Morning all. I hope you are doing well on this Friday morning. My day is off to a decent start. So let’s continue that with a morning prompt and see what the last sentence of the week brings us. Timers set for fifteen minutes and off we go.
I like the blindsided aspect of this. Plus I do like starting a story with the ending of something the main character thought was stable. It’s a bit mean kicking the chair out from under them, but I do kind of enjoy it as a story start.
Friday, June 12th: It was a well-earned vacation.
It was a well-earned vacation. Sarah felt as though she had been running constantly for the last six months. She put off everything to get this project done. She resceheduled appointments, rescheduled her life. She was certain she owed friends apologies for disappearing so completely. She took a deep breath and stretched luxuriating in the fact that she could still be in bed when the sin was past the horizon.
Her mornings required a little bit of balance and the only time she got it was before work. She had been getting up before the sun for months now for her morning yoga. It centered her, quieted her mind and got her ready for a day overly packed.
It was, she had to admit, nice to watch the sun rise through the windows as she stretched in the morning. It was nicer still to be able to wake without an alarm and start a slow drift into her day. She thought about staying in bed just a little longer, simply because she could, but her bladder had other ideas.
Sarah gave in, got up and went to the bathroom.
The sun was up but it hadn’t been up for long when she emerged from the restroom. She made her way to the kitchen and put on the coffee pot. Her well-earned vacation was starting with a few days of decompression.
She thought about booking in somewhere but the thought of having to pack, then get in some form of transport and go to a hotel, let alone choose a destination was too much. She told everyone she was going somewhere. She was fairly certain she said it involved a beach.
‘Maybe I will put a towel on the balcony at some point.’ She decided as the coffee brewed. This morning she planned to mosey through her morning and make a list of things she had been putting off. Her apartment was pretty clean because she had a cleaning service come. It kept the apartment from turning into a complete nightmare when all she could do was take herself between bed and the office before returning and collapsing.
For at least four of the last six months not only had lunch been at her desk but dinner had as well. On her way home last night she actually had to pick up groceries for the first time in a long while. When she did, she couldn’t actually remember the last time she stocked her fridge.
‘Not thinking about the office,’ she thought. Details of the project threatened to swim in. ‘Not thinking about that either.’
Even without thinking about it, Sarah felt a great deal of pride. It had been a monster project and she managed to pull it off.
She signed contentedly and walked through her morning quiet apartment, mentally ticking off the things she needed to get done. By the time she circled back to the kitchen, the coffee was ready. She poured herself a cup and sat down. As she sat, her cell phone beeped. She frowned and got up, going to pick the phone up off the charger before returning to the table.
She looked at the message. Her phone recorded a deposit made into her account. It was from work.
‘That’s odd,’ she thought. Before she could check on it another text came in. It was from the office. Sarah read the text with a growing sense of unreality. The text thanked her for her efforts, praised her for her work and then informed her that she was being let go as the company streamlined their workforce for efficiency. The deposit was her severance as per her contract. A second deposit would be made regarding the paying out of her unused leave. Again, as per company policy.
Sarah stared at the screen for a moment her brain not computing what just happened. She thought about the project. It would actually require more people, not less in the next few months. She wasn’t certain how they didn’t know that. The phone pinged again and a second deposit was made, this one was the pay out of her unused leave and overtime. Seeing how much overtime she put in and how much leave there was to be paid out made her shutter. As she stared at the numbers, Sarah found her anger building.
Ten til Midnight 