The time one spends driving to work is usually rather uneventful. You get stuck at traffic lights, you drive behind the slowest cabbie in the world, you stop to let a stray dragon cross the street...boring things. Sometimes you take the time to drink some coffee, make a phone call, or even start work on that short story you've been meaning to write. You can do as you please, safe in the certainty that nothing will happen any differently from any other mor--
And then you slam on the brakes as a man sprints in front of your car, and hope not to be rear-ended.
"Duke! What are you doing?"
Duke Seltzer, now standing safely by a lamppost on the opposite corner, looked up in confusion. He was exceptionally tall and lean, dressed in a business suit, whose jacket now hung crookedly from his shoulders. He had apparently never learned how to properly tie a tie, as the one he wore had come unknotted and was in danger of falling off. His blond curls stuck out wildly from his head, in disarray only partly due to his mad dash across the street, and his glasses were sliding down his nose. He looked like the least responsible person you could ever meet.
This was not far from the truth.
His companion, the woman who had shouted at him, stood across the street, arms crossed. Clearly possessing greater wisdom in the art of street-crossing, she waited for the light to change before running after him, long dark hair flying out behind her, black shoes splashing unnoticed through nearly-fresh puddles. She began shouting the moment she hit the curb. "You idiot! What the hell was that?"
"I--"
"You could have been killed!"
"But--"
"What is wrong with you?"
"Rebecca--"
"What?"
"Er." He looked rather nervous, understandably so. "I'm sorry?"
"Are you?"
"Yes..." He glanced at his shoes. "Is it such a big deal?"
"Yes."
"Oh. I am sorry, then. I just wanted to see what this was." He held up a ragged scrap of paper, soaked from the recent rain, a few words in scrawled ink bleeding through to the other side. "It's not as interesting as I'd hoped, just someone's address, but running across streets is fun, at least." He grinned.
Rebecca glared at him for a moment more, then sighed and shook her head. "What am I going to do with you?"
"We could go get coffee."
"You know that's not what I meant. Be easier to stay mad at, damn you."