How the World Fell Apart + HS

ii. What do you call a dummy with a phone?

Harry nods to her and continues to totter towards Reeve's office. It's all the way to the back of the room, through a frosted glass door with his name on it. It's on the main path through the office from the front doors because as Reeves would say, 'As the head of the newspaper, and you all as the heart, we must always be talking.' Or something like that.

He approaches the door and knocks on it, waiting for the other man to signal him in. He knocks again, it is loud. The door flies open, and Reeves appears, the usual jacket adorning his upper half nowhere to be seen but his brown suspenders are on full display. There's a cigar in his mouth and his nearly bald head somehow looks...messy. His blue eyes are beady and frantic behind his thin round glasses, "Styles get in here! Now!"

Harry steps in and the door slams shut, causing the voices in the office to quiet momentarily before resuming.

"I—"

"I don't wanna hear it.

Reeves walks behind his desk, motioning Harry to sit on one of the chairs in front of his desk. Harry's feet clunk forward but he makes no movement to sit.

"But Sir I'm sorry I didn't mean to arrive so late. It's just something came up my Uber got stuck in traffic." He could feel the heat creeping on his cheeks towards his forehead. I can't believe I'm lying to the boss's face.

"Styles I said I don't wanna hear it. We've got something happening right now, something bigger, more important, more exciting! Wait taxi? Styles you don't take an Uber you wrote a piece saying you thought they were killing New York culture." His eyebrows close the gap between them, the brown mustache sprinkled with gray hair slanting up the corner of his mouth.

"Well...I...I..."

Reeves raises his eyebrow.

"Okay I was actually at a café when this really weird thing happened. You're not gonna believe it but I promise it happened." Harry rubs his temple as he explains everything, pleading with his boss to believe him. He looks at Reeves who only looks back, his face unreadable. "Ok so there was this uh, big metal ball spider thing and it was shooting lasers and this girl, well girls and guys came and stopped it from destroying the city and I know this sounds completely fake but I swear!" His hands are making a sphere shape, trying to give Reeves a better understanding of what he had witnessed.

"My god." Reeves' left hand goes over his mouth, his index finger and thumb on either side of his mustache stroking it.

"Wait no wait! I have my notes." Harry scrambles to find his journal, patting his jacket pockets and rummaging through his bag.

"Harry, have you seen the videos?"

"Videos?" He recalls those girls on the street corner, but he didn't think anything of it besides him being the dumbest person in NYC and not recording whatever just occurred.

"Everything you just described, there's videos. We're trying to figure out what's going on so we can piece together a story for the front page tomorrow. You're telling me you were there? You saw the people who stopped that thing?"

The younger man nodded, his hands still searching his bag for his scribbled personal account. He feels around for the leather cover, finally finding it. He pulls it out and opens it to the freshly penned encounter.

He reads his notes off to Reeves, going further into detail in some parts to give him a better picture of what happened—what he felt in the moment. Reeves listened with widened eyes, taking in every detail the young journalist had experienced. When he finally finishes, Reeves has the biggest grin on the face; the cigar sticking out of his mouth.

"Styles, your stories have been subpar the past few weeks. They're dull and overdone, we need something exciting and fresh, something new. Something no one's ever done before, no one's ever read before." Harry nods, gulping as ideas race through his mind. Dogs wearing sweaters. Denim on denim. Electric cars. Non-GMO foods.

"Those superheroes we have flying around here. They've gotta have a story; no one knows anything about them. I want you to get in there, find out where they're from, what their stories are."

"Sir, I'm not really-"

"Listen. This could be your big break, Styles. The editor position for the features of the newspaper is open, and I know it's what you've been working towards. You get me a story worth reading, the position is yours. What do you say?"

"Okay." He gulps.

Reeves and Harry finally emerge from the office when Reeves calls a staff meeting; everyone running around through the cubicles listens to whatever announcement Reeves has. Reeves says he wants the current draft of the front page sent to him immediately so he can make changes as they continue to gather information from social media and the press conference from PD.

Harry finally leaves the office and heads to his apartment. By this time the sidewalks aren't as congested by the honking has yet to subside. He makes it to his apartment and finds his roommate in the kitchen cooking spaghetti and meatballs for them; thank goodness, food.

Harry explains to Kenny the day's events which Kenny is shocked to learn his roommate witnessed it all. As Harry explains the assignment he's been given, Kenny looks at him with a worried look.

"So, where do you start?"




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a/n: long time no post. hi. im sorry. 

unedited. probably lots of mistakes. i finally got inspired to write again.