Imperfect Valentine

Valentine's Day.

Different people think about different things when they hear the name of that winter holiday. Most people think about making cards for their friends and family, while others think about that over-sized stuffed animal they're planning to buy for their sweetheart this year. Then there are some people that just start fuming on about how much they hate February 14th.

Me? I've always associated Valentine's Day with one thing.

Money.

"Hey, you!" I stopped for a moment and snapped my fingers as I tried to place a name to the face I was looking at. After about three seconds of drawing a blank, I decided an impersonal nickname would do just fine for now. "New girl! Did all of the Valentine's Day scripts go out yesterday?"

"Goldie," she replied, starring at me blankly.

"What?" I stopped in my tracks for the first time all morning, coffee mug halfway to my lips. When the girl continued to stand there like a deer in the headlights I tried again, "WHAT?!?"

"Sorry, sir! Uh, Mister Head Writer, sir! Um, you see, G-Goldie, that's my name!" The young lady stood there nervously and trembled in her tiny high heeled shoes, probably afraid she was going to get fired during the first week of her new job.

Once she had finally made it clear to me that "Goldie" was her name, I couldn't help feeling like I should probably cut her some slack. Chances were that she had been named after the "Goldielocks" of our fairy tale world. Her parents had probably had high hopes that she would play the role of the next Goldielocks. Despite that, there the poor thing was, failed at that and working as the new secretary for me, the grumpiest gnome this world had ever known.

"Right, good to know. There's just one little problem," I said to her as calmly as I could, impatiently tapping my finger on the rim of my coffee mug to help keep my temper under control.

"Yes, sir?"

"I didn't ask what your name was, I asked if my scripts has been sent out yet..."

"Yes, sir! At least, I think so, sir. Didn't the Snow White script need some last minute fix-ups? Oh wait! I was supposed to remind you to do that, wasn't I?" Her eyes went wide as she suddenly remembered. Somehow she had forgotten to remind me that I still needed to finish one of the most important scripts of the month, a Valentine's Day special for a famous and beloved story.

With blood boiling at this new incompetence, I held tightly to my poor mug's handle. That is, until it cracked from the pressure, broke and sent the boiling hot contents to the floor.

I let it sit there for a moment, waiting for Goldie to react. She did nothing, just stared at the puddle of hot liquid surrounded by the shards of a once cheery looking mug.

"That's the fourth one this week," I said sharply, "Are you going to clean it up or not?"

"Yes, sir!" She yelped in a high pitched tone, then proceeded to run for some cleaning supplies.

Goldie had returned and started cleaning the spilled coffee in a flash, but not before I was already heading to my office to finish the script I was supposed to have done the day before. Gee, if only someone had reminded me.

It was about seven o'clock in the morning on Valentine's Day, so I hoped that if I worked through lunch, I could have Snowy's story by mid-day. Then it would still have time to be delivered and allow the princess and her knight-in-shinning armor to act it out before the end of the day.

Some of you may be wondering why we in the fairy tale world did specialty stories for Valentine's Day, and the answer to that is very simple. In fact, it was the same answer to the question about my favorite part of Valentine's Day.

Money.

You probably already know that the stories that have been acted-out are taken from the Fairy Tale World to the Logical World, (Better known as Earth) where the stories are retold for the enjoyment of humans. What you probably don't know, is that our story tellers that take fairy tales to earth sometimes sell the stories to the humans, so they can make movies, books, and whatnot about them.

So to me, Valentine's Day is an excuse to write cheep and cheesy stories for the saps on earth who want to make side-stories about them for a completely pointless holiday. All I have to do is make an insane amount of money.

"Oh, Mister Head Writer!" I heard Goldie's squeaky little voice call after me as I began to open my office door.

"What is it now? Can't you see I'm busy?" I asked curtly and continued opening the door.

"Well, sir, you don't understand! A visitor arrived to see you earlier, I sent her to your office!"

"Fine, so I'll see them. What about it?"

"Sir, it's not just any visitor, it's-!"

Goldie stopped short once I had opened the door wide enough to see the tiny horror that was waiting for me inside.

"Uncle Head Writer!" Her sing-song voice chimed and her eyes lit up as soon as she saw me.

"Pastel?!?" It was probably more than obvious by my tone that I wasn't particularly excited to see my "niece." Not that I cared if she knew that.

I clenched my fists and made a mental note to make sure that Goldie knew she had to to tell me these things sooner. Not that I wouldn't have let Pastel see me anyway, but it would have lessened the headache that I had gained from finding her sitting in my safe haven.

That may not make much sense to you, but think about it as if you're going to a gathering. Now, you know that someone you find extremely annoying is going to be there, but for some reason or another, you have to go to this event anyway. Being able to mentally prepare yourself to put up with said annoying person is better than having them take you by surprise once you get to the event, right? That's how it was with my miniature relative.

