“Where have
you been?” Tess asked, her voice a hushed whisper.
Corporate
Man hadn’t even settled into his chair yet, his computer was still loading
programs. He shrugged. “I was sick.”
“You’ve
been out of the office for two days.”
“Yeah. Would’ve been nice if someone had brought me
chicken soup. Or cleaned up the mess.”
“Miss Pen–”
Corporate
Man held up a hand to silence her. He
shook his head minutely. Not here, the
gesture implied. Tess nodded. “Well, I was worried about you.”
“We all
were,” said the bosslady, appearing suddenly at Tess’s side. “You never called in. I was beginning to think you’d abandoned your
post.”
“Sorry about that,” said Corporate
Man.
“We’ll let it go this time,” the bosslady
said. Then she glanced coolly at
Tess. “Miss Adams I’m sure Donald
appreciates your concern, but he does have a lot to catch up on. As, I imagine, do you.”
Tess scampered off, eyes cast
downward.
The bosslady stepped into Coporate
Man’s office and shut the door. “Don’t worry. It happens to us all.”
Corporate Man shrugged.
The bosslady tossed a legal-sized
envelope on his desk.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“Your first bonus,” she said.
“Payday’s not until the end of next
week.”
“For them,” the bosslady said,
casting a dismissive head gesture toward the outer office. “We at the executive level like to calculate
our bonuses on a more immediate basis.
Instant gratification and all that.
The decision to eliminate Gladys’s position and redistribute all her
work has been implemented. Done. The fruits of your labor await. If you have any questions, stop by my office.”
She crept to the door, opened it
quickly as though she were trying to catch eavesdroppers on the other side, and
slid out of the room.
Corporate Man picked up the
envelope. There was more than a check
inside. It was thick with papers and
there was some sort of object in the bottom.
He opened a desk drawer, retrieved a letter opener, and slid it along
the top of the envelope, splitting it open revealing an unmistakable shade of
green.
Cash.
And quite a bit of it.
He pulled the bills from the
package and started counting, though he instinctively knew the exact amount as
soon as he saw the stack. It was
mesmerizing. His fingers tingled as the
bills passed from one hand to the other.
He was halfway through the stack when he remembered the object at the
bottom of the envelope. He set the cash
on his desk and pulled the envelope open.
Inside was a syringe.
It was cold to the touch; metal and
glass. He picked it up by the cylinder
and held it in front of him. The metal
was golden, the glass like crystal. There
was a runny, oily liquid inside. A translucent
but familiar shade of green.
