Morning one and all. I hope you had a great weekend. We had one of those weekends where the rain was only just warm enough to still be rain instead of ice. And then the temps plummeted overnight so everything has that glazed look. It isn’t as glass like as an actual ice storm, but it is pretty shiny. I’m thinking that indoors until the thermometer starts moving again is not a bad plan. So since I am indoors and at my desk, let’s start the morning prompt. Ready? Let’s go.
Interesting. I think I started writing thinking it was just going to be a manager with a temper tantrum but then it sort of drifted into another idea that I liked a bit better. The transition between ideas isn’t all that smooth, but I like the second thought better so I don’t mind. It will just need a bit of editing before I can use it. This is one of those prompts I will probably jot down a few thoughts about before I save and close it in the prompts file. Just so I remember where my brain was going.
Monday, February 13th: His face screwed up with rage.
His face screwed up with rage. It was as though all of his body condensed. I could practically feel the tightening down of his form from across the room. I saw this once before and slowly edged out of his line of sight while he was still trying to focus. I knew when the tense rage coil released he would spare no one. The others, more accustomed to the erudite version of him, were not expecting the full impact of his wrath.
I lived through it twice before and was not willing go for a round three. As soon as I was out of his sight line I slipped down the side passage and made my way towards another part of the building. I was halfway down the hall when the eruption began. Even from a distance I winced at the vitriol spewing. At the moment, not being able to see him, not having a visual, only the sound arrowing through the airways, he sounded like his father. It was an uncanny echo.
The tones, the word choices, all drew on the deep well bequeathed to him from the old man. I found my steps hurrying faster, wanting to be out of hearing distance as well as sight. Old childhood memories stirred with his words. The present was stripped away and time seemed to flow backwards. Everything that I worked for, everything that I became started to fade.
It was rare that this rage surfaced and each time he sounded more and more like his father. The last time had been fifteen years ago and his voice was just edged with the whisperings of his father’s ghost. This sounded like a full scale possession.
As a general rule, I didn’t believe in ghosts. I didn’t believe in demons or goblins or even Big Foot. It wasn’t my sort of thing. Yet hearing that voice in the air I was willing to admit that of anyone could defy the grave and come back for one more time around, it would be the old man. It wasn’t a pleasant thought.
The corridor opened out into a small lobby. It wasn’t much of a lobby. There were none of the frills the customers would expect to see up front. It was merely an open area in front of the freight elevators in case something large had to be shifted around. It was for employee use only. I pressed the button and was thrilled when the doors opened immediately, the elevator already waiting.
I stepped inside and without conscious thought, the ghost of the old man’s voice still ringing in my ears, I pushed the button that would take me down to the loading docks. I couldn’t go upstairs and wait. I couldn’t sit, looking at the office and seeing the reminders.
He tried so hard to leave the old man behind. We both did. Yet these days when I went into his office, there were little touches, little details that reminded me so forcibly of him that it was almost as if he was becoming his father. Bringing it up to him would only cause denial. But I knew what I saw. I could barely stand that office in the normal course of events. Now I didn’t think I could go back there.
I reached the docks and cut through the temporarily quiet loading area to reach the employee parking lot. It was time for me to leave. I somehow doubted I would be coming back.
Ten til Midnight 