2 peas in a pod (George karim x OC~Alice Silver)

1. An interview with the enemy

The train... oh how I hate train journeys. I look around the cart and see a comfortably dressed man picking a booger out of his nose. Ew , I discreetly gag and turn my head to look at the woman in front of me who is nursing a small baby in a yellow onsie. at least this is normal. I close my eyes and try not to focus on my surroundings, the train is rattling on the tracks and ... the man who is picking his nose is gasping heavily for breath. and that is how he breathed for 3 hours and 21 minutes. I smooth out my dress and re-adjust my heels and attempt to relax and drain out his breathing.

I jump to my senses when I hear the baby in front of me crying loudly and the train breaks squeaking to a stop. I rub my eyes with the backs of my hands and sit up from my slouched position to grab my satchel and duffel bag which contained most of my clothes and shoes. As I walk through the station doors I get an overwhelming smell of petrol and stale cigarette smoke. A thick cloud of smoke wafts in front of my face and causes me to choke. I look over to the culprit and see a woman around my age leaning against the wall with a lit cigarette, she notices me looking at her and lifts herself up the wall. she drops her smoke on the floor and stomps on it with her boot.

"wanna buy some relics?" she asks holding out her bag which contains the most beautiful relics with the most horrid screams... too many screams.  I cover my ears to try and stop the terrible shrieks but they just kept yelling. The sound , after a few minutes,  was dulled down and I felt a firm hand on my back. "sorry, I didn't know you could hear them. My names Flo" the girl sticks out her hand, I slowly un-cover my ears to shake her hand. "Alice" I say with a small smile, my ears still ringing slightly from the moments before. "sorry for bothering you , i'll be on my way" she turns on her heel and walks swiftly down the alley near the train station. 

Once my shock and confusion wears off , I stick my hand out into the middle of the road to take a taxi to the only job I could find an ad for in the papers. 

The drive to 35 Portland row felt slow, it was silent too. Once I gave my gratitude and paid the driver. I slowly walk up to the house , it was a decent sized house. like a family home. my heels click of the stone till i reach the wooden door. I take one deep breath to compose myself and reach my hand out confidently to knock, but instead of knocking on a door I land a rather pathetic jab into a boy around my age who seemed to have opened the door before I knocked . I open my mouth in shock horror and take a step backwards to remove my fist off of his chest.  "ow, what did I do to deserve that?" he says in a sarcastic tone. I now take a closer look at the boy , he had curly brown hair which lies nicely on his head, his glasses are brown and he is wearing a lovely orange flannel and some jeans. 

I stare at him abit longer. "are you Arifs new girl?" he asks 

"I...what?"

"Arif.. the corner shop.. usually sends donuts at this time" he pushed his glasses up his nose and looks me up and down. 

"no i'm here for an ad I saw in the paper.. are you?"

"me? no" He says like he had been asked that a thousand times today.

"name?" 

"Alice Silver"

"Interesting..." he pushes his glasses up his nose once again, it is starting to annoy me now.

"thanks...."

"okey-dokey, come in and follow me" he turns swiftly and walks down the beautifully decorated hallway. I step into the home and shut the door behind me , I immediately feel a sense of welcomeness and warmth. I can smell plants and spices and fresh rain.

I follow the curly boy into a room with sofas in it which I assume is the lounge, I see a tall, brunette boy and a shorter , light brunette girl standing by a fireplace. The curly boy coughs to get their attention and they turn around, "Hello, i'm Lockwood and this is Lucy Carlyle" the tall one says. I fumble about in my satchel and pull out my resume to hand to Lockwood "I'm Alice Silver". They both sit down on a chair , Lockwood in the seat and miss Carlyle on the arm, and they look through my resume. "please sit" Miss Carlyle says and gestures towards the sofa infront of theirs. I graciously sit down on the inviting sofa which is ten times more comfortable then it looks. "have you heard of us?" the boy asks , "No" I reply . "would you like some tea or coffee" I think about how dry my mouth is and respond "coffee please, if it wouldn't be a bother" ."George can you go put the kettle on?" Lucy asks the curly boy. "yeah, but shes definitely a bolter" the curly boy leaves 

