"Chloe, did you scan those Chester files? I asked them two hours ago. A couple of pages?" Chloe rolled her eyes at Jane's rambling. "I should just do it myself, really." Jane continued, and Chloe wondered why Jane didn't just do it herself. She always said she should. Every time she complained about Chloe's 'failures,' which was quite often, Jane would end with 'I should do it myself.' And yet, she never actually did do it herself.
"I sent them to you 20 minutes after you asked for them. It took 15 minutes to locate them and five to scan the 13 pages. They should be in your inbox." Chloe responded and sighed, not sure why she even bothered.
"Well, I don't have them! You must have done them wrong, do it again."
"Right away," Chloe mumbled under her breath. "Because I'm not doing anything else. I'm just sitting here waiting for you to give my life meaning." She grabbed the Chester file that she had left out just for this reason. At the copy machine, she decided to make copies, the Friday morning meeting agenda for Francis, her actual boss. Francis always forgot and would hold up the meeting by 10 minutes while fumbling around the office, trying to get it all together.
Chloe pushed the number of copies and the 'okay' button, and the machine flashed the empty paper tray sign at her. Of course, there wouldn't be any paper in any of the three trays. She didn't think anyone else actually knew how to load the paper since it was so difficult to pull the tray out and drop a stack of clean paper in. She bent down and grabbed three stacks of paper from the box next to the machine.
"Took you long enough to come'" she heard Bill snicker behind her, and she rolled her eyes.
"Hello Mr. Moore," Chloe always called Bill Mr. Moore as not to encourage him, but it seemed to have the opposite effect.
"I've wanted to tell you all morning," He told her as he got up from his desk and walked over to her. Francis walked over just as Bill finished his sentence, "I had a dream of you."
"Francis, can you tell Bill how inappropriate that is?" She asked as she handed Francis the agenda copies and gave a meaningful look that was lost entirely on Francis.
"Hmm? Bill just had a dream about you." Francis said as he looked over the copies. "There's nothing wrong with that. We all work so hard sometimes work seeps into our dreams. Why, just Wednesday I had a dream that I'd lost the Chester file and finally found it in my neighbor's underwear drawer." Francis gave Bill a pat on the shoulder and walked away. Chloe shook her head and continued to scan the Chester file that Francis so happened to have been dreaming about.
"Aren't you curious about my dream?" Bill was still there now wearing a creepy smile as he attempted to bait her.
"Not in the least bit. No." She told him without looking up.
"But it was so… Real!" She could see his creepy smile grow to an even creepier grin out of the corner of her eye as he said that last word.
"Sounds like a real nightmare." She told him with a curt smile before heading to Jane's desk.
"I scanned the Chester file to your email, and just in case I'm doing it wrong, I came to see if it went through correctly," Chloe said to Jane as she reached the desk.
"Oh? Right. Well, let's see if you did it right this time. I doubt it, but we can check. I suppose I'll just have to show you how to do it after all." Jane sighed with annoyed exaggeration as she pulled up her email.
"Ah. There it is, and there are two of them. Hmm." Chloe pointed out the twin files in the scanned folder. "One sent about two hours ago, and one sent two minutes ago. You should call and have your system checked out if it isn't notifying you correctly."
"Uh, yes. Well, um, I'll call Nicki then." Jane picked up the phone as Chloe headed back to her desk.
Chloe sat down with a sigh. She hated her job. She already had enough work without adding Jane's entire workload and the stuff that Francis forgets on a daily basis. She might as well run her own company with all the work she did. If it weren't for Darren saving her at the monthly meetings, she would have blown up the whole place and been sipping margaritas on some random beach with a guy named Milton.
Five more minutes until lunch break. No one had called Chloe to stay behind, and everything's sorted out at her desk. Shut down and closed out to prepare for lunch and got her purse from her drawer. Two minutes until noon, and her phone rang. She growled at it and reached out for the receiver, then paused halfway.
