The Ascendant

Chapter Forty-Seven

The following day was my worst in nearly three weeks. I was totally dehydrated and utterly exhausted (although we had been far too drunk, not to mention overfed, to have sex when we got home) and Hobbs was on my case from the word go: complaining about my untidy desk, grumbling about my bedraggled appearance and shouting about the constant disappearances from my desk.

I could hardly confide in him that I’d spent half the morning convalescing on the toilet and the other half thinking about my next sojourn to the “rest room”. Three cans of fizzy drinks and two bars of chocolate had had no discernible effect on my energy resources, and still it was only half past ten. How to create the right impression, this was not.

I resolved to muddle through, to avoid checking the time so frequently and focus my attention on investigating customer complaints and chain-drinking coffee. I also made a concerted effort to get my mind and eyes away from the office junior, whose suggestive style of filing had already caused more than enough fiery flushes.

I made it to lunch time without rankling the effervescent Hobbs any further, and took a stroll up the High Street, making the most of what passed for fresh air before slumbering into my favourite greasy café. I ordered the all day breakfast with extra chips, devouring the lot and washing it down with some more coffee. So much for romanticism, I thought, trudging back to the office. I had so far completed approximately five percent of what I had set out to achieve at 7.30 this morning, and the afternoon promised to be equally bleak. I needed sleep, more coffee, and ten minutes alone with the junior, in any particular order.

The hours between two and four had been the most murderous, but once I’d made it past such a vital milestone I started to get a few things done. With the finishing line in sight I actually managed a spurt of sorts, eventually shutting down my computer a few minutes before six, a finishing time which would have been unthinkable only a few hours earlier.

‘You made it through then,’ said Hobbs with a congratulatory nod.

‘Just about,’ I replied. ‘I’ll not be doing that again in a hurry.’

‘Pay day celebration was it?’ Hobbs had become friendlier, perhaps acknowledging my courageous efforts towards the end. The day may not have been entirely salvaged, but it hadn’t been wasted either.

‘Yeah, I took my girlfriend out for a meal and ended up staying until they were putting the chairs on the tables. Got a bit carried away I think.’

Hobbs told me not to make a habit of it and left me to tidy up the shambles that was my desk top. As Rob was heading off a couple of hours earlier I think I spotted him stealing a grin, perhaps recognising the first fateful steps towards chaos and desolation. I would have to be in the office even earlier tomorrow, to retrace those steps and avoid attracting such attentive amusement from Rob in the future.