Dream's Intuition

Chapter 2 - Late for Work

The morning sunlight peers through the crack in the curtains and bathes my body.  I open my eyes to see a blue screen staring back at me from the TV.  I turn my head and read the wall clock “9:00”.  I have slept in.  I spring into action, pulling the blanket off my body and letting it fall to the ground, I rush to the bathroom, brush my hair and teeth quickly and change shirts.  The jeans from the day before will have to do, not that anyone would notice or that I really care.  It seems warmer so I can pull off a polo instead of a sweater which will be a nice change from the weather we have been having lately.  I grab my huge purse and search for the door keys.  Kay is usually pretty good at waking me up but perhaps she was in the same boat this morning, or she didn’t come home at all; not unusual.  Either way I am sure to have an interesting story that evening, Kay was always the livelier one of the two of us, the life of the party, always the center of attention for good reason.  Too bad she wasn’t home, I would have borrowed that great yellow shirt she just bought.

            I race out the front door and towards the bus stop, it is only a 15 minute ride and if I was late I could always just make up the time afterwards. I work in a small office with a handful of collegues.  We are a smaller branch for  a large American marketing firm.  We handled the Northern Ontario business, with three additional (larger) firms in Canada: Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver.    I am in a bottom of the barrel Data Analyst position, spending my days sifting through raw numbers creating tabulation formulas, spreadsheets and graphs.  Computers are marvelous things that can make any information look much more professional.  I provide this information to my senior analyst who will draw conclusions on my leg work, the job was monotonous, however there was room to grow within the company which was a grounding factor keeping me in my position.  There were also opportunities to handle the overflow from other offices so I saw a large variety of information which helped make my day more interesting.

            Getting off the bus I ran to Williams to grab a cup of coffee for me and my supervisor; he always dealt better with my attendance issues when I provided him with a large latte.

“Sorry, I’ll stay late tonight, promise. “

“That flies as long as it’s ready for Friday.”

“I can handle that.”  I hoped that was the truth as I had yet to look at my workload. I put the latte on the corner of his desk and threw my purse on the ground behind mine.

“What did you do last night?”  he finds it entertaining to point out that I have a relationship with my couch.

“Watched a movie.”

“Sounds exciting.  You are the only 23 year old that I know that lives like a 50 year old.”

“Hey, I live in Sudbury, what am I supposed to do?  If I was back in University I would be going out every night with my friends and coming home at 5 in the morning to go to school the next day: but I’m here, and besides I outgrew that stage years ago.”

“Like I said your 23 living the life of a 50 year old.”

“Hey I live through Kay, she leads all the excitement for the both of us.”  he always loved Kay stories, she could get herself in the world of trouble and somehow weasel her way out of it looking like a hero.  Whenever I went out, I went out with her, she was a great source to release any tension, and also a great source to create tension. 

“So where is my favourite girl?  She hasn’t come by lately to see you at work, or called yet this morning.”  He pulled his dark rimmed glasses off his face.  He wore the book glasses not because he needed them but because they were stylish.  While he was 32, he could pass for early twenties easily.  He was hip and in touch with his environment, which is probably why he was my supervisor, running a group of twenty year olds who need someone who can sympathize with the added stress in our lives and foster our creative side.

“I don’t know, she didn’t come home last night.”

“Hot date?”  He raised his eyebrows.

“Ken! I don’t know, and not like I would tell you if I did!  She probably just didn’t want to drive back home in the storm and crashed at a friends.”

            I managed the rest of my day, browsing the internet and staring into space, a usual day at the office for me.  Ken left around five and I worked a little later just to make it seem as if I was making up for being late, truth be told I had not done much work at all, and with one working day left before deadline a knot was starting to form in my stomach.  With the office being no inspiration, I decided to walk home. 

            It wasn’t a long walk, a few blocks and with a hot chocolate in hand, even as the evening started to cool off, I was warm.  The sun was just starting to set and the traffic was slowing down, a few birds stuck around to sing my way home.  I reached the apartment feeling revitalized from the fresh crisp air.  Kay’s shoes were not at the door waiting to greet me as they always were and the bathroom light was not illuminating the hallway in it’s usual fashion either. 

            I took of my boots and quickly went to my room to change into sweats, my jeans were starting to smell after days of wear and tear, and the hamburger juice I had spilled on them earlier.  I threw them into my laundry hamper for future cleaning and slipped into a matching jog suit, bright pink to keep me cheery.  I picked up the phone to call Kay’s cell to check up on her.  Her answering machine came up right away, “Hi there, I can’t come to the phone right now but if you leave me a message I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”  Her perky voice rang back into my ear followed by a beep.  “Well, well, that must be some date you are having that it carries over two days and you ignore your best friends call!  I better hear all the dirty details when you come home! Oh yeah, can I borrow your yellow shirt tomorrow?  I am assuming it’s a yes if you don’t call back.  See you soon!.”  It always annoyed me that she forgot to charge her cell phone all the time, it dies and you never get a hold of her.

            I pushed open her bedroom door and stepped in searching for that perfect yellow shirt, it would look great with leggings, and be super comfortable in case I decided to do drinks after work. 

Her room was a mess, clothes littered the floors and make up was strewn across her dresser top.  I found the shirt laying on her bed among a few other things.  Even among the mess her room smelled of fresh cotton.  I looked around her room at the pictures on her walls and end table.  They were of trips and birthdays; there were pictures from the beach and of her 23rd birthday, many of which were kept our little secret of events that had passed by.  I took the shirt back to my room, hung it up on a clothes hanger.