"Nope, I'm going to let it go to voicemail," she said out loud to herself, refusing to answer. She instead grabbed her Blazer and shrugged it on. Then the phone rang again. "Ugh! Seriously, I can't win, can I?" She grumbled as she picked up the phone. "Chloe Harris, how can I help you?"
"Chlo! I need you to grab my suit from the cleaners, Pumpkin Face," the voice on the other end of the phone said in a rush.
"Dear? Why didn't you call me on my cell?" She asked in a tone that suggested never to call this number again, although it was utterly wasted on her husband.
"Huh? Oh, 'cause you always have it turned off during work hours."
For this very reason, she thought.
"Anyway, Sweet Lips, I need that suit for the three o'clock meeting with the partner stores."
"Fine, I'll grab it. Give me 30 minutes."
"Oh, and pick my regular up from Danny's Deli. Love you." He hung up before she could respond. She shook her head and rushed to the door without looking. She noticed too late that Bill was waiting for her.
"Hey, let's do lunch, babe." He gave her that wonderful creepy smile of his as he held the door open for her.
"No thanks, Mr. Moore," she ducked past him through the door.
"Don't worry; I'll let you drive if you want." He smiled pointedly and added a wink to be extra creepy was her guess.
"I'm meeting my husband for lunch." She informed him, moving quickly in the direction of her car.
"Monday then. I know where to get the best sausage in town," Bill called after her.
Finally, Chloe was done with work. She had to stay late to help process a file Francis forgot about so it could make the deadline. She was now headed to her mother-in-law's house, hoping whatever it was she was needed for this time wouldn't take too long, and she could still make it to Fantastic Fabrics before it closed, which for some reason was 8:00 pm on Fridays. Chloe rolled her eyes before knocking just to get it out of the way. She knocked then came in, although she'd been told to go in without knocking, something about it's practically her home and why doesn't she and Jon move in. Of course, if she did that, she would lose what little sanity she had left. "Oh, Chloe, Luv! I'm in the sitting room," her mother-in-law called out to her. "You said you needed help with something urgent, Mrs. Harris?" "Call me, Mom, how many times must I tell you," Mrs. Harris said for the ten billionth time in the past ten years. She motioned towards a bunch of pain
Chloe woke up later than she had hoped on Saturday, so she skipped the mirror and scale ritual. She already knew the McDonald's from yesterday did nothing to reverse the numbers in her favor. Chloe headed out to try and get her errands done on time and make it to the party with a gift in hand. She stopped and picked up a white chocolate mocha from Starbucks and some daisies from the local florist. No matter how behind she is this week, nothing cuts into Father-Daughter time, and daisies were his favorite. Chloe stopped at her father's grave with the flowers and had meant to get the milk between the Starbucks stop and the florist but completely forgot. She put the flowers in a vase and sat cross-legged in front of his headstone and had her weekly chat with her dad to let him know about what had happened since last week, which wasn't very much. Chloe told her father how she had saved Mrs. Harris from utter humiliation by picking out the perfect painting to hang, how ye
Chloe finally made it to the Auto Dealer, where she met up with Jonathan at the tail end of a business meeting with his father where he went over numbers that his father paid no attention to. "Hey Candy, what's up? Bring my lunch?" Jonathan liked to call her weird pet names. For some reason, he thought it was cute, and she thought it was tacky, but he'd been doing it for fifteen years, and it didn't look like he'd be growing out of it soon. She had known him most of her life but started dating him when 14, Jon was 16. He'd always been a bit thin due to his wrestling and stayed that way through adulthood. He was a relatively decent-looking guy with short-cropped thick brown hair, small squinty blue eyes, a narrow nose, thin lips, and a mediocre square jawline. He was 5 feet, eleven inches tall, and about 180 pounds even though he rarely worked out unless watching Mixed Martial Arts competitions counts. "Yeah, I'm on my way to Fantastic Fabrics, so I figured I'
