Chapter Text
Berdly woke up to a call from "Scam likely". 5 minutes later, his actual alarm sounded. He then showered, brushed his teeth, and got dressed. He opened the front door and quickly shut it with a slam. It was a very bright day that day. He figured he should've expected this from 5:30pm in the middle of June. To be fair, it was a mostly cloudy week.
Eventually, after a process of microdosing sunlight into his apartment by slowly uncovering the windows, Berdly was ready for departure. Today's hopefully gonna be a good day, he thought. He meant it, too. A couple days ago, Noelle reached out to him for the first time in a year. She said she was in town and was open to reconnecting with him at QC’s. He told Catti about this but she seemed disinterested as usual. He covered his eyes as he opened the door. Hopefully, he repeated as he fiddled with his keys for a solid minute until he found his apartement's.
As much as jarring as the sunlight was, QC’s Diner was within walking distance from Berdly’s apartment building. He got in his car, anyway. He was tired and still way too bright. When he got there, he swiftly settled himself in the south-west-most booth; anything farther back would be in line-of-sight of both the front door and the windows. The window-light only hit the seat opposite of him. He ignored a second spam-call and settled himself in. By the time Noelle arrived, Berdly had his social prowess prepped and his phone silenced.
“Hey Berdly! Sorry for contacting you on such short notice. I don’t know how booked your life is,” Noelle said as she sat across from Berdly. She was almost unrecognizable. Her hair was cut shorter but dyed and was more detailed. She had earrings, too. Though, likely for the sake of the occasion, she kept her piercings simple and wore a familiar green and red shirt.
Berdly paused for a moment. “Good afternoon, Noelle,” he recovered. He also looked different. His feathers were disordered and he had dark rims under his eyes. He had a coffee stain on the button up he wore, too. “And no worries! While my occupation is demanding, it possesses a flexible work-flow. In fact, that's why I don't seem as straightened up as normal. You never know when duty calls!” Most of that was true.
Noelle seemed to accept that perspective. "I understand. Susie has accepted keeping her camera on hand wherever we travel just in case we stumble into anything content-worthy. And Kris is able to show up prepared whenever we need them to as well. We don't even tell them half the time, fahaha!"
"Film?" Berdly inquired.
"Yeah. I started a Spooktube channel. Are you familiar with the 'Old World'?"
Berdly nodded. It was briefly covered in training.
"We decided it was the perfect opportunity to make content. Just me, Susie, Kris, Jockington, and the 'Diving Bell'!" Noelle explained. Then, after a pause, she asked "But, enough about me. What's going on in your life? I hope you're not still stuck on volunteer work, are you?" And as a spontaneous follow-up: "I never took you for a breakfast-for-dinner kind of person before."
He wasn't. He chose to respond only to the second question after taking a bite of his breakfast-for-breakfast. "Again, I was contributing to society. The work at the library was therapeutic, too. Of course, not as therapeutic with two delinquents harassing me!" he argued, taking a jab at Kris and Susie.
Noelle ignored the jab and that topic all-together to circle back to her original question. She repeated, "Yeah but… what are you doing now?"
Berdly wished he could say he was a college student like Temmie. Or some sort of scientist or acclaimed author or teacher. What he did not want to say was that he was an intern at the only place that would take him: Paranormal Investigations LLC. A contractor that hunts--no--identifies paranormal activity so that actual ghost hunters know what they're up against. Specifically Hometown Paranormal Investigations because for some reason, Hometown seemed to be the region's center of paranormal activity. Berdly didn't know whether to blame Catti, Kris, or the Blook family for that.
"..." He stalled. "... Uh… I do paranor…" Too late now. "Mal stuff like you." he said, his voice growing confident. "Yeah. Yeah! I work with Catti on it. Our line of business is to scour a residential building, recording evidence and clues," he elaborated. This was kind of half-true. Him and Catti were just the driver and equipment manager, respectively. It was the others who actually went inside of the houses. But he felt confident in it for the first time in a while.
"Interesting," Noelle said. Berdly missed talking to her like this. He just wished he was less of an asshole in the days he was able to. She then considered something he said and asked, "Wait? You said you work with Catti? She said she was busy when I invited her."
Busy? Berdly wondered. Him and Catti worked around the same time of night. She didn't tell him she had work when he asked her, either. "Well, I guess I'll tell her you said hi if you want," he said, furrowing his brows. "Maybe I could also see if her schedule has some openings in the near future."
"Thanks for that."
It was that point when Berdly felt two buzzes in his pocket. He had set up his phone with unique buzz patterns for different types of notifications. This one was all too familiar. He slouched over and sighed.
"What's wrong, Berdly?" Noelle asked.
Then, Berdly remembered that she was under the impression that he loved his job so he straightened back up with a grin. "My team needs me. I must away!" he enunciated. For a brief moment, he felt what he said to be true. He felt as if he was in high-school again.
Noelle thought for a while, considering what her parting words would be. Eventually she landed on, "Kris got a new phone number, by the way."
What? Huh? Whatever, it probably doesn't matter… Berdly reasoned. He had zero idea what that could have meant but the others really did need him (even if all they needed him for was for transportation) so he couldn't afford to stall. But he did offer Noelle a passing glance as the door chimed open and a second as he passed by the window in his car. She was looking out the window, sipping her coffee. The few remaining rays of light from the evening blanketed her.
Then, after two right turns, all that was behind him. That was nice while it lasted, Berdly thought. When he got to the Hometown P.I. office, he strode up, swiftly slid the office key in, and clicked the door open and shut, all without losing his momentum. At the company printer, he swiped the pinned file and produced his steno notebook and his pen to begin the transcribing process. Then, he tore it off and stashed a piece of tape in his ring finger as he walked towards the van. He started it and waited… and waited… and checked the time… and……
Oh, Catti! She was at her usual desk spot in the corner on her phone. Berdly must've not noticed her entry as usual. Berdly didn't exactly know how ease in to what he wanted to say so he just blurted, "Noe-"
"I don't care," Catti said. And that was that. Berdly was just about to turn his back when she added, "Also, Blue Ears and Burgerpants resigned."
Berdly suppressed a groan. Although they added way too much unresolved romantic tension to any room they were both in, they were quite efficient at their job. On the bright side, their resignation implied a positive outcome to that tension. Catti did not exist on that side, though, which probably explains her mood. "That's unfortunate to hear. Who's resuming their role?" he inquired.
Catti simply pointed to him and herself.
This flustered Berdly to an embarrassing degree. He stuttered, "T-then who's assigned to our tasks??"
Again, Catti pointed to him and herself.
This prompted Berdly to pace around the room several times wondering how to react to this news and what to do about it before he decided on taking solace in the van. It didn't really do much except hide him from Catti's gaze(but it was probably fixed on her phone either way).
There's no way I could-how could anyone-just 2 people-no, no-I QUIT-I could send the papers right now. He drifted from thought to thought for what felt like hours in his mind-palace. Then he took a look at his portrait image in the mirror and considered how he defaulted to calling day-dreams his "mind-palace" and remembered everything else keeping him from a normal workplace. So, he set the van door ajar and called, "Catti, we're leaving. I'm departing with or without your name in the EOD report." She responded with an exasperated sigh.
As Catti loaded the necessary equipment into the back, Berdly thought back to his time with Noelle. He was glad she even wanted to meet with him in the first place. She even looked as if she had ended her day content with the decision to. He was, too. Except, for Berdly, his day was just beginning.