Voilà

Facing a Horrible Boss

NATHAN’S PERSPECTIVE

         That was an exhausting night. A really exhausting one! I just hope to God that Michelle won’t find any fault with costumes. Now I understand what it takes to create clothes like that, seriously. I always had an overwhelming urge to give Michelle a good kick in the ass. She’ll never get married; trust me, if she goes bossing round like that.

          As expected, Michael and I were late for work. Let me point out, not because of me. It took me half an hour to wake him up. At last I resorted to the final and the worst idea. I poured a mug of water on him and then he woke up spluttering.

          “What the hell?! Did you just piss on me?” he asked, looking up at me with utter disbelief and disgust. See? He sleeps that deeply. Imagine having to wake him up when he gets drunk.

          “Good. I was starting to think you were dead. Now would you like a personal invitation from Michelle to come to work? We were supposed to be early today. Thanks to you, we are terribly late and I won’t be surprised if Michelle sacks us today,” I said with a martyr’s expression.

          “Well, a gentle prod would have been enough. I’m a light sleeper.” Michael said indignantly, wiping his face.

          “Oh, wait. Now I’m certain that there has been a grave mistake committed there, Mr. VanHalen. Let me rephrase that for you. By ‘gentle prod’ you must have certainly meant ‘a real hard kick in the ass,’ didn’t you?” I asked with so much sarcasm that even Touchstone and Jacques in Shakespeare’s As You like It would have been ashamed.

          “Okay, whatever. I’ll go get ready.” Michael said, avoiding my glare.

          “You’d better. And by the way, don’t you think we should have written down our résumés? It’s going to come in handy so soon,” I snapped.

          After an hour we were finally on our way to work. I was so furious and worried that I was driving the car so fast that I thought we would end up in a hospital rather than at work.

          “Dude, slow down!” Michael yelled when I narrowly missed a truck. “It’s better to hear Michelle’s blasted lecture than to die, okay? So many people’s hearts are going to be broken when I’m gone. And the main point of all? I haven’t even screwed Cecelia Lippmann yet!”

          For a minute I forgot to yell at Michael when I saw what was awaiting us at the main entrance of the building as I pulled into the parking lot. Michael was still muttering about how his hair had been totally windblown. He had not seen what or who precisely, was ready to receive us. If he had, he would have been blown away by the wind.

          “I’d be surprised if you still had your hair on if you’d see the person welcoming us with open arms.” I said, wide-eyed. Michael looked thoroughly perplexed. Following my gaze, he saw what I was seeing and his jaw slacked so much that it could hit the ground.

          “Michelle Wang.” We both muttered as we sat glued to our seats with her nasty glare burning into us.

MICHAEL’S PERSPECTIVE

          I remembered the last time I screamed. It was when I was in fifth grade. Blake had thrown a plastic tarantula on me when I had thrown spit balls on him. Don’t ask me why, I don’t remember. I always had a phobia for spiders and Blake knew it very well. Then I screamed so loud that it would have put a girl to shame. For two weeks, rumors circulated that someone had it recorded and I even got blackmail letters.

          That was exactly how I screamed when I saw Michelle through the car’s windshield. Nathan did not take his eyes off the figure standing at the entrance of Voilá’s building. Her thin lips were set in a grim line. She was looking at our silver Porsche like it was a disgusting alien spaceship. And the looks she gave us when we both got out of the car? Believe me; she looked at us like we were scum. Slimy, stinking scum.