It
began as a stream of consciousness, as Howard Biggs sits in his posh suburban
home, set in the hills of New
Hampshire. He stares out the window at the large
number of pine trees dotting his lawn and the lone palm tree at the end of the
drive. He was very proud of his palm tree. He had to have it dug up and shipped
to Florida
every winter, but the looks neighbors give him are worth it. You see, Howard is
a very rich individual. If he had a nickel for every dime that he had, he would
still be rolling in cash.
This
story, however, is not about him. It is more about a man named Patrick Jones,
who works for one of Howard’s companies, Glowing Swords, Inc., which mixes and
packages potting soil. His psychologist told him that keeping a journal might
help him clear his mind and relieve some of the stress he has been feeling. He
was recording a stream of consciousness involving his thoughts on BLT
sandwiches, all the while sitting in the employee break-room eating his BLT.
Once the last bite of his sandwich was swallowed, his mind came to an abrupt
stop; his muse had left him. He sat with an empty mind and began looking around
his environment. It was immaculately clean. The counters never cluttered. The
faux morale raising posters evenly spaced on the walls. Even the mini-fridge
bore not a sign of wear.
“Hey
Pat, how’s it hangin’,” Pat’s friend, Hank said at the top of his lungs as he
slapped him heartily on the back. Pat’s BLT almost made a return voyage to his
plate.
“Fine,”
was Pat’s terse response. He washed down the BLT with a sip of Dr. Pepper and
got up from the table. Though it has no bearing to the story, Pat was a few
inches shorter than Hank. “Is it your lunch break already?”
“Heck
no! I was just tired of workin’. C’mon, let’s go over to Ruby Tuesday’s.”
“No
thanks, I just ate.” Pat may as well have told the chairs to dance the tango.
Hank plopped his hand on Pat’s shoulder and steered him out of the break area,
through the office, out the door, and to his own car where he was forced to
drive to Ruby Tuesday’s under penalty of peer pressure.
Once
seated, Hank ordered a cheeseburger with no tomatoes and Pat ordered nothing
more than a piña coolada. They spoke of many things, including ships, sails,
and ceiling rats, but mostly they griped about work. Pat asked about Hank’s
family and he said fine. Hank asked Pat about bachelor life. Pat could do
nothing more than shrug his shoulders. They continue to chat until they finally
leave shortly after. They had separate checks.
On
the way back, Pat’s car was rear-ended at a red light by a widowed grandmother
named Theresa Willows. The day before, Theresa received a call from her
daughter, Emily, asking if she wanted to spend a few days with her family while
she had a few days off from work. She quickly and happily agreed, and began
packing as soon as she got off of the phone. At about seven o’clock this morning, she finally decided
that her purple cardigan was far better looking than her navy blue one. After
she packed away this final article, she heaved up her suitcase and dropped it
into the back of her wood-sided station wagon. After readjusting her mirrors
for the first time in several weeks, she started the car, flipped it into
reverse and pulled out onto the street. She was cruising along the freeway going
a respectable five under the speed limit and looking forward to seeing her
grandson again, who had recently turned eight. She got off on the exit towards
Emily’s house and continued along the road between several gas stations and
fast food joints. Her stomach forced her eyes to glance longingly at a Denny’s
just long enough to not notice the light change or Pat’s car stopping ahead of
her.
The
bumpers made a dull clunk when they met. There was no damage, considering the
glacial speed Theresa was moving at, but Hank was already working himself into
a spitting rage.
“Pat!
That grandma just slammed into you!”
“Okay,
let me check if there’s any damage.”
“Darn
right! While you’re at it –,” was the last Pat heard as he slammed the door
shut. He walked to the back of his car and saw there was no damage. He and
Theresa exchanged phone numbers, but neither of them had any need to use them.
Pat was single, not desperate. Pat and Hank drove back to work, and Theresa
finally made it to her daughter’s home in the suburbs. She dies fifteen years
later of a completely unrelated stroke and she is buried next to her husband
with most of her family visiting the burial ceremony.
Pat
and Hank pull into a parking space on the far side of the lot and garner some
important exercise in the hike back to the office doors as the dust from the
packaging facility across the street fills their lungs.
“Okay,
just let me know if you need any ideas for the next soil bag design,” Hank said
as Pat sat in his cubicle. “Later.” Pat gave a non-committal wave as Hank
walked away towards his own desk, then turned to his own computer screen. He
stared at it hoping for some inspiration, but it never came. His
cubicle-neighbor’s radio was quietly playing Rascal Flats. It was playing it
just quietly enough to be utterly nerve-wracking. Pat poked his head over his
cubicle wall and said, “say, could you do me a favor and turn that down a tad?”
Patricia
“the Other Pat” Adams just glanced up from her
computer screen at him. She had had a bad day. The high point of her day ended shortly after she
woke up and she realized she had no more milk for her bowl of Cheerios. She did
not have time to go grocery shopping last weekend because of the overtime work
she had to pull to finish a project. She was running low on several things.
Worst of all, her toaster was on the fritz and her warranty expired a week ago.
The drive to work was bad, but that was a given. The traffic into the city was
always bad. After the morning, however, it seemed worse. She was cut off twice
by some chowder head driving a Pontiac Aztek. She swore briefly, and then
turned up her car radio to vent off some steam. Strangely enough, she found a
parking space somewhat close to the office building. She thought her day would
start looking up. When she sat at her desk and looked at her inbox, she saw a
report from her boss asking her to do all of the work she did over the weekend
over again. She swore and tore a large chunk of the paperwork off with her
staple remover. She sat down and set to work on it in silence. At around
eleven-thirty, she was not even half-way done with the revisions when the Pat
in the other cubicle got up and went to the break room. Though it had nothing
to do with her, she was irritated that he had the freedom to get up and eat
lunch while she was busy with menial work. She turned on her radio in protest
and settled back to work. She did not have anything against Pat. You could say
they were friendly office-mates, but she was just in a particularly crummy
mood. Around the time Pat was rear-ended, the Other Pat paused from her work
for a moment and thought about tomorrow. She had scheduled to take that day off
no matter what so she could visit an old college friend whose mother was
visiting. Now, the neighboring Pat had the nerve to ask if she could turn down
her radio.
She
just glared at him and did not respond. Pat continued to stare at the Other
Pat, though not quite glaring. To make a bad day worse, the Other Pat was the
first to blink and grudgingly agreed to turn it down. Pat thanked her, which
was returned with a “humph.” The music was still mind-numbingly quiet, but Pat
thought it would be silly to say anything again.
The
Other Pat lost her stream of thought. She knew she could not leave until she
finished her work, but she was in such a terrible mood that she could not pay
attention. She finally turned off her radio, got up, and called it an early
day. She left the building and drove back home after letting her Mr. Roberts,
her boss, know that she could not finish all the work. He had forgotten all
about that project, but gave her the okay to go home early. He was very busy,
and could not be bothered with trying to remember what it was he had
what’s-her-name do. He was currently busy clearing a battlefield of mines so
that General Smiley-Face can march his troops across the treacherous, gray span
of land.
To be continued... maybe...
I was bored at work a few days ago, and this is the result. I'm thinking about continuing it. Let me know if you want to read more of Pat's "story" on this blog.
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