Chloe pulled into her drive and went through the back door so as not to disturb Jonathan, who would be home by now even though it was relatively early, still not even 7:00 yet. He might be working on something for his golf meeting. She went into the spare bedroom and grabbed the gift that was waiting on the floor for her, then she headed back to the back door. Just before she got to the door, she thought she could hear Veronica Moulton's voice. That wasn't unusual, really, because Veronica was their neighbor and pretty much her second-best friend. Veronica and her husband Nicki were good friends and would hang out with Chloe and Jon. Nicki worked in the Tech department and would often have lunch with Chloe. She had never had any qualms with Veronica hanging out with Jonathan, just the two of them. Never seemed to be any reason to second guess if Veronica's husband Nicki was staying late at the office working on system upgrades or something. Veronica would invite Chlo
Chloe enjoyed the party a little too much. At one point, she started a taco tossing phenomenon. She momentarily let the thoughts of the White Rabbit and Alice scene from earlier surface just long enough for her to lose control and toss a mini taco against the wall. All the other girls had no idea why she had done it but having drunk round after round of cocktails and shots, they found it great fun and joined in with elevated enthusiasm. Tacos were being flung all over the party room. She felt a little bad for the workers that have to clean it all up but damn, it was worth it. It allowed her much needed stress relief. She went to the bar after the party as planned to call her best friend and hear her thoughts on what she should do. Covered in mini tacos, Chloe attempted to brush some of the taco debris off but quickly gave up and just walked into the bar, tacos and all. It wasn't exactly a dive bar, but it wasn't posh enough to turn her and her tacos away, so she sat down and
Chloe took two muscle relaxers and washed them down with two glasses of wine. She took a quick shower to get rid of the tacos, and she crawled into the spare bed with her towel still on. She woke up in the middle of the night feeling hot and strangled in her towel, so she shrugged it off onto the floor. She pushed the comforter off as well and slept under the sheet. Chloe woke the next morning to Jon kissing her. What the Fuck, she thought, very confused for a moment as to where she was and what was going on. She looked around and realized she was in the spare bedroom. Then she remembered passing out in there after her shower, the night before. "Sweetcheeks," Jon said between kisses. "Why are you in here? You should have come to bed, Pumpkin Face." "Huh? Oh, mmtacos." She told him as he made his way down her neck. He had never spent so much time kissing her body like this. "I got tacos…all over and…washed up um, before bed."
Chloe got to the Café, and Nicki was already waiting at a table in the patio corner. She made her way over to him. She had been thinking of how to tell him since yesterday, and she still had no idea what to say. "Hello…" Nicki said as she approached. He paused, noticing she looked anxious. "Chloe? What's up?" "Hey, Nicki," she managed, "Um, how was your workout?" "It was ok. You don't look so good. What's wrong?" Nicki cleared his throat. "Is everything ok? How's Jon? I already ordered, so don't worry. I got you the strawberry chicken salad and an Ice tea." He nodded towards her drink. Chloe smiled gratefully at him and took a massive gulp of tea, practically downing half the glass before she said anything. "Oh, Jon? Umm… He's fine. He's at the club with his dad and the guys. Just yesterday, he was with Veronica. She was fucking him on our bed." Chloe was now rapidly blinking her eyes. Maybe
Chloe went home and texted Kendra, Jon fucked me this morning before golf. Nicki wants to even the score. He's in love with me. Jon and Veronica have been fucking since Christmas. Idk I'm going to take a bath. Chloe was in the bath until it got cold, still staring off and trying to organize her thoughts. She got out and put on a robe, then went to the closet to find some clothes to put on. She hated everything in her closet. It was all Jon likes this, and hates that. He practically picked everything she wore. Even if he didn't shop with her, still in the back of her mind, she could hear him weighing in on everything. That's it she'll go shopping and get what she wanted to wear for once. She grabbed Jon's platinum card and put on a pair of jeans and a horrible polo that Jon preferred, and headed to the mall. When she got home, she put her new clothes in the spare bedroom closet where all the clothes not approved by Jon were. Mostl