"Happy Valentine's Day, Uncle Head Writer!" The pink-haired pixie exclaimed and she flew toward me.

"You too, kid," I waved my hand as I walked past her, as if it would make her fly away. Then I took my seat behind the large mahogany desk in the room and asked her, "What are you doing here? Didn't I get rid of- I mean, assign you to watch over that Tulla girl's story?"

"Of course you did, silly!" Her cheerful words were accompanied by a laugh that reminded me of a tiger trying to rip out someone's eardrums. Why of all days had I chosen that day to forget my earplugs?

"But I didn't just come to say hi to you," she continued once she'd stopped making that infernal noise she called "laughing." "I also wanted to let you know that Tulla and Rizzi got their Valentine's Day special scripts yesterday evening!"

"Did they now? You know, that one was one of my favorites out of this year's batch," I said with what some people might have called a smile on my face. "How'd they like it?"

"Ummm," Pastel paused for a moment as she tried to recall their reaction, "Oh yeah! Tulla said something about it being 'the silliest piece of nonsensical fluff she'd ever had the displeasure to read' and Rizzi thought it was a joke. That is, until Tulla told him that you stopped telling jokes a few hundred years ago, then he decided the script was just plain insulting."

The tone Pastel said that in was shockingly passive. As if she was telling me that the sun was shinning and it was a completely normal day in the Fairy Tale World, not as if she were telling me that these two kids thought my work wasn't good enough for them!

"They WHAT?!?" I demanded, as if shouting would change the opinion of the script's recipients.

"Uh-huh, and last I knew they were following me over here to come see you and complain! I think Rizzi said something about 'telling that old half-pixie he can't boss us around.'"

Before I even had time to explode over that punk daring to call me a half pixie, (I'll have you know there's no were near that much pixie blood in my system!) there was a soft knock on the door, followed by Goldie's voice speaking through it.

"Sir, one of the princesses is here with her hero, and they'd like to see you right away."

I hesitated before telling her to send the kids in. Although, it turned out that the few seconds that passed between my decision and opening my mouth to summon them was longer than they wanted to wait. Just as I breathed in to give Goldie the okay, Rizzi himself flung the office door open and charged in with Tulla right behind him. Goldie, stood wide-eyed and watched from the doorway. Then, not knowing what else she could do, shut the door behind them and scurried back to her desk.

"Would you mind telling me what THIS is?!?" Rizzi demanded, throwing a surprisingly heavy pile of stapled papers onto my desk.

"That would be your script, son." I replied calmly. Any other day, I might have throttled that brat for disrespecting me, but today I had decided I'd rather just insult him. "Honestly, if you can't figure out something that simple I don't know why we let you play hero for Miss Tulla here."

"Of course that's what it is!" The young man's face was turning beet red by that point, and I wasn't sure I'd ever heard of him being so flustered before. "But what were you thinking when you wrote this?!? This stuff doesn't sound like anything Tulla or I would ever do!"

"Does that matter? Last I knew, you did what I told you to, NOT whatever you thought was best!"

"It's not like Rizzi ever sticks anywhere close to what the script says to do, anyway," Pastel added under her breath.

"What?!?"

"Nothing, Uncle Head Writer."

"If you think we're going to do this, you're crazy!" Rizzi said, returning to our former subject.

"Or I could always fire you and get someone else to do it!" I reminded him.

"Uncle Head Writer, you wouldn't dare!" Shock and horror passed over Pastel's face as she shrieked that phrase right in my ear.

"At least that way I'd still have my dignity intact!" Rizzi replied with a snap.

"Where you serious about firing them, Uncle? Oh, please don't! Please, please, please, please, please, pleeeease!!!"

"Excuse me," Tulla finally spoke up, only barely loud enough to be heard over the commotion "But if I could have a word with The Head Writer, please?"

"So long as you promise not to start screamin'." I replied, sitting down in my favorite chair and rubbing my forehead. The noise level and energy of these youngsters was giving me a headache like no other.

"Thank you," the blonde girl replied, then she softly cleared her throat and continued. "I'm just as upset about the Valentine's Day scripts as Rizzi is, but I came here with the intentions of finding a compromise, rather than just running in demanding satisfaction."

At the last part of her small speech, Tulla sent Rizzi a cool glare. His simple reaction to this was to shrug his shoulder and then lazily sit down in one of the many empty chairs. The young man's temper seemed to be calming already, and he was returning to his usual state of a laid back attitude.

"Yes, your boyfriend here made that quite clear. I get that you don't like what I wrote, but maybe you could tell me why?"

"I think it's because..." Tulla paused for a moment and a slight shade of pink rose to her pale cheeks, "Because of the extremely romantic scene you wrote for us. Rizzi and I, you see, we're not really... Oh, how do I say this? Um, we're not a couple?"

That was what this was about? They were angry because I had asked them to pretend they were a couple for one day, so I could make a ridiculously large amount profit?

