The Thing About Jessie

Act1

The buzz of Zack’s phone woke him from a catnap, leaving him laying disoriented on the couch as he identified the noise. By the second ring he realized he’d over slept. By the third ring, he realized that it was Saturday and Zack wasn’t around to answer the annoying contraption. Heaving himself off the couch, Sephiroth snagged the receiver before the call got kicked to voicemail.

“Extension 8329.” He sighed, deciding to be anomyous until he found out who it was. Anyone calling Zack on a weekend was either an emergency, or in need of a last-minute date. The first he would have to handle, the second, well, it would be good for a laugh.

“Oie-oie-oie ama-baby?”

The woman’s voice was saucy but sadly unfamiliar. Sephiroth tried to digest the bizarre dialect, the sound was familiar but the words were not. “Excuse me?”

“Z-man?”

“I’m afraid not.” He smirked into the phone. The call was definitely of the social variety, and from the sound of it, his friend was sampling the fruit from back home. Her accent was almost too thick to believe. “You want Zack right?”

“Ya. Who’dis?”

“His supervisor.” Sephiroth drawled. “But I’m afraid he’s not in right now. I’ll take a message for him if you like.”

“Wait… supervisor? What’s your name?” The accent faded to almost-normalcy, making the woman less exotic but considerably easier to understand.

“Sephiroth. What’s yours?”

“Fuck!” She swore sharply, “You’re Sephiroth?! General Sephiroth?!”

“Indeed.” He resisted the urge to quip if that was indeed her name.

“Oh crap, I’m sorry! I can’t believe I just swore at you!” From saucy to frantically apologetic, the woman lost none of her energy. “I mean… Oh… damn. I’m sorry!”

He rolled his eyes. “It’s quite all right. I’ve heard worse. Who shall I say called?”

“Oh,” The woman was still collecting herself. “Um, Jessie. Tell him Jessie called… he was supposed to meet me for dinner, do you know where he is?”

Sephiroth found a blank piece of paper under the fax machine and scrawled a note. “Right. Saturday, five-fifty-three-pm, Jessie called.” He leaned against the desk and realized that the opportunity for mischief was just too good to miss. “Actually he’s already gone out. Something about a date. Point of fact he left yesterday afternoon for a long weekend affair, so I think he was planning to go traveling with someone.”

The silence on the other end of the line spoke volumes. He had nothing against the woman, and was sorry if she was hurt by the news. Honestly he didn’t really care, more interested in seeing Zack’s reaction on his return. Sephiroth didn’t consider his ‘friendly duties’ to extend to covering for the man’s double-booking himself. He could get out of that hot water all on his own. Jealous and petty perhaps, but mostly just damn entertaining.

When she regained her voice, it was remarkably even, her accent coming on a little stronger than before. “Did ‘e mention wi’ who he was heading out to see?”

“Christine P. something, or so says his blotter. I’m afraid I’ve never made her acquaintance.” He replied mildly.

Her reply was muttered, not really meant for him to hear, but the bit of patois caught his attention anyway. She was casually flinging around vocabulary he had never had a chance to hear before now. On a whim he jotted it down on the corner of the page to look up later. Constant interaction with random bush-rats would make him an amateur etymologist yet.

Clearing his throat to catch her attention, he distracted her from her ire. “Was there any message you wanted to leave? A phone number perhaps?”

“Yeah. Yeah you can tell him- Gah! I can’t believe that he- You can tell him that I’m _really pissed at him_ that’s what you can tell him. And then tell him- nah forgit it. Bastard’s not worth it.”

Sephiroth had to smile as he added to his note. “Alright. Let’s see. ‘Saturday five-fifty-three-pm, Jessie called. She said to tell you that she’s really pissed at you.’ That sound about right?”

“Add to that, ‘and she can’t believe you ditched her to hang out with that slut Christie.’ There, that ought to do it.” Jessie agreed amicably. “And that he can go ta’hell if he thinks he’s going to get back into my bar without some _serious groveling_. Yeah!”

Obligingly, he added another line to his note. “I think I’ve got it all down. I’ll just tape it to his phone for him to see when he gets back, shall I?”

“Thank you kindly, General.” Jessie’s voice was rather pleasant when she turned on the charm. “Was a pleasure talk’in to ya. You come down to my bar sometime yeah? I’m right off 22nd and High Street in Sector 2. Drinks would be on me, as many as ya like.”

“I may just take you up on the offer someday, Miss Jessie. Have a good afternoon.”

Placing the phone back in its cradle, he was as good as his word, taping the now-lengthy-note to the top of it where his assistant could get an eyeful come Monday-morning. Deeply amused, he retreated back to his apartment to wait for the real entertainment to begin.

-End Act 1-

-Act 2-

Sephiroth could count the seconds between when he heard the office door open to when the tell-tale crinkle of paper alerted the other resident of the suite to his imminent doom. Zack stood silently reading a moment, and then walked with measured steps to the doorway separating their two spaces.

“General,” his too sweet tone betrayed his annoyance. “Did you talk to Jessie this Saturday?”

“What was your first clue?” Sephiroth didn’t bother to look up from his emails. It wasn’t a proper Monday if he couldn’t wind Zack up about something. The man was so predictable sometimes.

