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Frank Burrows could not remember getting to the office.
This was not unusual. For close on sixteen years he had made the half-hour drive from his apartment building to the Wesley-Miles Insurance Company office block downtown. His body knew the route so well that it required no supervision. Each turn signal, each lane change, each small acceleration was encoded so that his mind was freed to anxiously anticipate the demands of the day or mull over the tasks not yet completed.
He hung up his coat in his staff locker and entered the open plan office of the Claims Department. As staff increased and company funds decreased, management had decided on the open plan format to ‘increase productivity and economize on space.’ Emily, the plump redhead who was located in the cubicle next to his, referred to them as the ‘chicken coops’. Frank had been sad to lose his private office, but had accepted the change without objection. Times change.
He walked to the office manager’s desk to collect his mail and smiled at yet another Temp. The regular office manager had discovered Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and the Temps had now become a regular sight. Frank barely bothered to learn their names. They were all so impossibly young and insisted on smiling relentlessly. This one, a vigorous blonde, nodded brightly when Frank asked if she had received the stationery requisition forms.
“I already put it on your desk, Mr. Burrows,” she said, beaming proudly.
“Thank you, miss - ...uh...thank you,” Frank mumbled and walked to his desk, greeting Emily as he passed her cubicle. She was affixing a calendar to one of the side panels of her ‘coop’ - it appeared to depict a series of young men wearing only segments of fire department uniforms. Emily was always absorbed in the decor of her coop as if by making it a more personal space she could forget that they were linked by a maze of vinyl paneling that afforded little privacy.
At his desk Frank immediately began his morning ritual. First he opened his day book in which he listed the tasks he had to complete in a neat column. Then he went down the list and placed an A next to priority items. He would first work his way through the A’s and, if time allowed, would then move on to the other items. Those he could not complete would be neatly transcribed onto the next day’s page before he left work. Appointments were listed down the left side. Not much today. Mrs. Crawley was coming to report the dent she had found on her rear fender at 11:00am.
Sighing, Frank moved to his mail, methodically opening, scanning and filing the contents. He was dimly aware that he had been noticing himself sighing more frequently. But he was only dimly aware of it. He forced his attention back to his work. He knew how quickly the morning could fly by. Although the work was never finished, he always set himself a steady pace and gained a sense of accomplishment if by the end of the day the A tasks had all been neatly ruled through.
The A list today was challenging. Perhaps only a third would be completed by lunch-time. Lunch was 1pm. Frank would go to Lucy’s Sandwich Heaven which would provide him with his usual chicken mayonnaise on rye and a diet Pepsi. He always went alone. Emily had asked him to lunch a few times but he’d always refused. His excuses had been feeble and she soon gave up. He wasn’t sure why he’d said no. Emily was a friendly woman who would often make him smile at a silly joke or surprise him with some salacious office gossip. He’d briefly wondered if she was attracted to him. He was in his late forties, short, brown hair graying now and although he didn’t exercise he ate sensibly and was still trim. He didn’t wonder if he was attracted to her.
The mail completed, Frank examined his in-tray. There, as promised by the Temp, was the stationery requisition form. A stapler had gone missing from Frank’s desk and would have to be replaced. Frank smoothed out the form and picked up his pen.
It was at that moment that something strange happened. He seemed to freeze momentarily and then, ever so slightly, his hands began to shake.
Emily had been standing up to adjust her new calendar. From that vantage point she could glance over into Frank’s cubicle. She saw him tense up while reading something on his desk. Frank usually never displayed emotion. He was always the same - controlled, measured, efficient. What could it be that was causing this reaction? Emily, who was not a woman intimidated by the social disapproval of curiosity, watched.
Frank Burrows had felt his stomach contract as if he’d been punched suddenly in the stomach. Images began to flash through his mind like electric sparks - so quick they left only an imprint. Banal images of himself - driving, eating, working, sleeping, masturbating, watching TV, doing laundry, watching TV, working, driving, watching TV - they sparked and sizzled faster and faster. And from deep within him came a flood of anguish so intense it burst up out of his heart and flowed down his cheeks. A sob, awful and heavy and ancient, broke through his chest. Frank Burrows howled as he felt the pain. He staggered to his feet, his hands over his face, and rushed across the office floor - the chicken coops passing him in a blur - and out the door.
Emily watched his exit with astonishment. A silence which had fallen over the office suddenly ended when the other office staff began speculating wildly amongst themselves about what had happened. Emily walked slowly round to Frank’s cubicle. She was concerned about the quiet, gentle man who had been her neighbour for the last five years. He had been reading something just before his outburst. Had it been bad news, some sort of unexpected shock? She looked down at the paper on his desk. It was the stationery requisition form which the Temp had given him. Nothing unusual.
A form with a list of stationery items with little boxes to check.
And across the top of the form the Temp had written in neatly printed block letters,
WHAT DO YOU NEED?
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