Rule Four // c.h

Disaster Zone

Today I was going to be working on some very old, very delicate scrolls from Egypt and I was ecstatic. While I couldn't really read hieroglyphics, I did like handling the documents. Restoration is one of my favorite tasks. I was at peace in this silent room and that's kind of how I liked it. Jillian had come down here earlier, asking if I wanted some coffee. She isn't really allowed down in the Artifact Room but it's okay for a little while.

"Coffee would be great." I told her. "Remember to leave it by the door though. We could both get in trouble if it's anywhere near any of this stuff." Jillian nods.

"Got It Mrs. Hood. Be back in a ten minutes." Staying true to her word, she came back with two cups of coffee, one she left by the front door for me but the other she brought further into the room. I watched her sip from it slowly as I unrolled the scroll and it made me nervous, I shook out my nerves though. It was fine. As long as she left soon. Everything would be fine.

"You know, you really shouldn't have brought that in here Jillian." I told her as she hovered over my workbench.

"I know. I'll leave in a little bit. I just wanted to get a look at the scrolls. They're really from Egypt?" I nodded my head slowly as I carefully laid them back down on the desk. They were fragile and I had to get them back in a temperature controlled environment. I was just making sure they were still readable and that there was no dust or hair particles attached to their glass plating. "That's so cool I've always wanted to go to Egypt it's so.." I pushed back in my chair a little, trying to stand. I hadn't realized how close Jillian was to me though and so I knocked back into her and like something out of a Curators nightmare, I watched as her hot coffee spilled out of her cup and onto the table.

I think I screamed. I think we both screamed. I immediately snatched up the scrolls. The coffee was already making the paper curl and warp. "Mrs. Hood! I'm so sorry!" Jillian started shouting, she was pulling tissues out of her purse, dabbing at the coffee on the table and reaching up to touch the scroll with her bare hands.

"No! Jillian!" I shouted, rushing over to the restoration desk. "You can't just dab at it with tissue! I told you you couldn't be in here with coffee! I told you to leave!"

"But Mrs. Hood I..." I could tell she was freaking out. But so was I. These documents weren't that important. It wasn't like she pulled coffee on the Declaration of Independence but they were historical artifacts and it was my job that was on the line right now if I didn't get this fixed. If I couldn't save this scroll then I would be out of a job. Even if I did manage to salvage it, I could still be fired.

"No! Jillian!" I snapped at her again. "Get out! I mean it this time. Leave!" I didn't spare her a glance though, I was already hard at work trying to fix the coffee stain, trying to uncurl the old, withered paper. I heard her run away. I heard the door slam shut as she left the room and then... Silence. I couldn't worry about her feelings right now though. I had more important things to do.

I worked diligently, trying to get the stain out and for the most part, it was working. It was hard to get the scrolls edges to uncurl though and that made me chew nervously on the inside of my cheek. The words blurred a little in places where I hadn't been able to stop the coffee from running and I had to quickly go over them before they were lost forever. Then I had to air out the paper and wait for it to dry to assess the amount of damage still left.

While I waited, I stood and stretched before heading back to the scene of the crime. The coffee was still on the work bench, piles of soggy tissues sitting on top of a portion of it. I swallowed hard, a lump forming in my throat. I quickly got some paper towels and swabbed up the mess before washing my hands and running my hands through my hair in frustration. I angrily threw the now cold coffee Jillian had bought me into the trash can. All of this just because I tried to get up off my stool.