Chapter 1: Reese Accidentally Tells His Boss What He Should Do with Someone's Shoes
HE COULD CLAIM IT WAS AN ACCIDENT. Everything went so wrong, so quickly, that Reese could barely keep up with what he was saying out loud. The words came tumbling out of his mouth like a train going full speed into its eventual wreck.
Wait, was this even a train wreck? Supposedly, you couldn’t look away from a train wreck because it was both horrifying and fascinating. And people loved tragedy, especially the gory, bloody ones.
Would this count as a bloody tragedy though? Hm. Judging from the way Marina was peeking into the open office door, typing the numbers on her office phone furiously, then whispering urgently to whoever her gossip friend was, as though Reese wouldn’t notice, this one could as well be counted as a drama. But a bloody tragedy? Hmmm.
Reese considered the question to himself, staring at the clear blue sky outside of the full window right in front of him. A couple of birds flew past, free and uncaring. Dancing as if mocking him. A flap of their wings asked him, Who’s inside the cage now?
Yes, Reese finally decided, perhaps this was a tragedy in the making. Or, at least, he was pretty certain there would be a body by the end of this. Probably Reese’s.
“Care to say that to my face again, Bennett?”
He flicked his eyes back up to his fuming boss. The complexion of Zach’s face was so red it could match Reese’s auburn hair, which would trouble Reese if he cared. But he didn’t. Not anymore.
Reese was quiet now, contemplating. Honestly, he couldn’t even remember the long passionate rant he had just graced his boss so early in the morning. And, if he thought about it again, it wasn’t like it was something new either. They’d fought over every little things hundreds of times during the past four years they’d been “secretly” dating that Reese was just used to it at this point.
The worst kept secret at that, too. Everybody in the office knew, for one. Zach was the only one who’d insisted on the secrecy for the sake of being “professional”. Reese couldn’t see what was so professional about the several times Zach had dragged him and slammed him onto his private office table before.
Oh. Reese did remember one particularly important thing he’d mentioned in his tirade. Still smiling pleasantly, he repeated, “I said: Are you going to start giving fellatio to your higher-up’s shoes too? You’ve done enough licking anyway, so that wouldn’t be much of an upgrade, would it?”
A multiple crash landed outside the door behind him. Ah, yes—those pesky printouts and a million files. Hashtag-felt. He barely noticed someone else’s gasp as Reese was too busy staring serenely at the volcano ready to erupt right before him. He started counting. Three. Two. One....
The volcano opened his mouth—
Reese stood up. “If I’ll be excused?” Then strolled out leisurely right before he heard Zach yelling out his name.
He chuckled to himself. Well. If a yell could shake the whole building, he thought, Zach’s surely would.
✷🎃🎃🎃✷
Back in his cubicle, Reese was fighting against a massive headache. Which was absolutely delightful. As discreetly as he was capable, he pinched the bridge of his nose. He wished so badly for a sweet relief of a dreamless sleep.
Frustratingly, he’d been getting this headache on and off for the past six months or so. He had tried to Google it before, as he was too exhausted to see an actual doctor—seriously, who would even have the time?—but it turned out that the headache was mostly likely due to stress. Wow. Really? He was stressed? He wouldn’t have known, what with the pile of documents he’d put down beside his table since they wouldn’t fit on top of it anymore. Or, the fact that he couldn't remember the last time he went home before nine in the evening. He was absolutely relaxed. No stress was found. He was completely Zen. What the hell was this article talking about?
“Man,” Bernard murmured to him from his own cubicle across the hallway, “you are so utterly dead.”
Aha. News travelled at the speed of sound around here. Turning, Reese cheerfully began, “Bernard, how many times do I have to tell you that I already am?”
“Quit saying those dreadful things while smiling, dude. It’s creepy as shit.”
Reese considered this. “Do people still use ‘dreadful’ as a word anymore?”
“You’re going to get fired this time. Like, for real,” his long time coworker replied gravely, completely ignoring his question. “Doesn’t matter if you’re bending over backwards for the boss. That was way over the line.” Reese raised his eyebrows. Was that what Zach was telling people? That he was the one bending over backwards?
Reese sighed, closing his eyes as he slumped down his chair. Of course, he knew he’d just crossed the line. The fact was he wasn’t sorry about crossing it at all. If anything, he was feeling disappointed in himself. He wasn’t usually so hot-headed.
Okay, so maybe that was a huge lie. He had always been hot-headed—he just didn’t act on the aggression. Hearing someone complain about him, he’d smile, ask what the problem was and look for a feasible solution. If someone angrily yelled at him, he would nod and smile and take it. If someone did something bad or wrong to him, he’d smile and wave them away. There was always a way to fix it.
He’d learned this early on when he was still a child living only with his mom. He looked exactly like his mother; auburn hair, natural tanned skin, pale light green eyes, slight build that forever got him mistaken as twenty-year-old twink instead of a twenty-nine-year-old jaded, nihilistic man with a questionable moral. His mom was all sunshine and absolute joy to be around with. As usual, Reese blamed his deadbeat father for his rotten personality.
