The Tower

May 9, 2014, 6:10 AM

It's never a good thing when you wake up and you're more tired than you were before you went to sleep. Of course, on this Friday morning that was only three hours ago. It's been such a long week, and judging from Nigel's ever worsening mood, the ongoing board meeting isn't going too well either. All week Nigel has kept me securely chained to my desk, piling one impossible task after another on me. But I remained resolute and now I just have to get through today. Because tomorrow afternoon I leave with Kori for Disneyworld to celebrate my birthday. I've been planning this for almost a year, okay, since my last birthday, and I am sooo ready for it.

I gulp down my uber-early morning coffee and sadly, at this crack of dawn, it isn't nearly as satisfying as a Venti Triple Americano. Fortunately that will come in about two hours when I get to the corner coffee shop by the office. Just in time to rescue the day as my first caffeine buzz wears off.

I stumble into my bedroom and plop down at the dressing table. With my current level of exhaustion and need to get to the office, I put on extremely minimal makeup. But then I decide to make up for my minimalism with some perfume, pulling out one of the little samples I got from Sephora. The card that goes with it looks pretty earthy so I spray it twice onto my neck.

Bam!

Yeah, I'm suddenly in an Old Spice commercial. I'm definitely a little more alert now and look down at the inside of the card and read "undeniably the most masculine scent..."

Terrific.

I put on cologne instead of perfume.

Ten minutes later I have easily three layers of skin scrubbed off my neck and there are still faint traces of the man musk. Unfortunately, I'm clearly not fully alert because I get the brilliant idea to spray perfume over the remaining man smell. I hit it with a dark vanilla and patchouli, thinking maybe the dark scent would meld well with the cologne and make it smell more feminine.

Nope.

Now I just smell really really weird. Like warm vanilla laced with drugs being sold by a very gay and flamboyant Hispanic drug dealer with slicked back hair.

Yea Friday...

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May 9, 2014, 4:00 PM

Despite the not so good start to this pre-vacation Friday, I've managed to get through the day and have just one more hour to go before I can break free and escape to the Magic Kingdom. Nigel has been upstairs all day so it's actually been a fairly good day. Kori has been having all sorts of fun with my new line of perfume. Eau de Percy. Percy Number 5. Cologne de Joyce. Parf...

The front door opens and simultaneously "Percy! Office!" rings out.

Shit.

One fricking hour to go. Really?

"Coming Nigel," I call out from my cubicle. I drop my head, close my eyes, take a deep breath, and push back my chair.

Crash!

"Hey!"

"Fuck you Victoria." Right now I'm so tired I have the grace and poise of a crackhead rhino.

I climb out of the chair and head into the prick's office.

"Yes, you wanted to see me?" I ask curtly. I'm barely hanging on here, trying to keep it together before I really blow it.

Nigel nods to yet another stack of drawings on his worktable. "That fucking tower is killing the Corona Castle project. And us. The Bill of Quantities were clearly all fucked up and now we have too much or too little of shit. It's destroying the schedule and costing us millions. Whoever did the takeoffs for it really screwed the pooch." He's glowering at me.

Shit, he thinks I did it. The proverbial screwing. But I didn't. I had nothing to do with the tower. It was ...

"Nigel, I didn't do those takeoffs. Everything I worked on was for the main building, the castle. I had ..."

"Then if you didn't fuck up, who the fuck did?" he growled.

Oh, the prick is going to love this one. Hey, he asked, didn't he?

"Victoria," I say plainly. I can feel the smugness oozing out of me.

I saw it. It was just an instant, a nanosecond, a scant flash in time, but it was there.

It was fear.

Then it was gone. Nigel the Prick was back in full form. "It doesn't matter. But now you're going to redo the takeoffs. For all of the Tower drawings. By next Wednesday."

That's it. My building anger finally overwhelms logic and consumes me. I put one foot in the stirrup and swing up onto my brilliant white steed, which just happens to be a unicorn. That's right, my High Horse is a unicorn. Get over it.

"Nigel, you can't! You know I'm on vacation all next week. I've been planning it all year. Kori and I already bought the plane tickets. We leave tomorrow. Why should I clean up Victoria's shit?"

"Hey" wafts in from outside the office.

I shout over my shoulder towards the open office door, "I said shut the fuck up Victoria!" I turn back to Nigel. I lower my voice to a throaty growl. "Now, Mr. Cooke, I have busted my ass all year on the damn project, doing everything you've asked me to do. I have stayed late almost every damn day since you've taken over the department. I think the least you can do for me is let me go on my vacation and make Victoria redo the takeoffs." I'm prancing circles around him, my unicorn high stepping it like a Tennessee walking horse.

There's silence outside the office. At least the bitch finally listened to me.

"Are you through?" Nigel asks evenly.

Yeah, that might be a good idea. I feel something vaguely like my senses returning to me after their panicked flight a mere thirty seconds ago. So with the spectacular immolation of my career complete, and bits of Nigel's y-chromosomes splattered across the walls, I dismount but keep my unicorn nearby. When he fires me, I'm mounting up.

"Wednesday morning," he says with a flick of his skinny little wrist. "All of them."

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