An orange pen sat on the desk, mocking him with it's unusual color. Or, at least, Jonathan thought the pen was meant to mock him. He knew why he was in his boss's office; the harsh florescent lighting flickered down on him like an interrigation lamp on a freshly caught police suspect. He had been careful though.
He had wore gloves to keep his fingerprints off, and had carefully practiced writing with his left hand for months to produce a legible, but very different scrawl from his usual handwriting. He knew where the cameras were in the main office, but the hallway and washroom were unobserved by mechanical eyes. The keyswipe registered those entering, but not those leaving. It had been a simple thing to look like he was heading home for the day, then hide in a stall in the washroom, feet up to leave no hint of his location for an hour and a half, reading silently on his phone to pass the time.
The official list had been put up by Lisa, his soon to be interrogator, obsessive-compulsive paper-pusher, and office tyrant of a type that Jonathan thought that it would be more suitable if she came to work each day with a black leather bustier and a notched whip rather than her clipboard and sensible gray pantsuit. He had found her control cloying from the first day he had been hired to sit at the desk, staring at his computer and talking endlessly to the voices piped directly into his head, already made angry but half-defeated by a labyrinthian maze of touch tone terror and computerized combat.
Jonathan was, outwardly, a model employee for the most part. He had learned the pages of insurance material until he could dance through the pages like a squirrel through an oak. Calm, professional and infatiguable, he handled anger and screams as easily as whimpering pleading. He did what public relations said their service was for: he helped people. It was a violation of the real purpose of things however, and for this he had earned Lisa's endless, if futile, wrath.
He happily worked the extra hours thrown to bury him, dodged attempts to bungle his pay with immaculately crafted paperwork that confirmed him to be correct, and passed reviews that seemed to measure his performance to the millimeter rather than to the customary half-yard or so. Lisa's endless attempts to gain power over him had been thwarted again and again with ease, leaving her almost visibly angry. The rage at his insolence radiated off her like the heat of hell, the other employees cowering in their cubicles to avoid a painful lash from her stymied wrath. Each day she could not find him guilty made her rage increase and brought amused, hidden joy deep in Jonathan's soul.
He had wore gloves to keep his fingerprints off, and had carefully practiced writing with his left hand for months to produce a legible, but very different scrawl from his usual handwriting. He knew where the cameras were in the main office, but the hallway and washroom were unobserved by mechanical eyes. The keyswipe registered those entering, but not those leaving. It had been a simple thing to look like he was heading home for the day, then hide in a stall in the washroom, feet up to leave no hint of his location for an hour and a half, reading silently on his phone to pass the time.
The official list had been put up by Lisa, his soon to be interrogator, obsessive-compulsive paper-pusher, and office tyrant of a type that Jonathan thought that it would be more suitable if she came to work each day with a black leather bustier and a notched whip rather than her clipboard and sensible gray pantsuit. He had found her control cloying from the first day he had been hired to sit at the desk, staring at his computer and talking endlessly to the voices piped directly into his head, already made angry but half-defeated by a labyrinthian maze of touch tone terror and computerized combat.
Jonathan was, outwardly, a model employee for the most part. He had learned the pages of insurance material until he could dance through the pages like a squirrel through an oak. Calm, professional and infatiguable, he handled anger and screams as easily as whimpering pleading. He did what public relations said their service was for: he helped people. It was a violation of the real purpose of things however, and for this he had earned Lisa's endless, if futile, wrath.
He happily worked the extra hours thrown to bury him, dodged attempts to bungle his pay with immaculately crafted paperwork that confirmed him to be correct, and passed reviews that seemed to measure his performance to the millimeter rather than to the customary half-yard or so. Lisa's endless attempts to gain power over him had been thwarted again and again with ease, leaving her almost visibly angry. The rage at his insolence radiated off her like the heat of hell, the other employees cowering in their cubicles to avoid a painful lash from her stymied wrath. Each day she could not find him guilty made her rage increase and brought amused, hidden joy deep in Jonathan's soul.
