The Intern

Chapter Seven: It's a Date

"So, you are the Ella from high school. I thought so, I mean, from your favorite videos games to the way you drink your coffee. It was too coincidental to not be you," David says hugging me and picking me up from my office chair.
"Las-Dave, I think we should talk about... The fight before you left," I say quietly. David sets me down and looks at me with a frown plastered on his face.
"El, I don't want to-"
"Dave, we'll have to eventually," I say looking down at the ground.
"Ella-Bear, let's just enjoy the fact that we were brought together again," he says putting a finger under my chin and making me look up at him. "Okay?"
I say nothing and nod.

"So, you never realized that David worked here before you interviewed?" Sohinki asks as we sit down at a Mexican restaurant just a short walk away from the office. David sits next to me, Sohinki across from me, and Joven next to him.
"No. I didn't watch any Smosh Games videos before or after I interviewed. I don't know why, I was just more occupied with other things I guess. The only person I really watched on YouTube was Markiplier," I say.
"Yeah, Mark's pretty cool," Lasercorn says.
"Yeah. He said something on the plane about you guys being cool," I state.
"You met Mark on the plane here?" Joven asks. I smile and nod.
"He said he wanted to collab with me one day for our channels, then we exchanged phone numbers," I say excitedly. My phone blares Panic! At The Disco. I look at it Mark(iplier) shows up on the screen. "Speaking of-"
I answer it and get up from the table.
"Hello?" I ask trying to calm myself down. I walk out of the restaurant and stand on the sidewalk.
"Hey, Ella!" Mark chirps happily.
"Hey. What's up, Mark?" I ask.
"I wanted to know when your next day off is. I want to do that collab we were talking about on the plane," he says. I nod, then realize he can't see me.
"Oh, uh, yeah. I'm off tomorrow, we could meet up somewhere. Are we going to your house then?" I say.
"Yeah, we can go to my house. I can meet you at the mall at about twelve..?"
"Sure, sounds good!" I say a little too excitedly.
"See you then."
"See you."
Click.
I walk back inside and sit back down next to David. They all look at me expectantly.
"What?" I ask.
"What'd he want?" Lasercorn asks seemingly jealous.
"Oh, he wants to do a collab tomorrow!" I beam ignoring Lasercorn's jealousy.
"Cool," Sohinki says. I nod. The waiter finally brings our food to our table and we chow down.

I sit in the passanger's seat on the way back from the restaurant. Joven's driving and Lasercorn and Sohinki are sitting in the back.
Lasercorn and Sohinki are filming a vlog and talking about Joven's bad driving. I laugh as Lasercorn says something about Joven being a bronze driver. I've been watching Smosh Games on YouTube more since I got to L.A. and I get that reference.
Sohinki points the camera at me.
"Oh, no. Don't- Don't do that," I say.
"Oh, come on, Ella, you're part of Smosh Games now," Lasercorn says.
"Well, not the part that's on camera," I say.
"You have a YouTube channel, it's the same thing," Joven says. "And besides you being on camera keeps them from ragging on me all the time."
I chuckle. "I suppose."
"Guys, this is Ella, Smosh Games's new intern. Any video you've seen in the past few days has been edited by her," Sohinki says.
"Hey," I say turning around in my seat and waving awkwardly at the camera. Sohinki chuckles at my awkwardness.
We arrive at Smosh Games after a few more jabs at Joven's driving. I get out of the car and close the door behind me. Joven and Sohinki are fighting about Joven's driving. Lasercorn walks next to me.
"Hey," he says.
"Hi," I say. We walk in silence for another few feet.
"So, Ella, you still make videos for your channel?" he asks.
"Well, yeah. I post videos once or twice a week," I say shoving my hands in my pockets.
"Oh," he says simply.
"What are you trying to get at David?" I ask looking up at him.
"Well... I just wanted to know if you'd like to record some stuff for my channel tonight... You know, after work," he says. I look ahead and see Joven and Sohinki have already made their way into the building.
"Uh, yeah, sure. Sounds like fun. What were you thinking about doing for the video?"
"How about we play GTA, since you loved watching the rest of us play it while you were editing," he says. I nod.
"It's a date... I, uh, I didn't mean it like that. I mean, it's not a date, but like it's kinda a date, but not like romantically. I mean-"
"Ella," he says. "It's fine." He chuckles. I feel my face turn bright red. We walk into the building and get in the elevator.
"I'm sorry, David. I didn't mean it like that," I say.
"You don't have to apologize, El," he says with a warm smile. I can't help but smile back and stare into his chocolate brown eyes that I used to get lost in so so long ago. The elevator doors open.
"Lasercorn! Come on we've got recording to do!" Wes shouts happily from the recording room. Lasercorn looks at me and shrugs sheepishly.
"I gotta go, but I'm sure you've got some stuff to do," He says. I nod and walk off to my office.

Later that night, I head over to Lasercorn and Sohinki's apartment to play GTA with Lasercorn. I bring my Xbox One with me because it has all of my stuff on it already.
I walk up to the door and knock a few times. I wait patiently, rocking back and forth on my heels.
"Hey, Ella," Lasercorn says opening the door. I wave, not saying anything. "Well come on in. We've got some gaming to do. Sohinki is going to play with us too, if you don't mind."
"No, not at all. Actually, that sounds like more fun," I say stepping into the apartment. It's laid out exactly like mine, so I just walk into the living room to see Sohinki playing GTA already.
"Dammit," he mumbles as he gets blown up by another player for his bounty. I chuckle. He turns around. "Oh, hey, Ella."
"Hi," I say sitting down on the couch beside him.
"So, Ella," Lasercorn says. "I have two T.V.s and I'll set them up in here so we can play, and I saw that you already brought your Xbox so that works out perfectly."
Lasercorn carries two T.V.s into the living room one at a time and sets them up. I set my Xbox up and he sets up his.

"Officer Corn is on his way to bring down you two criminals," Lasercorn says to Sohinki and I.
"Sohinki, you and I have got to team up to take down Officer Corn," I say. Sohinki smiles and nods at me.
"Officer Corn will not be brought down by two petty criminals!" Lasercorn exclaims shooting a flare at Sohinki and I. I run out of the way, but Sohinki gets hit.
"Ella, run!"
I don't run, instead I take out my rocket launcher and shoot it at Lasercorn's police car. It explodes, killing Lasercorn and giving me a star.
"Sohinki, I think we should get a helicopter and try to get five stars by killing a bunch of military dudes," I say.
"Yeah," Sohinki says. "Then I can parachute out of the helicopter and get a jet."
"I want a jet," Lasercorn whines.
"Then come on, we haven't got all day," I say getting into a helicopter I spawned.

"Dammit! I died," Sohinki says. Lasercorn flies away in a jet.
"I didn't,"Lasercorn gloats. I fly the helicopter away trying to get away from the cops and swat team.

We stop recording and sit back in our chairs. Sohinki stands up. "I'm going to bed. Night guys."
"Night," Lasercorn and I say in unison. We sit in silence for a while and I smile to myself.
"What are you smiling about?" Lasercorn asks curiously.
"Just this week," I say. "It's been really hectic, but also the time of my life. Honestly, if I hadn't gotten this internship, I don't know what I'd be doing right now. I mean, I start my actual college classes in a few days, but if I weren't here, I'd probably still be working at Wal-Mart and going to a small community college in Michigan. This week has just been so... Amazing."
"Don't forget to mention you reunited with your best friend," Lasercorn says. I smile at him and nod.
"And I reunited with my best friend."