[Gareth84]

Synopsis: A tale of a angry office worker facing his demons. One of afew shorts ive written each based on a different emotions, this one is hate.

I hate it here – stupid inhumane cubicle, flaming uncomfortable chair that hurts my back, the incessant and unrelenting ticking of the clock. I wonder if it’s the lack of human contact, sunlight, or interest in the work that upsets me more, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.

I regret being here from before I even arrived; from the second I wake in the morning, dread falls over me like the night sky over the world. The place instils me with a feeling I cannot stomach, a churning sensation like rocks against mud. But the thing I hate most, perhaps even more than the job itself—the thing I hate above all things in this godforsaken hell-hole—is the sound, is that sound. The grating breathing noises coming from the beast on the other side of my partition. It infuriates me to a point where I do not know myself any longer. To me he sounds like a hippopotamus in the last throws of life, or perhaps an elephant in a deep roaring slumber. The main difference is simply that the man on the other side of my partition is neither dead nor asleep—at least I assume he isn’t. It is hard to tell as I can’t see him over the cubicle divide, nor have I ever seen him.

This was probably a blessing for both of us, as I worry that should I ever come to face to face with my eternal tormentor, I very well might have to remove his nose from his face. What I still don’t understand is that, unless the man is deaf, he lives with the sound of his own breathing twenty-four hours a day and has yet to go completely insane and top himself.

I imagine him at night in a dirty flat by himself, sittng in his “TV” chair for hours on end, not wanting or daring to move his huge putrid fat carcass to the bedroom for fear of not being able to move back to a vertical position come the morning. He sits there until the early hours, mouth open, watching nonsense quiz shows and the Open University in the hope of maybe somehow ‘bettering’ himself. He dreams that, on the off chance that if someone happened to speak to him at the water fountain the following day, he might actually have something interesting to talk about. Come daylight, his poor brain must be in early stages of meltdown, much like the handfuls of crisps he shovels endlessly into his mouth until he cannot stay awake any longer. Then he passes out in his chair, too tired to even hear the vacuum of his own nasals bellowing. I picture him waking to the stagnant flavour of his own mouth with a fright. His eyes withdrawn, dark and tired he brushes the remnants of lasts night’s crisps from around his mouth. Then he hauls his all-encompassing weight along the trip to work simply to spite me and make my small and miserable life that extra bit more painful.

The hoarse sound is still pounding into my brain, something like a drill working against a blackboard. Like dogs yelping in pain mixed with an obnoxious whistle, blowing, blowing and blowing again and again. I can feel my hands becoming fists, my face getting hot and turning red. I’m trying to block it out, concentrate on my work. Staring deeper into the computer screen, attempting to lose myself in numbers and equations. I type loudly, rustle paperwork, any noise I can make in retaliation—in defence. Every attempt I make to block out even some of the noise is in vain. He is an unstoppable army marching over peaceful and unprepared lands, burning and destroying any life that stood in its path without mercy, regret or thought. I can feel my sanity ebbing away with every heaving tone; I can feel the walls of my tiny cubicle closing in around me. I can almost smell the flavour of crisp he consumed hanging in the air. I can’t take any more.

I’m on the edge of my chair now, teeth gritted, fists clenched; waves of rage fuelled hatred crash over me time and time again. I slam my hands down hard on the desk as I stand to finally face my tormentor. Teeth bared, I ready myself to leap over the partition and let loose my fury.

“RIGHT” I scream. Hoping to gain the edge of surprise and shock in the ensuing fight, I push my monitor out of the way. It lands on the floor with a almighty crash that seems to make most of the office gasp in unison. From a hundred other cubicles, I start to see faces appear.

Too late to turn back now that everybody's watching—I feel a sense of giddy exhilaration with the knowledge that now, after so long, I will have my vengeance! The desk now clear I begin my ascent; one knee up almost gives me the height to see over the top. I imagine this must have been what the soldiers in the trenches felt like. The excitement mixed with lashings of fear, the freedom of mortal combat. Oh what monstrous face must you bear? Just a couple of more inches.
I’m fully up now, standing on my desk. I almost gag as the grisly horror unveils itself before me with such pride.

There is no one there, further to that there is nothing there. No computer, phone or even a chair. The cubicle lies empty; it looks as if it has always been so. I don’t understand. I begin to feel dizzy as I look around again. The hundred faces of a hundred cubicles keep looking, staring, some aghast others smirking whispering to each other.

‘Oi oi, look at fatty’
‘Oh that poor man’
‘Its amazing that desk can hold him’

The sound of a hundred whispers makes one sole voice of mockery; slowly I lower myself from the desk, tears beginning to well in eyes. I find myself back in my cubicle, no great victory won. As I return to my seat awaiting the manager, I hear something. Truly a most terrifying sound, the sound. I hear the breathing once again, but it is not alone anymore. Today the awful rasping sound is mixed with quiet sobbing.