‘It’s beautiful,’ Janet breathed, staring up at the shards of rainbow light filtering into the office.
‘Right?’ I chuckled, triumphantly putting my hands on my hips. ‘It’s amazing!’
‘I can’t believe corporate let you get away with it.’
‘Why not?’
She frowned and looked back at me. ‘It’s a stained glass mural, Percy.’
‘Ah, please,’ I dismissed her concern. ‘They let their offices do this all the time.’
‘This?’ she raised a disbelieving eyebrow. ‘Specifically this?’
‘Sure, sure,’ I nodded. ‘They sign off on tonnes of commercial decorative window glass around Melbourne for their satellites.’
‘Doesn’t that just mean like, frosted glass and stuff?’ she frowned.
‘Frosted glass isn’t decorative,’ I laughed. ‘You really have no idea what you’re talking about. No, no, decorative glass is colourful, crafted by European artisans and carefully shipped across the world in a specially-chartered jet.’
‘Did you seriously—’
‘Took three months,’ I nodded seriously. ‘Worth every second.’
‘It’s not the time I’m worried about!’
‘Oh, I guess you would have been happy if I’d just gone with a standard commercial window tinting for an office. Price really bothers you so much?’
I shook my head, disappointed.
‘I expected more from you.’
‘I wonder if this counts as embezzlement,’ she wondered aloud, casting her eyes back up to the ceiling. ‘I guess that’s for the prosecutor to decide.’
‘Would you relax!’ I laughed. ‘Look at it! It’s a work of genius! I think he’s really captured the way my eyes sparkle in the light of a setting sun.’
‘Right, right… wait a second,’ she frowned again – if she’d ever stopped frowning at all. ‘That’s you up there?!’
‘You didn’t realise?’ I asked, slightly hurt. ‘But you’ve been saying so many nice things!’
‘Because I think the colours are nice, not because I thought you were dumb enough to commission a stained glass portrait of yourself to sit above your entire office!’
‘But–but…’ I rapidly flicked my gaze from her, and back up to the window. ‘But the eyes! The sunset!’
‘Get a lawyer!’ she called over her shoulder as she stormed away.