Starting in chronological order, in Serious Isabella gets selected for a mayoral internship but I skipped to the end to keep the Phinabella plot moving. For anyone who wanted to see it, here is Isabella's first few days as an intern at City Hall. (Filling in the gap between chapter six and seven)

"So, what exactly are you going to be doing for the next eight weeks?" Gretchen asked as she and Isabella made their way to City Hall. It was Monday and the official start of Isabella's mayoral internship. She was buzzing with excitement at the prospect of spending eight weeks working in City Hall.

"Well, during those eight weeks," she explained, "I'll be working beside Mayer Doofenshmirtz in the runnings of Danville."

"Oh wow," Gretchen nodded approvingly. "This is going to be great for you."

"It's supposed to develop leadership and organisation skill," Isabella continued. "And it will be a great thing to add to my CV when I apply for college."

"College is ages away," Gretchen replied. "You're always thinking ahead."

"What do you mean?"

"This is going to such a great experience, Isabella," Gretchen shrugged. "I guess what I'm saying is don't see it as a way to get into college see it as an opportunity to learn about yourself. Live in the moment, if you will."

"Sure," Isabella smiled. "I'll live in the moment and enjoy this opportunity."

"Alright then, Chief." The girls drew to a stop at the entrance to City Hall. "Have a great day!"

"Bye," Isabella waved her off before taking a breath and starting up the steps. Outside the doors, she met a woman with short red hair glasses and yellow earrings. She wore a green business suit (jacket and skirt) with a black shirt underneath and black heels.

"I'm Melanie," she droned. "Welcome to City Hall."

"Nice to meet you," Isabella smiled, offering her hand.

Melanie glared at it in disgust making Isabella think she either hated germs, or she hated Isabella herself. "I know who you are. You're the new intern. Well I'm the mayor's secretary and since he's too busy to be here, that means I'm in charge of you." So, it was Isabella she didn't like then.

Melanie turned on her heals and clicked her way inside, with Isabella hurrying along behind. "I'd give you a tour, but it won't matter since you won't be spending much time up here."

They reached the elevator and waited in tense silence for the doors to open. Once the elevator arrived, they stepped inside and Melanie gestured to the levels.

"There are four floors to the building. The basement, where you'll be; the first floor, where the majority of us work and the second, where the mayor's office is along with the conference rooms. The Mayor's quarters take up the third floor but it goes without saying that they are out of bounds." The doors opened once again to admit them into the basement.

Melanie walked over to a janitor's closet and opened the door. "This will be your office."

"That's a janitor's closet," Isabella protested, more indignantly then she had attended.

"Don't worry, princess," Melanie taunted sarcastically. "There are only a few rats."

"Yes, Ma'am," Isabella said meekly. She entered the closet and found a tiny desk pushed against the far wall, a lightbulb hanging from the ceiling with a dim glow and the walls hidden behind rows of cleaning supplies. There was a chute embedded in the wall above the desk.

"Your job will be to read through all the mail the mayor gets and determine which ones are urgent and should be brought up with the mayor and which ones are not. Every three hours you will bring the important ones to me and then shred the others. You are required to be here each morning at eight and your day officially ends at five. Questions?" Isabella opened her mouth but Melanie talked right over her. "No? Good. See you in three hours."

And then she was gone leaving Isabella alone in the dingy cellar that apparently was supposed to be her office for the next eight weeks. She sighed, scratched her head.

"Well, it's not perfect but there's nothing a little redecorating can't fix," she said to herself. "I don't have any of those letters I'm supposed to be sorting through so-"

The loud rumbling coming from the chute interrupted her soliloquy. She looked at it curiously as it began to rattle and suddenly the tiny room was flooded with a flurry of letters. After a few seconds, Isabella gasped as she resurfaced from beneath pile with a scowl on her face.

"Enjoy your time here," she muttered, recalling what Gretchen had told her. "Easier said than done."

"Isa?" Vivian called as the front door opened. "Is that you?"

"Yeah," Isabella trudged into the kitchen. "It's me."

"How was your day?" Vivian turned around from where she was washing the dishes, caught sight of her dismal looking daughter and her mouth dropped open. "Oh, Honey are you ok?"

"I just had the worst day ever," Isabella said.

"Tell me everything."

"Where to start?" She laughed humourlessly. "I didn't even get to see the Mayor and instead I got stuck with his secretary. I'm working in dingy little office in the basement, with barely any light and no signal. I have to sort through hundreds of letters, most of them about minimal things and only one in a one hundred being actually urgent. Those ones go to the secretary and the others I spent most of my day shredding." She held up her hands, which were burning red and covered in paper cuts. "Like I said. Worst. Day. Ever."

"Well that does sound awful."

"Ugh, it is!" Isabella moaned. "It's nothing like I thought it would be. My hands are on fire, my eyes are sore from squinting in the dark and my back is aching because my is backless. Did I mention my chair is backless? No? Well it is and I hate it."

"Hate is a strong word, Isa," Vivian warned before she softened. "So, what are you planning on doing about it?"

