Chapter 6

I woke up screaming bloody murder this morning. Talk about nightmares. I thought this qualified as the worst nightmare I've ever had. It was bad enough that he was in my dream, to have sex with him, even in a dream was the most terrible thing. I didn't think there was even a word in existence to describe my loathing and disgust over the whole affair.

I opened the bedside drawer and threw my bottle of anti-psychotic pills away. I wasn't sure if it was the culprit, but I needed to blame something. I still wasn't feeling any better though. I banged my head to the wall, until I couldn't stand the pain.

The memories were still vivid in my brain.

Now I got a freaking headache as well.

I concluded that it was obviously an extremely dumb thing to do. Now I had to find an aspirin in my tortured state. Not a very easy thing to do when you were clutching your head in agony with one eye closed.

I spent quite a long time under the shower, trying to get rid of the burning pain in my brain. It took me about half an hour just to get a shred of sanity. It took me 10 minutes to be able to get out of the shower without tripping over my own feet, 5 minutes to find a comb and about 20 minutes to get dressed since I only used one hand and one eye to do those. The other eye was closed in pain while the other hand was too busy massaging my poor head.

Damn! What I am going to do with my hair? I forgot to cut it yesterday.

I arrived at the office almost 5 minutes late, again. Had to struggle with making a ponytail as I found out that all the scissors in my house were blunt! What the hell?!!

If this 'coming late to work' thingy keeps up though, I might end up being on the shortlist for the next downsizing. I hoped Mr. Stuart didn't take any special notice of this.

It took me a few extra minutes to settle down in my cubicle. It appeared that the IT division, the server room especially, was pretty busy today. People were walking back and forth just outside my cubicle as if we were at war or something. I wondered if someone important was coming.

I went out to visit the cubicle next to mine, the one occupied by Steve Candle. Normally I wouldn't really speak to this burly, muscly, macho and obviously full-of-himself guy, but today was an exception I guess. He still gave me the creeps though, and the weird way he looked at me this morning as I walked into the lounge really wasn't helping.

I knocked on the partition that separated our cubicles. "Hey Steve, you know what's going on in this office?"

He just stared at me. An expression of puzzlement ran on his face, or was that confusion?

His stare was getting me very uncomfortable, so I knocked on the partition again and called him in a louder voice, despite the fact that he was only a few feet away from me. "Yo Stevie, dude, hello?"

I knocked a bit harder.

He looked like he was awakened from a journey somewhere far away as he coughed and regained his composure. "I'm sorry, do I know you?"

Now it was my turn to be confused. The only difference was that I was confused and starting to panic. This was starting to sound like a scene out of Twilight Zone, the one where you suddenly woke up one day and found out that you were lost in some parallel universe of which you weren't supposed to exist in.

"Umm, I'm Patrick Willows. I work in this cubicle over here," I said as I nervously pointed to my cubicle, which as I've said before, was right next to his.

Now his face turned into one of astonishment. "Ricky? God Damn, did you do a hair extension or something? I'm pretty sure your hair wasn't as long as this yesterday. Hell, the only person in this department with a hair longer than you, is Mr. Stuart's wife, and she doesn't even work here."

He turned around looking back at his flatscreen monitor, mumbling incoherent words. I did catch a few disconnected words though, such as 'pity', 'damn' and I think he mentioned the name of a french dish.

My voice raised a pitch, "Steve! I'm asking you if you know what the friggin' hell's happening here. Why is everyone being busy out of a sudden?"

He turned around, looking at me with a raised eyebrow as if saying, 'you incompetent slowpoke'. It wasn't just my imagination; I've heard him call some people that in the open, especially when he was the project manager.

"You don't know what day this is?"

"Tuesday," I answered, in a matter of factly tone.

He spoke slowly, as if talking to a child, "Do you know what's so special about this particular Wednesday?"

Was there anything special today? I must've missed a memo.

He must've noticed my confused expression as he answered his own question for me, "Today, is 20th of December".

"Uhh, yeah, I knew that. So what's the big deal?"

He spoke even slower this time, "You know ... Christmas is in ... a few more days?"

"Look, I'm not dumb. You don't need to treat me like I'm a child. I can understand you perfectly no matter what speed you choose to say it. I know Christmas is approaching, but what's the big deal? I'm very sure that Santa will not drop down of our chimney and give us all presents for being good boys and girls. So please, GET STRAIGHT TO THE POINT!"

"We don't have a chimney."

"Oh great, now you're being sarcastic."

"Okay, you know that Christmas is coming?"

"Yes."

"You know that I've always wanted a Porche?"

"No, and there's no chance in hell that me or anyone else will give it to you as a Christmas present."

"Tough."

"So what is this about?"

"You know Mr. Stuart will be spending Christmas in Switzerland?"

"Yes."

"Did you know that the office will be closed from the 21st to 1st January?

"Now that's news to me. When did he say this?"

"About 13 minutes ago. Everyone's urged to finish their work before Christmas holidays or they won't be getting any end of year bonus."

"Well, that's a revelation. Thank goodness I've already finished all of mine."

It was almost lunchtime. The hectic-ness of the day had slowed to a trickle. Most of the people from my department decided to take advantage of the looser rules today to get lunch earlier. So there was only me and one or two other guys in the office.

I was chatting with Sue about her Christmas plans when I sensed an ominous presence behind me. I didn't even need to turn around to know who it was. I've had years to remember the aura of the sinister character behind me.

So it didn't surprise me when he said, "Pat, we need to talk".

I turned my chair, ready to launch an assault with my venomous tongue when I saw him holding his right palm upwards in front of me.

I thought he was awfully nice to offer, so I place the wrapper for the coffee candy I just ate onto his palm. At least it would save me a trip to the trashcan. Apparently the cleaners forgot to put my dustbin back into my cubicle when they did the cleaning yesterday.

He responded by throwing the wrapper back at me, which flew away from me since it was just a thin sheet of plastic candy wrapper.

"You know, littering is frowned upon in this office."

He totally ignored me. Instead, he said, "Let's talk reparations".

I raised my right eyebrow, briefly wondering if he was on pot.

He walked closer to me, and ended up trapping me between him and my chair. He placed his hands on mine, effectively pinning me to my chair. I tried to struggle and pull out my hands from under his but failed. Man, this guy has a really strong grip.

"Hey, let go. What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"I want to make sure that you won't be going anywhere. We're going to settle this right here."

"Settle what, dumbass? I don't remember maiming that psychotic brain of yours, though I did entertain the thoughts of driving a hockey stick up your behind."

"Oh, you liked that, didn't you? You were moaning so loudly when I did that."

I decided that he was definitely on pot, "Excuse me, as far as I know, it was my left leg that got beaten with a hockey stick. I don't remember your hockey stick getting anywhere near my butt when that happened".

"Don't change the subject. I'm talking about this morning, in my house, on my bed."

Well, what do ya know, the head-banging worked. I totally forgot about that dream until he mentioned his bed. I still thought that he was on pot though. Seriously, his wet dreams were none of my business.