Balance - Book one by Marc Dickason
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If you had asked me to rate my first attack on a scale of one to ten, ten being the most horrifically unpleasant experience of my life, I would have probably gone for about a six. The second attack did better, achieving an easy eight.
These were my thoughts as I buried Critter 2 beside his predecessor. I was pleased that my cat burying skills had improved with repetition, and the poor furry beast was safely underground in about half an hour.
“I’m sorry pussy cat.” I muttered as I patted down the dirt. He had been a bit of an aggressive asshole as far as cats went, but I believed we could have been friends given an adequate amount of time. Sadly with my bank balance looking dismal and the fact that burying a third cat seemed almost guaranteed, there would not be a Critter 3. Consequences would have play out of their own accord.
But these particular consequences seemed the least of my worries. Whatever it was that was happening to me was increasing in intensity, and my concern for potential accidental harm growing in equal amounts.
As I arrived for work I had more or less made up my mind that I needed to come up with the money for defence training. I played with a few options, wondering if a bank would dare loan me money based on my dismal income, or whether some poor sucker could be fooled into buying my car. Neither of these ideas seemed feasible and I got busy with work, logging onto the net and starting a browse of my favourite sleazy websites. I had just come upon an article that eagerly reported an incident involving a suspected convict eating his own liver, but before I could check as to whether Benny played a part I was interrupted. Brent was at my table, cup of coffee clutched in hand.
“How’d the thing go?” he asked nonchalantly, but I detected a glint of real interest in his eyes.
“Okay.”
“Got your Spirit Level?”
“Above average.”
“Nice.” He took a slurping sip of coffee, looking thoughtful. “So? Gonna go for training?”
“Was considering it.”
“Cool.”
“Not sure where I’m gonna get the cash for it.”
“What, you don’t know?”
I shrugged. “What?”
A premature grin suggested he was about to reveal a secret of the universe. “The Whisperer has to cover it.”
“What?”
“Defence training. If it’s to prevent harm to your person, The Whisperer has to cover your training costs.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“Most don’t.” He took another sip of coffee, looking smug. “It was either that or dental, The Whisperer took the defence training route because they assumed they’d never have to actually pay.”
“Wow. How do I…?”
“Ask Claudia for the form.”
“Will do.”
He cleared his throat and scratched at the little goatee.
“Hey, do you ever gamble, Jet?” His attempt at being casual failed.
“Not really.”
“What would you say if I told you…?” But he was cut off.
“Brent!”
A short, balding man was approaching at speed, the suit he wore so perfect and finely pressed it seemed to glow. The sneer on his podgy face suggested he had just caught a horse shitting on his bed.
Brent looked up; his face fell and shoulders sagged. “Paul, I was just…”
But Brent was cut-off a second time. Paul, who I recognised as my boss but had not exchanged two words with since starting work, was so close to Brent that for a second I imagined he might grab the taller man in an embrace. Instead he spoke up into Brent’s face with a commitment to intimidation so fierce it must have been, at the very least, a finely honed hobby.
“You tryna jerk me off?” Paul spat, making Brent recoil an entire step.
“I… no, not trying to jerk you off.” Brent stammered.
“You think I don’t know, Brent. You think I don’t see you sneaking off every five minutes? ‘Going to the bathroom?’ ‘Going to make copies?’” Paul clicked off each set of quotation marks in the air with his fingers, a gesture done with such conviction I expected he might add a full stop at the end of the sentence.
“Well… I was just…” Brent shrunk under the verbal assault. It was painful to watch.
“Where the hell are my design layouts, Brent? Is that what you’re doing right now? Delivering my design layouts?”
“No…”
“Then you must be tryna jerk me off, Brent. Isn’t that right? A quick hand job? Tryna slip me a ‘handy’ while I’m not looking?” The quotation marks were clicked off again. By now the exchange was drawing the gaze of others in the office.
“No, not trying to slip you a handy, sir,” Brent muttered.
“In my office. Now.”
With that Paul let out a shuddering sigh, smoothed out his suit, and stomped off, his stalking stride as practiced as his intimidation.
Brent stood rigid and stared at the floor, his face flushing a red so deep it could have passed for rouge.
“We’ll talk later,” he murmured to me, then followed in Paul’s footsteps for what was likely a good session of being belittled.