I’m always surprised by the arrival of Friday after a Monday Holiday. It feels as though it might have done something nefarious to one of the other days when I wasn’t looking. But Friday is here and I am rather happy to see it, nefarious though it is. So lets jump into the last prompt of the week and see where it leads us. Timers set and off we go.
Okay I may have to take a few minutes at lunch just to see where this goes…
Friday, January 24th: It was so unexpected.
It was so unexpected. He touched the envelope, surprised to see it. The envelope was a pastel green and clearly the size of a greeting card. ‘But no one knows it is my birthday,’ he thought.
It wasn’t something he talked about or mentioned. His friends were more acquaintances than close friends. They had drinks together at happy hour and often dined together, mostly with clients. They knew his work life and he theirs. None of them pried into what happened outside the office. He saw a couple of wedding rings and assumed those people were married but families weren’t discussed wither, only business.
Was wasn’t all that enamored of them at the office. He was polite and worked well with them, but he didn’t like them. He hoped somewhere deep down in his soul that what he saw of them was just their work persona and that outside of work they took on different personas, were better people.
‘But they wouldn’t send me a card,’ he thought. He carried the card, along with the rest of his office mail from the mail room and back to his desk. As always, he took a moment at the security desk to let the scanner go over his badge. It beeped him through and the security guard nodded. The man barely looked at him.
Like hoping his coworkers were better people outside the office, Wes also hoped that the bored blank stare of the security guard meant that he had a rich internal life. That as he stared blankly at those passing him by he was composing a symphony or an epic poem. There certainly wasn’t much to do at Sandersen, Inc. They had the security system in place because it was standard procedure. There had never been any problems. He knew the CEOs and VPs liked to think that it was because of their security systems that they didn’t have any problems but they just weren’t the sort of company that invited trouble.
‘But they would think themselves less if they had to do without their security. What would the other companies think?’
Wes shook off the thought as he reached his desk. The cubicles offered very little privacy. The walls were merely dividers. When he was sitting down his forehead and up could be seen over the top by the others, but they were visually blocked. He could look out and see the tops of other people’s heads poking up out of the cubicles like groundhogs not quite certain if they wanted to try seeing their shadows or not. The actual offices were a level above. Those had glass doors but they were shaded so no one in the cubicles could look in. The bosses could look out and down into each of the cubicles should they so wish. Wes had never seen any of them so much as glance in their directions.
Other cubicles had small personal touches, a decorative wall calendar, a personalized mug. Wes didn’t bather. All that was his was in the bag he brought to and from home. He had never planned to stay in the world of Sandersen, Inc, but he was good at his job and every time he thought about leaving they gave him a slight pay increase that made him feel guilty for the thought. He sat down and set his mail on the desk. The card in it’s pastel green envelope was on top. He reached for it.
Ten til Midnight 