Isabella shrugged, "It just seems like a waste of my time. There ae so many other things I could be doing instead of ripping open, skim-reading and more often than not shredding letters."

Vivian folded her arms. "Well I don't know who you are but you are not my daughter."

"What?"

"No, no, no," Vivian continued. "My daughter is positive and always looks for the silver lining in any situation, no matter how bad it seems. She makes the best out of whatever she's given and most of all, she never gives up. She keeps fighting and doesn't let one bad experience deter her. She-"

Isabella smiled appreciatively at her mother. "Ok I get it, Mom."

"Oh good," Vivian jokingly breathed a sigh of relief. "I was wondering how long I would have to go on for."

"I've got a lot of thinking to do before tomorrow," Isabella said. "I know I can turn this around."

"That's my girl," Vivian agreed approvingly.

The next morning, Isabella woke early and spent an hour preparing herself for the upcoming day. Vivian agreed to drive her and her equipment down to City Hall and when she walked inside at eight precisely, she had a little pull wagon with her. She waved good morning to Melanie who glared suspiciously at her but said nothing.

When she got to her office, the first thing she did was replace the light bulb with a stronger one and put up a lamp shade. With the room looking brighter already, she then placed a large laundry basked under the chute to collect the letters. She hung lanterns from the shelves holding up the cleaning supplies and draped some white sheets over them, instantly making the room even more bright. Finally, she placed her laptop onto her desk, unfolded her new chair (put the old stool in another closet) then stepped back to admire her work.

"Not too shabby," she congratulated herself. A second later the chute started rumbling and letters started tumbling out and into the basket. Once the flow stopped, she squared her shoulders and got to work.

Two hours later, she had sorted every single letter into separate piles without even having to open them. One pile contained fifteen letters each from different people. While sorting through them all, Isabella had found that four names came up repetitively: James Smith, David Johnson, Christopher Williams and George Brown. Now each of them formed a pile with at least two hundred letters each.

She had made a note of those names before heading upstairs with the fifteen from different writers. Melanie was seated at her desk, as always, and was filing her nails.

"Hey Melanie," Isabella greeted cheerfully. "Here are the letters you should pass on to the Mayor."

Melanie jumped. "You're early!" she looked down at the letters being handed to her and added accusingly, "You didn't even open then."

"I didn't need to," Isabella explained patiently. "The majority of the mail the Mayor gets is from four people. It's fair to assume that since there is only one letter from each person in this pile, they are all urgent. I would also propose the Mayor meets with James Smith, David Johnson, Christopher Williams and George Brown since they write-"

"I would propose," Melanie cut her off mockingly. "You're in no place to propose anything, intern."

Isabella laughed dryly, "I get the impression you don't like me very much."

"You're damn right, I don't."

"Why's that?"

Melanie squinted at her sneeringly. "Every summer a little know it all comes to City Hall for the internship and every year they make me look bad in front of my boss. Well, little girl, not this year. I will not be showed up by a ten-year-old."

"Actually, I'm thirteen," Isabella corrected before jerking in fright back as Melanie swiped her hand through the air aggressively cutting her off.

"Besides the point," she snapped. "Now go downstairs and do what I told you to."

"I finished sorting through all the letters," Isabelle replied. "And I don't think it's a good idea to shred them consider-"

"Fine!" Melanie growled, sounding exasperated. "Congratulations you've been promoted. Consider yourself on coffee duty. Here's everyone's schedules and what coffee they like. The kitchen is over there. Don't talk to anyone."

Isabella took the pile of papers and had a flick through. They contained what coffees everyone liked for different situations and their schedules. She sighed and made her way back to her office.

"Terry likes a cappuccino after business meeting but a caramel latte serves fine any other time," she read aloud as she waited for the lift. "Barry likes expresso in the meetings and black in the afternoon… this is crazy."

She spent the rest of afternoon in the kitchen hurriedly making everyone's coffees. If she'd been miserable the day before, this had taken it to a whole new level. She'd made progress with the filing system for the letters and making her office a little more habitable, but now she was stuck making coffees for pompous jerks who didn't even say thank you.

When she arrived back at her house that evening, she went straight up to her room and started compiling all the information together onto a spreadsheet. She refused to let Melanie win; she was not going to give up. The next morning, she visited Steam Noir and asked if they did deliveries. The answer was no, so she called in a few favours and the manager of the coffee shop agreed to let Garret, one of the waiters, set up a stand outside the doors of City Hall. Isabella left the new spreadsheet she'd made with which coffees to make and when with him and promised she'd be back in a few hours to help him deliver around the building.

After sorting through the letters, giving the stand-alone ones to Melanie, she donned a Steam Noir apron and made her way around City Hall to give everyone the coffees they wanted.

When they took a break for lunch, Isabella accepted some herbal tea from Garret who insisted it was on the house as a thank you for allowing him to get this gig.

"It's even better work experience than mopping the bathrooms," he'd grinned.

