I'm not a hardship. I'm awesome.

It had been a few days since Kate had been back home. It had been about a week where she'd been, mostly hanging out with Bod, waiting for the call that she knew would come. Her dad rallying the troops. Marshall was staying with their Grandma Sandy, and Kate was sure he was expecting the same.

The call had come today, so... Here Kate was, walking into the Gregson house again, bag over her shoulder and wearing a yellow sweater with the face of a polar bear on the front of it. She'd bought it while she'd been away. If you liked reading into things, there could have been symbolism there. Or maybe she just liked bright colors and bear motifs.

( Art and other things. )

[ooc: NFB, preplayed with the incomparable nimeni, to be continued in the comments! Lifted and tweaked from USoT S03E11 'Crunchy Ice'. Warning for Bryce being a creeper at everyone. Seriously, I lack proper labels for this.]

So, while there were minor parts of this week that had been mildly depressing, today Kate was pretty excited because her first post-high school job interview was finally here. In preparation, she'd finally had her hair trimmed a bit from the overgrown hippie mess that it had turned into over her time in Fandom (though not as much as to completely lose her pseudo-bohemian charm) and she'd put a lot of thought into her outfit. The job was for a fucking fashion magazine, after all! She had to dress to impress. And she was pretty pleased with the end result, too, thinking it a pretty neat ensemble in appropriate fall colors. Cute but professional. That was the aim.

And she was practically on fire at the interview proper. Bubbling with energy. "And this is what's refreshing about me," she declared. "I am the only person that you are gonna meet here today who isn't lying on her resumé. What's the point? Yeah, I didn't go to college. Yeah, my high school transcript reads a little weird. Yeah, I worked at Barnabeez on Shawnee Mission Parkway and had to sue for sexual harassment, but that was only because my boss was insane!"

She gave only half a second's thought to whether she'd grinned a little too widely during that last bit. No matter, she pressed straight on, leaning forwards toward the interviewer, a thirty-something guy who... really did not look cool enough for a fashion magazine, but she'd deal. "This is what you get with me," she said, and emphasized her points with her hands. "I am smart. I am dedicated. I could write about fashion." She leaned back again, as relaxed as she could pretend to be. "I could write the hell out of this magazine."

At least the guy was smiling, though he had a correction to make. "This isn't a writer's position," he said. "It's... administrative."

Oh. "But I could get there, is what I'm saying," Kate replied, recovering quickly. "This is who I am," she added, smiling. "I'm telling you everything. You can trust me to do a good job because this is me!"

( Is this also you? )

"I'm gonna go out and get some air," Kate told the others. "Meet me out front, okay?" She didn't stay and listen to any comments or objections. She really did want some fresh air. This day was utterly, utterly fired, and she didn't want to spend another minute around the sights and smells that made her remember things she'd rather not. She'd had enough of that already.

Once outside, she turned her cellphone back on, then scrolled absently through her contact list. Was any of this something to report to the world? Maybe not.

[ooc: NFB, but can be open should you wish it to be. Adapted from USoT S03E01, still.]