got a phone call the next week about halfway through the day's project. He was told some guy on line six wanted to speak with him. Despite his confusion, Alec picked up the phone, "Hello?"

"Alec! It�s Mr. Wilson, Angela�s father."

What the hell did he want, Alec thought as he held the phone in stunned silence. Even though he was not impressed with the interuption of his work, he still wanted to be polite, "Can I help you with something?"

"Yeah, I've got a problem that requires your expertise. What�s the answer for 43 across? The 8 letter word for scheme."

"Umm, it�s... let me see..." He opened his desk and filed through a few papers, "That would be conspire."

"Brilliant! And what about 25 Down?"

Alec paused for a few minutes, and suddenly began to realize that Mr. Wilson was never going to leave him alone. He was going to call everyday with questions about the puzzle he created the day before. How could he ever get any work done with this looney calling him up all the time asking his for answers to a question that even a f*****g twelve year old could solve. It was a situation he slowly began to dread, "LEAVE... ME... ALONE!!!" and with one spur of rage, Alec picked up the phone, ripped it out of the wall and hurled it at the wall. Yet with his bad aim, it managed to shatter the window of the office that belonged the Chief Editor.

Alec was suspended, with pay for two weeks and ordered to seek psychiatric help. The time at home actually allowed Alec the space he needed as he continued his work and resumed his undertaking and kept writing. He was determined to get a week ahead of schedule so that he wouldn�t freak out the next time someone interrupted his method of operation.