A smile in purgatory 火海一笑 (BxB)

First Phone Call

(Timeline: Week 2 Saturday)

It was Saturday 11 am.

Hanson was working from home, on a project developing a finance app for revenue distribution. His cell phone rang. He looked at it and it showed Simon Wen Kexing's name. He was busy with his programming code and did not want to lose focus, so he ignored the call. He had to finish the app before noon in order to publish it to the app store the same day. If he missed the noon deadline, he would have to wait one more day for the store to publish his app. It was the company's rule. Also, he gets paid extra if he finishes the project before deadline. Deadline was Sunday.

He successfully completed the code, tested his app on his computer, cellphone, and tablet, and found a couple bugs. He fixed those bugs and tested his app again, on 3 different platforms and 3 different operating systems, and confirmed that the app ran smoothly, so he submitted it to the app store. It was 11.59 am when he clicked "Submit".

Thank God he did not answer that phone call, or he would have missed the deadline by just one minute. And it would have cost him his bonus pay.

It was noon when he dialed Simon back.

"Hello!" A man answered.

"What do you need." Hanson said, monotonous.

"Uh, YOU called me, so YOU tell me, what do YOU need?" The man said.

"I got a call. I'm returning the call. Now I will hang up." Hanson said with his monotony, and simply hung up.

---

"JERK!" Tony swore as he closed the flip phone.

"What is it?" Simon asked, walking out of the bathroom and toweling his hair dry.

"You were in the shower, your phone rang, so I answered. The guy was nasty." Tony said and handed the phone back to Simon.

Simon flipped it open and looked at the Call History. It was Hanson.

"Oh that was Hanson! What did you say to him? I needed his help!"

"I didn't say anything. He was so rude, didn't say Hello, and just hung up. Who the hell does he think he is anyway!? Dickhead..."

"He NEVER says hello! I told you! I've known him for two weeks, he's always like that."

"Oh... so THAT'S the guy...!?"

"Yes, that's him. My drill sergeant. Let me call him back."

Kexing called Hanson back and told him that his roommate Tony answered the phone because he was in the shower. They are used to answer each other's phone. He then apologized for his roommate's poor phone etiquette. And went on to ask Hanson for help with a particular question in the homework, about a copper wire.

"Hanson, I am going to put you on speaker phone because I can't hold the phone and type on the computer at the same time... So I went to filter the shape for Round, but the copper wire didn't show up, so is the inventory zero then?" Kexing asked.

"The shape for wire is just simply Wire. Round is for actual bar stocks that are circular in shape. Wires come in roll, not bar stock, so go to the shape "Wire". It also says in parentheses Roll of wire, next to Wire." Hanson explained.

Kexing found it and the inventory and location, and thanked Hanson. "Thank you Hanson, I finished the homework, I think I got everything right this time. You're going to be proud of me on Monday. Have a good weekend. Goodbye now." Kexing said politely.

"Ok." Hanson said and was about to hang up, but Tony shouted in the background.

"Would it kill you to say welcome when somebody thanks you? Or goodbye when somebody says bye? Or same to you when somebody says good weekend? Or do you have to be an ASS all the time?"

"Sssshhhhh!!!" Kexing pushed Tony and quickly deactivated the speakerphone feature. "I'm so sorry Hanson, I think ... Tony is drunk, I will see you Monday, ok bye." Kexing quickly hung up.

~ ~

Kexing threw a pillow at Tony, "What did you do that for!? He's my boss! You're gonna get me fired!"

"He needs a good smack! A spank !"

"Go spank your boyfriend !"

"I will ! Don't think that I won't !"

Tony threw the pillow back at Kexing. Ziggy immediately barked at Tony "WOOFF!!"

And then barked again "WOOFF WOFFF!!"

The dog always participated in the boys fight, whenever Tony bullies Kexing. A tiny little Westie, but loyal and ever so protective of his owner. Especially after Willie died, Ziggy's responsibility grew double. So he started barking in double whenever Tony did something to Kexing, that he didn't like. Before Willie died, when the boys fight, Ziggy would bark once, and Willie had the habit of barking twice in a row. After Willie died, Ziggy would bark once for himself, and then twice for Willie. His job got tougher. He got tougher too. Don't mess with him. And don't mess with his Lao Wen.

So then Tony barked back at Ziggy, "WOOFFF!" and then went out. He had a date with his boyfriend and was running late.

And yeah, somebody's gonna get spanked tonight.