"you are very skilled miss Silver good at listening, touch , sight. May I ask why you were fired from Fittes?" Lockwood asks with a raised brow. miss Carlyle now takes my resume off Lockwood to get a better look. "well, it wasn't that I was performing badly. I was asking too many questions and snuck onto floors that I wasn't permitted on, I was an active agent there though, one of the most respectable too"

"I see a gap in your resume of at least a year till now" he says "yes... um when I left Fittes my family struggled back home and I decided to take a small break but still help neighbors and friends with their ghost problems to keep my senses sharp"

George comes back with the drinks and some biscuits on a tray. Lockwood and Lucy grin "well then , time to start the tests" he says. I'm mildly confused as the ad didn't say anything about tests but why not go along with it anyway. "I don't like to go by references or referrals I prefer to witness the talent myself" I nodd "please take a biscuit" I look at the plate filled with biscuits held up in front of me , to be fully honest they look sickening "no thank you" I smile lightly fiddling with my hands. George sits down in an armchair across the room from us. Lockwood and George both look at eachother

"now then" Lockwood says and pulls a handkerchief off of a jar with a skull in it. "what do you think this is?" I take a look at it for two moments before my reply "it is  a lovely piece of silver glass made by the sunrise corporation" I tap the glass and the skull makes a horrid face to which I laugh slightly "its a ghost jar, the skull is the source and the ghost is tied to it.not sure what type though.. phantom, spector?"

Lockwood looks at Lucy and back to me "thats right". George picks up a comic and says "she was freaked out by it, you can tell " I look over at him with a stink eye "I can hear you , we are in the same room" .I turn my attention back to Lockwood and Lucy "where did you get the skull , the only place i've seen one is at Fittes". Lockwood smiles "Questions later, now what can you tell me about this?" he reveals another item to be a pocket knife. I pick it up and hold it in my hands , my eyes close and I tune myself into the item "I can hear gun shots and dogs, no violence, just happiness . maybe a hunter" Lockwood is going through some emotions you can tell just by looking at his face , "this belonged to my uncle, he took it with him on hunting trips. had it with him when he died from a stroke , nice bloke".

another item in revealed to be a watch , I pick it up and Lucy gives Lockwood a death stare and whispers to him. "this item has lots of death , horrid death. probably shouldn't use this for interviews " I put it down with the best show smile I could put on my face. "memento of my first successful case, wanna hear about it?" Lucy jabs him in the side . I laugh shakily and shake my head. 

the last item is a cup, I pick it up and stare at it for a moment "this..." i hold it up " is a toothbrush cup" I put it down and Lockwood chucks it back to George with a laugh, Lockwood taps lucy on the leg "she got it faster than you did luce". I pick up my bags which I had previously discarded next to me and stand up "I didn't come here to play about, I came here to find a job." Lucy stops me as I try to leave "please stay they did this to me too , its harmless humor " she smiles. "I don't think i would want to work in a place run my schoolboys playing agent till their parents get home " I start to walk out the door freeze in my place when I hear "her shoes are ugly anyway". i spin around and defend myself because these are my favorite shoes. "ha, my heels probably cost more than your pathetic comic and yourself combined"

"bet you cant fight with a rapier in those heels"
"wanna test that theory curly?"

"I might goldilocks"

"You're not getting up, you scared?"

"I am getting up, this is just a deep armchair"
"I'll wait" I cross my arms

"I am so sorry about their behavior but you are phenomenal and this would be the most haunted cup in London if half the stories were true" Carlyle says and holds out her hand "welcome to the agency, if your still interested?" I shake her hand "yeah thank you." I say calmly, mentally comforting my shoes as they have never been insulted like that before. "I'll show you to your room"

Lucy leaves and I follow with her leaving Lockwood and George with eachother

~Lockwood's Pov~
George looks over to me after chucking his comic down " I hate her " He says " give her a chance mate , I think you'll like her "
" I will never like her , she punched me as soon as I opened the door " He says and pushes his glasses up
" you'll like her eventually"
I saw how he glared at her but he did that with Lucy too he would warm up to her eventually.