Poison Ivy

Chapter Fourteen: Frozen Peas

I huffed as I leant on one leg, awkwardly folding the other too far over so that I didn't have to sit properly on the office chair. My elbow was pressed hard against the desk in front of me as it propped me up, my chin forced into it. All my actions were forced and required considerable amounts of control over my mouth. I thanked God, Allah, Buddha and anyone else whom were thought to have some outer spiritual power over this world for granting me with a brain and mouth filter otherwise I'd have been 'let go' from ROCK Bottom about two hours previous due to all the colourful language that would have been let loose – luckily I had been able to pent it all up and I only grimaced, winced and groaned in pain a grand total of twelve times which makes for at least one hundred less than this morning when I had woken up.

Mike looked up from his paper work, sighing as he watched me. "I really think you should take the rest of the day off, Ivy." He told me, his face washed with concern.

"I'm fine, Mike, I've told you that three times already."

"I'd have believed you the first if you weren't sat as though someone had lodged a pike up you rear." He grinned slightly and I internally yelled out in pain at such a thought. Definitely too soon.

"Look, go home, rest a little and come in tomorrow. I won't fill it as a sick on your permanent record if you don't want me to." He promised and I sighed.

"I'm sorry," I told him and he held up a hand, holding his pen between his index finger and thumb, as he shook his head.

"I don't want to hear it. Just go." He said and I smiled weakly.

"Thanks," I nodded towards him before slowly raising myself painfully off the chair, letting out a little whimper as I did so.

I shot Mike a pitiful look and his eyes smiled at me whilst his mouth grimaced.

"I'll call you later to check up." He told me and I nodded again, grabbing my bag and a small pile of paperwork I had been working on before giving Mike a small wave, walking out of the office.

I waddled – yes, waddled – down the hall way towards the elevator, glad we weren't a health enthusiastic building that were big on stairs.

It took me longer to reach the ground floor than it usually would and as the elevator doors swept open, revealing the lobby, I groaned.

Such a long distance of three metres to get out onto the sidewalk and then some to get to my car. I'd parked it as close as I could to the building so that I would lessen to pain of walking, however, it didn't help all that much, especially when Mike told me we'd had to switch offices with his work colleague, Dan, who had sprained his right ankle and pulled a muscle in his left leg last week falling down a small flight of stairs – poor soul, but what about my damned back end?

Lugging myself outside and over to my car, I let out a sharp breath, propping my back against my car door. I shuffled the paperwork under my arm and slid my bag off my shoulder, reaching into it to grab my keys. I managed to pull out the bothersome keys after struggling to detach them from the pocket lining that they'd hooked on to – this always happened, I was quite frankly tired of its reoccurrence, especially as past situations weren't at all pleasant.

I'm surprised I didn't get pulled over on the drive back home, I was practically leaning out my car door and my legs were kicked up to the side of me, across the handbrake which I was certain was an illegal position of driving in every state in America, and let's be honest, it's not like we're big on road safety here – countless times I've witnessed people on cell phones with no seatbelt on, driving at least twenty over the speed limit permitted – but somehow, I'd made it home without one cop car flashing me.