While heading back to her office that afternoon, she stopped by the kitchen to grab a glass of what to take downstairs. There were two men in there, arguing over something. She didn't intentionally eavesdrop as she opened the cabinet to get a glass, but they weren't being subtle about it either.

"- tell him that he's busy?"

"He's the Mayor, Jordan. Of course he's busy."

"This meeting has been scheduled for three months and the manager had to wait for eight just to book that slot!"

Isabella squeezed behind them to get to the sink.

"Well, I'd say the Fire Chief gets priority. His department is more important than the post office."

"This isn't about importance, Mike. This is about the mayor treating everyone fairl-"

"Fairly? Please. What is fair about a first come first served situation?"

Isabella turned the tap off and left them arguing behind her. A clash in schedule? This was the perfect opportunity for her to prove herself. If she could just come up with a way to allow the mayor to attend both meetings, she might move even further up the rankings.

Isabella grinned, just imagining the look on Melanie's face if she managed to pull this off. She already had everyone's schedules so it was a simple case of rearranging a couple things.

"Ok, Isabella. Let's do this."

After finishing the coffee shift, Isabella found herself outside Mayor Doofenshmirtz's office. She had considering taking her solution of the clash to Melanie but that was out of the question since the secretary would most likely claim the glory for herself. So, Isabella had looked over the spreadsheet and asked Garret to make her a cup of tomato mint tea and told the secretary she was taking the mayor a soothing cup of his favourite tea. After taking a second to compose herself, she raised her hand and knocked lightly on the door.

"Come in," the Mayor's voice rang out. She pushed open the door. "Ah, Isabella. Is something wrong?"

"Of course not, Sir," she replied politely. "I just brought you a cup of tea…"

He inhaled deeply, "is that tomato mint?"

"Yes Sir."

"Thank you very much, this is just what I needed."

"Is everything ok, Sir?"

"Well," he rubbed his eyes. "There's a clash in my schedule is all." He frowned and looked up at her. "I don't suppose you could take a look at it?"

"Me, Sir?"

"You are known for having a lot of things in your schedule," he spread his hands. "And no one else has managed to come up with a solution. What's the worse that can happen?"

Isabella laughed nervously. This wasn't what she had expected to happen but if she was being honest it was a better alternative to admitting she'd been listening in on a private conversation.

"It'd be my pleasure," she smiled.

"The manager of the post office waited eight months to book an appointment with me next week, three months in advance." The mayor explained. "But the Fire Chief, it seems, has booked the same slot a couple of days again. Apparently, it's important and I can't miss it. But the post office manager has been waiting for such a long time I can't find it in my heart to let him down."

"Well," Isabella consulted his schedule like she was seeing it for the first time. "This meeting with the CEO of the gas company? Both you and your financial advisor are meeting her?"

"Yes, it's about the budget cuts we've had to enforce on them."

"Is there a reason you need to be there?"

He hesitated. "Now that you mention it…"

"Meet the manager of the post office next week in the slot he booked and arrange to meet the Fire Chief during the time your financial advisor meets with the CEO of the gas company. If there's anything the two of them can't resolve, you have an open slot in two weeks time. That would give the CEO a chance to think through the offer that would have been put on the table and your advisor time to fill you in and have a rethink."

"Isabella," the mayor shook his head in wonder. "That's the perfect solution."

"Oh," she smiled modestly. "Happy to help, Sir."

"It's your third day here, and you've already solved a problem my top advisors couldn't." He stood up and shook her hand. "Not to mention, you knew my favourite tea."

"Well I finished sorting through the mail you get earlier than Melanie expected and since she couldn't come up with anything else to do, she assigned me coffee duty and with that job came everyone's favourite beverage."

"You make it seem like I get a lot of mail," he laughed.

She tilted her head, "you do."

"I do?" he frowned. "I thought I only get a couple every day."

"The letters you get are the ones I spent the deeming urgent," Isabella explained, a voice in her head telling her how crazy it was that she was educating the mayor on how the operations of City Hall worked. "You get hundreds of others and I spent my first day opening them all and shredding the less urgent ones… we should discuss that by the way."

"Tell me," he gestured for her to go on.

"Well four people send you hundreds of letters a day, they're mainly small things so they are considered unimportant, but strictly speaking, if they feel the need to write to you, then they probably are important."

"That does make sense," he agreed. "So, what would you suggest I do?"

"Arrange to meet with those people," Isabella said. "Talk to them about their concerns. That will greatly reduce the number of letters you get every day so someone won't have to sort through them all."

"Isabella, how would you like a promotion?"

"Sir?"

"As of now, I'm asking you to work as my chief advisor and planner."

"Me?"

"I don't see anyone else up for the job," he smiled. "Do you accept?"

"Sir, before you do this, I need to confess that I arranged for a Steam Noir stand to be put up outside City Hall."

"Do we need to pay them?"

"No, he's doing it for the work experience."

"You arranged for us to get free hot drinks of actual good quality?"

"Uh… yes?"

"Isabella Garcia-Shapiro," he shook her hand again. "I think you'll do great things during your time here."