Aidan hadn’t always been headless.
Aidan hadn’t always been headless.
He was known for very much having “a good head on his shoulders.” He wasn’t clear on what that meant. If anything, there was a slight niggle in the back of his mind that this saying may evolve into him having “a smashed head on a boulder.” Regardless,
“The Thursday report isn’t going to write itself,” he said to Noah the office busybody, to which Noah gave a knowing roll of the eyes, and then the dice because it was his turn on Snakes & Ladders. A game Aidan always won.1
Aidan slowly backed away, still holding the milk, and then headed to his desk. He absentmindedly placed the milk in his backpack. The Thursday report most definitely did write itself, he thought, opening last Thursday’s report and making a few tense changes and scanning his calendar for the following week to add a couple of highlights. He fired off the email and then sat back in his office chair.
It squeaked with discomfort. Aidan took his phone from his pocket and tapped in the ‘Instagram’ icon. There was Jamie with a new story of him in front of his Prius asking for opinions on his newly found identity as a car defacer. The phone started vibrating in his hand and he chucked it behind him, instinctively, onto the bean bag section of his office floor.
BLING
An email popped up on in the corner of his computer screen. It was from CottageCraft Ventures Corporate Comms. He took hold of the mouse and hovered the cursor over the notification. Then carefully moved to the bin icon and deleted it. He wasn’t going to be caught out by a typo on a Thursday. He looked up to the motivations board that hung in his section of the office.
“DON’T GET CAUGHT OUT BuY A TYPO ON A THURSDAY” it read in large vibrant letters.
“Winner,” he said to himself, took his laptop from his docking station, stuffed it in his bag and headed for the lift.
He found himself suddenly in sync with Isabella, the founder of the company, who was also heading for the lift.
“Did you see my latest email?” She asked excitedly.
Aidan wasn’t sure what to say. “It’s Thursday?” he ventured.
“Word. For. Word. Impressive, Aidan. Let’s get lunch tomorrow, there’s something I want to propose to you. There’s a new poke2 place that’s opened I want to try.”
“Erm… ok.” *I want to correct that. Should I? I’m going to.* “Poke.3”
“Yes, I always struggle pronouncing Poke.” She continued to get it wrong. “If you prefer we can just get some Pho4 from the usual place.”
“You mean Pho?5”
“Yes, I struggle with that as well. I just love foods I can’t pronounce! Like lasagne.” You could hear every letter, and ‘g’ was particularly heavily pronounced.
Aidan wasn’t sure what to do and they were both standing in front of the lift without pressing the call button. He hoped that it would just magically stop and someone would get out. At this point he would have been grateful to see Noah. Suddenly he remembered he’d left his phone with the bean bags and, worryingly relieved, he casually start back towards his area.
“Forgot my phone,” he said like a ‘goodbye.’
Isabella followed him, then started to walk a bit quicker, then broke into a jog/steady run and jumped with a loud “WOWEEE!!” onto the bean bags. They both laughed and he relaxed a bit.
“My phone is in there somewhere!”
Isabella reached into the pile, fished it out and tossed it his general direction. He caught it like a pro.
“I really should be going. See you tomorrow.”
“For lunch!” She called after him.
“Lunch!” He repeated emphatically and made his exit.
Aidan’s Snakes & Ladders technique was legendary at CottageCraft Ventures.
She pronounced it incorrectly, rhyming it with folk
Pronounced correctly, rhyming with Loki
Rhyming this with slow
Fur