“What’s his problem anyway?” Reese found himself confiding to Bernard even though he knew he shouldn’t have. Not in this company, this Joja Corporation head office where everyone was so ready to backstab each other to get to the top, or throw other people under the bus to save their own skin. Bernard had always been the latter, but Reese couldn’t help it this time. He had to talk to someone. A therapist preferably, absolutely, but, hey, Bernard was close. And free. “He’d been so unbearable in the past month. He kept calling me to his office, blaming me for every single mistake I didn’t even do.”
“Ah, you think it might have something to do with the higher-ups' discussion on promoting you?”
Reese glanced at him blankly. “What promotion?”
This time Bernard looked uncomfortable. “Umm, it’s just a rumor. Some higher-ups came by a few months back asking about you. And you know, you’re practically the best employee here.”
“Nobody,” he started slowly, “had come to see me to discuss anything.”
“Oh.”
“So, it might be nothing,” Reese continued faintly, mind moving too fast for him to grasp. All those fights and for what? Over a gossip? Why didn’t Zach talk to him first? That stupid fucking knucklehead. And even if he were about to be promoted, why couldn’t Zach just be happy for him? “Just a silly rumor.”
“Well, there’s also that.”
“And,” Reese added flatly, “even if they offered, I would say no.”
“What?” Bernard shouted, earning him several hushes from other cubicles that Reese would bet both of his kidneys were taking notes of the details of this specific drama. Reese? The role model of an employee cursing at the boss? Unheard of. Call E!News, they needed to know this ASAP. “No, seriously, why?” Bernard asked, in lower this time. “Everyone wants to go up, Reese, are you insane?”
Reese could practically feel the heat of the envelope hidden inside the drawer of his desk. It had been there for months, re-opened and re-read for dozens of times already. He’d been thinking about it so much, it ached. His beloved late grandpa’s scrawl across the pages, telling him about the farm far away from the city, how much he’d loved it, how much he’d loved Reese, how much he’d love it if Reese would have it.
Reese’s longing was a tangible thing. He could pick the strings in the air, played the cord as though he’d been playing it all his life. Perhaps he had. After all, he remembered those summers he’d spent at his grandpa’s farm. Those summers were ones of the happiest moments in his life.
He looked around his cubicle. Plain blue, dull, sterile, other than a few photographs of him and his mom, or of him and his grandpa before the sickness sadly took him. Reese wanted to take the envelope out again, just so he could feel the love poured inside of it. The safety of it.
Joja Corporation or a new life in the middle of nowhere?
This shouldn't have been a difficult choice. He’d prepared his whole life for this job. The financial stability of working in a big corporation with great benefits and retirement funds. For years Reese had worked his ass off. He’d climbed up the ladder from nothing, played the political game he didn't even like. He had thrived. So, why would he be stupid enough to start from scratch?
But was it really so stupid to want something different? It was this toxic environment of an evil corporation—or a blank page where he could be whatever he wanted. Whoever he wanted. A new place where he could finally live.
With that, Reese quickly logged back into his computer and typed furiously. He ignored Bernard’s worried mentions of his name. He had to do this before he chickened out. Reese didn’t consider himself an impulsive person, but after being treated like dirt all month over an unconfirmed rumor? He was done.
And, waiting for the letter to be printed out, he thought to himself: as he should be.
Reese packed up his bag, then gently pocketed his grandpa’s letter. He slammed the other letter he’d just printed onto Bernard’s table, declaring, “Consider this my resignation letter.”
“What?” exclaimed several coworkers who had finally given up the pretense of not eavesdropping.
“Reese, are you out of your mind?” one of them asked.
“Nah,” Reese said as he walked away, “I’m done here. See y’all whenever.”
“Wait! Reese!” Bernard sounded panicked now, though Reese couldn’t begin to imagine why. “You cannot just leave this here. I’m not going to be in the middle of your lover’s spat.”
Ah, there it was. “Just give it to the dickhead. And tell him we’re done.”
“Reese!”
✷🎃🎃🎃✷
Down outside the office lobby, inhaling winter air that was slowly turning into spring, Reese pulled out his smartphone and called up their usual sex toy shop. He ordered the biggest dragon dildo in the shop, requested it to be sent to Zach’s flat address with a note read: So you won’t be lonely while I’m away, my little snookums. He ignored a passerby glancing at him, looking scandalous.
Someone was yelling, followed by a series of raucous klaxon. Another person was cursing. A fight on the side of the road probably. Yeah, Reese thought to himself, he wasn’t going to miss this city at all.
The second phone call was picked up on the second ring. The chirping tone of his mom’s greeting eased the tension he didn’t realize he was carrying. “Reese, my sweet boy! It’s so rare for you to call at this hour. How are you doing? Working hard? Want to come over later for some cookies?”
“What kind?”
“Oh, please. You eat all kinds.”
“Yeah. And I’d like to be prepared.”
Reese smiled as he imagined his mom rolling her eyes. “Chocolate chips and peanut butter.”
“I’m coming over right now,” he replied, already walking faster to reach his Audi in the parking lot.
Bafflement colored his mom’s next words. “Isn’t this a work hour, sweetie? Are you ill?”
“Not exactly.” Reese took a deep breath, then let it gust out. Still smiling, he asked, “Say, Mom, do you think I’d make a decent farmer?”
✷🎃🎃🎃✷