“Oh, I don’t know.” Zack drawled. “Just this little note here.” He cleared his throat and began to read aloud, feeling the need to offer example.

“Zack- Saturday five-pm, Jessie called. Said to tell you that she’s really pissed. Said to tell you that she can’t believe you’re going out with Christie. Said to tell you to go to hell. Cheers. --S.”

He took a breath. “CHEERS, Seph?! What the fuck!”

“I wrote five-fifty-three, as I recall.” Sephiroth smirked a little as he sent a report to the printer. “But yes, that was the gist of the message.”

“Why the hell didn’t you let it go to voicemail?!”

“I thought it might be Scarlet.”

“You still could have sent her to voicemail after you found out who it was.”

“She had the most charming accent. Even odder than yours when you’re completely smashed.”

Zack blinked, digesting the comment. “Well yeah she does, doesn’t she.”

“She even invited me out for drinks, an altogether pleasant woman.”

“Yeah.” He agreed and then shook his head, remembering to be angry. “God damn it, you really think this is funny don’t you?”

“You might avoid these situations by not giving out your work-number in social settings.” Sephiroth calmly sat back in his chair, watching his friend deflate.

“Did you _have_ to tell her about Christie?” Zack almost whined.

“She asked.” He got a suspicious look for his efforts.

“And how did she know to ask?” The dark haired man rubbed his face.

“I believe I mentioned that you were on a date.”

“And _why_ did you do that?” Zack growled out.

“Because she asked where you were?” Sephiroth replied unhelpfully. “If you had wanted a cover-story, you should have warned me before you left.”

“Sephiroth… Remind me to do something really rotten to you later.”

“You can try.”

“Really really nasty, like super-gluing your hair to your desk or something.” His friend vowed.

“You going to call Jessie back and apologize for standing her up?”

Zack cringed, revenge forgotten. “Damn it! Yes! I guess I have to! Damn it to hell- she’s going to kick my ass. You have no idea how long that girl can hold a grudge. I don’t know what the big deal is… not like she doesn’t sleep with-” The man wandered back to his desk, crumpling the note in frustration. The muttering continued for a few more minutes before he put his head down on the blotter with a depressed ‘thump.’

Sephiroth leaned to the left a bit, enabling him to see his partner’s sorrowful state. Deciding to take pity on him, he scrounged up the other bit of paper he had kept from the phone call. “Hey, Zack, what does ‘ Macha’n’Mima’ mean? I tried tracing it back to Wutanese, but the best I could come up with was ‘dick with something’…”

“What?” The southerner looked back at him in amazement. “Where’d you hear _that_?”

“Jessie called you several things on the phone the other day, but that was the only one I jotted down for further study.”

“Oh.” Zack sighed. “That makes sense. It’s um, loosely, ‘penis with ears’. Meant to be insulting and all.”

“Ah.” Sephiroth resisted the urge to grin mostly from long practice, storing the tidbit for possible later use. “Most informative. Thank you.”

“No problem.” Zack replied sourly. “Hey, I’m going down to the cantina to get some coffee, want any?”

“No salt, please.” Sephiroth predicted the childish prank before it could be considered. He was rewarded with a vague ‘damn it’ as the man retreated out the door.

-end Act 2-

“I don’t think she’s forgiven you yet.” Sephiroth noted as they sat at the bar.

‘Ato jou-ya. Thanks for the drinks.” He waved at the woman wiping off the tables. She grinned back, putting her hands on her hips.

“Live’lye’UncleBoney’ until I mi’ya’gain, General!”

Sephiroth nodded gamely and followed Zack out of the building. It wasn’t until they reached the street that he gave up and asked. “Live’lye’UncleBoney?”

“Live like Uncle Boney until I see you again.” The southerner translated helpfully. The clearer wording didn’t bring any additional meaning to light.

He shook his head. “And how does one ‘live like Uncle Boney, pray tell?”

“Well, it’s sorta implying that you live every day and really love it. Sort of along the lines of ignorance-is-bliss, and Uncle Boney is as ignorant as they come.”

“Live like a happy idiot.” Sephiroth mused. “Sounds like Palmer’s philosophy if you ask me.”

“He does have an alarming number of Uncle Boney-ish qualities, yes.” Zack sniggered.

“I think I like her best of all your women so far. Why don’t you marry her?

I would, cept she’s spoken for. Zack laughed. Her heart’s set on Peter Mitou.

And what does Mr. Mitou do for a living?

Cargo crane operator, used to work over in sector5 hauling things up to the plate edge, but took the big development contract in Junon last year when their docks opened for commercial shipping. He’s going to make a killing over there and come back to make Jessie a very rich woman.

He a nice guy?

Oh yeah, really cool. Especially considering that he knows I occasionally sleep with his best girl and doesn’t want to gut me for it. He’s a confident cat. Knows she’ll always come back to him in the end.

He seems to be correct in that assumption.

Oh yeah. She’s crazy for him. Just not so crazy for the whole monogamy thing. Not yet at any rate.

Heh. Sounds like your perfect type.

When she isn’t being all scary? Yeah. She’s a wildcat.