How selfish could some people get?

"But you're going to be, whether you like it or not, he's your future fairy tale prince." I kicked my feet up on my desk and gestured to the scruffy-haired boy.

"I know he is," Tulla admitted sheepishly, then turned her gaze from me to the floor, "And I know we're going to have to, you know, at least pretend we like each other one day. It's just that, according to the original scripts that wasn't supposed to happen so soon. I'm not even sure that I could make myself act like the Valentine's Day script says right now."

"Come on, Tutu, it's wasn't that bad." Rizzi said, not even bothering to look up from the snow globe he'd found on my desk and had begun using to preoccupy himself.

"Rizzi, did you even read the whole thing?"

"Of course not, I stopped after the third page of that mushy stuff. Why?"

"Read the last part," Tulla rolled her eyes and handed him the copy of the script he had so kindly slammed on my desk earlier.

After a few moments of leafing through the pages and then scanning the final paragraphs, his eyes went wide.

"A kiss scene!?!" He mouthed in disbelief.

"What can I say?" I told them with a shrug and a chuckle, "People from Earth love the romantic stuff."

"No, no, no! Not now! Not yet!" Rizzi stood up in a flash and leaned across the desk towards me, "I know we'll probably have to in the future, the distant future, but for the sake of all things good and fairy tale-like NOT YET!"

I had expected that these two might squabble a bit over their Valentine's Day story, but I hadn't expected this reaction. Yet there they stood, with Rizzi practically begging me not to force this upon them with Tulla nodded vigorously beside him. I could have threaten to canceled their story again if they didn't comply, and they probably would have cooperated then.

The thing was, sitting there, looking at their frenzied expressions, I realized something. At least these kids were honest, and that was a trait I hadn't often seen among the fairy tale heroes of recent years.

As much as I never would have admitted it out loud, I sort of liked them too. Sure, the boy was pretty ill-mannered, brash, and almost downright stupid in some ways, but he never tried to pretend he was someone he wasn't. Maybe the girl was also a little flighty, controlling, and a tad too concerned with the minor details of life, but she was also dedicated to what she wanted and believed in.

"Fine," I finally said after a lengthy silence, during which I had been pondering the character of the two young adults before me.

"Fine?" Rizzi echoed, as if he suspected me of trying to trick them.

"Yeah, you win." I clarified. Then I walked over to the door, opened it, and sent a command to my new secretary, "Hey, Goldie."

"Yes, sir?" She asked, looking up from the pile of papers on the desk before her.

"Get me a dinner reservations for two at the nicest place in Diamond Kingdom that's not booked up. Oh, and and a pair of tickets for a boat ride on the river, for those two kids that came in earlier, Tulla and Rizzi. While you're at it, get a messenger out to the Goblin Queen at their story and tell her she's got the night off."

"Yes, sir."

"For us?" Tulla questioned, "But, why?"

"Because, it's not like you've got anything better to do this evening, and I can't finish a completely new script in time for you today. Just don't question this unusual kindness from me, or I'll make it go away. Got it?"

"Yes, sir! Thank you, sir!" They both said in unison, still carrying shocked expressions.

"Now get! Can't you see I've got work to do?"

Moments later, just after I'd shoved Tulla and Rizzi out the door, there was just one more "tiny" detail to be taken care of.

"Hey Uncle, why'd ya do that for 'um? You're not usually so nice!"

"I wasn't just being nice, Pastel. I figured you'd know me better than that by now." I smiled devilishly as I walked to the window, waiting to see Tulla and Rizzi walk away from the building and into the city, "There's profit to be made yet."

"How?"

"You, my dear little niece, are going to follow Tulla and Rizzi tonight. I don't buy that malarkey about them not 'liking' each other yet, so you're going to be taking notes of every last thing they do. Then I'll turn that into a story, send it to Earth, and just say it was done free-style!"

"But aren't Tulla and Rizzi gonna act differently if I'm with them?" She questioned, tilting her head to the side ever so slightly.

"That's the beauty of it, they're not going to know you're there!"

"Like a spy?!?" The young pixie's eyes went wide with excitement at the very idea of playing spy for an evening.

"Yes, a spy!" I smiled, playing along in order to ensure that Pastel was inspired to do her mission correctly. "Now, hurry up! Don't let them out of your sight!"

"Okay! I promise I won't let you down!" With those concluding words, Pastel flew out the door with a fire of determination burning in her soul.

Finally, peace and quiet. As walked back to my chair and sat down, a new thought drifted to my mind. Until now, no one had ever questioned my scripts. Then, what had at first seemed like an inconvenience had turned into what was perhaps a more realistic way for me to get a believable Valentine's Day story from Rizzi and Tulla.

Of course, it had only turned out that way because of my superior businessman skills. Like my old father had always told me, "When life gives you lemons, make lemon-aid. And then always give one-hundred and ten percent... Markup, that is."