It’s 8:53.
I like to get here early in the mornings. It shows initiative and dependability. Plus you get to skip out a little early at the end of the day. That’s always nice, especially on a Monday. I am well-rested and feeling buoyant; the weekend was pretty good. The schedule is pretty light, so it looks like this is going to be a prett-
OH NO....
I have just discovered that I am not the only one working this morning. I sit in my chair and turn on my computer. My optimism has turned to dread.
Maybe he will call in sick.
No, no. Don’t get your hopes up.
Maybe he will forget he works mornings this week and they will fire him.
I wish I was that lucky.
Termination seemed imminent a few months ago. But that was before “the accident,” the so-called “injury” that has rendered him useless. Not that he had much use before. To you or I, the cure for this particular type of “injury” would have an application of a band-aid from the first aid kit in the storage closet. But when you have 550 pounds of pressure decimating your legs, discoloring them to the point of rotting off, an adhesive strip simply will not suffice when trying to stop the crimson geyser spraying from your left lower appendage.
He lost two pints of blood that day.
It was a paper cut. On the leg. The doctors almost had to amputate.
Maybe he died.
If he did, I would win the pool. My entry was ten months, an ambitious, and in retrospect, overly eager wager. One of my cohorts said two years; the intern said three. The boss went with four. Nobody went past five. There’s no way a behemoth like that could live past 50. It can’t. Right?
This is the eighth month since “the injury.” Now it walks with a cane. The industrial strength steel of this particular staff is far better-suited to its owner than the previous two it used to shoulder its enormous mass. They never stood a chance. The metal clank of that cane as it strikes the ground is the sound I fear most in this world. It is the sound that has haunted my nightmares for months.
Before I can even prepare myself, it begins.
The muffled sounds of the gears and motors in the shaft carry through the doorway to the office. The chimes are audible from the floors beneath me. They are getting increasingly louder as the steel and iron box slowly moves upward.
ding.
No, that’s not our floor. It’s getting closer… Maybe it’s not him. Please God, let the elevator pass.
The hydraulics echo through the chamber. I pray for the pistons to jam and cause the elevator to get stuck.
Ding.
I think it’s right underneath us now. Just don’t stop. Keep going. Keep moving up…
DING.
False alarm. Now it’s one floor below. Just pray it doesn’t stop on the next…
DING!
This is when the dread begins. The sequence is always the same. And yet I still cringe.
The bell rings loudly and the door screeches open. I hear a thud. And then another. And then the metallic clank.
The odor hits the room before he does. He wobbles in, out of breath. Boom, boom, clank, huff, huff. Boom, boom, clank, huff, huff. It mutters something to itself that I ignore. It collapses in its chair, and the chair nearly collapses itself.
Go to your happy place.
I hold my breath as the stench fills the room. Against my will, the stink of sweaty flesh and the odors of unwashed clothes seep into my nostrils. I try not to inhale, but the act is futile. I close my eyes and envision myself as a Crucian carp and cherish my ability to hold my breath for months, swimming with schools of fish in the Asian sea, roaming free, living a listless existence. Listless, like the quarter-ton man that now sits in front of me. The man that is staring at the television screen with a blank look on his face. The man whose heavy breathing indicates that he has just taken five steps in succession and is on the brink of cardiac arrest. The man who is the brunt of my existence.
I open my eyes and inhale. I instantly lament no longer having gills, as the foulness nearly flattens me. I gag. And I gag again. He is oblivious.
And then the narcolepsy kicks in.
It begins to snore. The trek from the parking lot to its desk seems to have taken its toll on Beelzeblubber.
Quick, look! It sleeps on the job. Fire it.
But the boss is nowhere to be found. I contemplate ways to escape, but my eyes are transfixed on the monster. It fades in and out of consciousness. Any sudden movement or noise may awaken it. I stare some more. Strangely, I am intrigued. What must it dream about? A chair without arms? New stockings for its corroded legs?
My dream is that he never wakes up. Sweet Jesus, it would take twenty paramedics just to carry him out of here.
As I ponder this horrifyingly beautiful scenario, the glutton flinches.
Do not make eye contact with it. If it awakes, do not engage it in subtle pleasantries or anything that could be construed as such. This is what it wants. Go about your work. Block the malodor from your mind. Let it sleep. Let it dream…
I begin to daydream myself. Underneath the water, I am free. Free from the stench, free from the lethargy, free from the awkward comments… I am in a place where the monstrosity cannot harm me. For the first time in months, I am truly happy to be at work.
But both of our dreams are shattered by the ringing phone. I reach for it as fast as I can, but I am not fast enough. Before I can answer, it opens its eyes and looks at me.
And then it speaks:
“Ummmmmmmmmmm…. so what do you want to do for lunch today?”
Five o’clock can’t come fast enough.
- B
"The eyes believe themselves; the ears believe other people."
- ancient Chinese fortune cookie
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