Roger’s Plan

 

My writer’s circle had a day where we challenged each other to do something very different from our usual style. My challenge: “Write in a universe with no gods. Main character is an atheist doing something completely mundane.” Thus Roger’s Plan was born!

Sorry, no Gna chapter this week. A new section inserted itself at the top of Chapter 13, and I haven’t had time to edit the rest of to make sure it matches. I hope you enjoy the filler!

 

Roger frowned. There was, once more, no coffee in the office coffee maker. Oh sure, there was the smell hanging around the kitchenette, but it only served to taunt him. Olivia got her coffee. George got his. Even the new guy, Richard – even he got his cup of coffee. It was like this each morning, as Sarah made and distributed the black gold to everyone but himself.

He sighed, straightened his tie, and formed his fake smile solidly onto his face before heading back into the pit. It irked him greatly that Sarah’s desk faced the kitchenette door, forcing unwelcome eye contact every time he left the coffee room.

There she sat at her cubicle, silently mocking him, with an equally fake smile as she nodded to him. The perfume of her hairspray wafted unpleasantly to his nostrils, dispelling the pleasant aroma he’d just enjoyed.

So that’s how you want to play it, eh blondie? We’ll see about that.

He returned to his desk and stared at the screen. No work was getting done of course, he was busy plotting his revenge.

===

“So Roger,” she said as she pretended to lean on the divider behind him, “are you going to apologize?”

“Sarah,” he said as he wheeled his chair around, “I think it’s safe to say that I’d rather die first.”

She smirked. “It’s your funeral, Roger.”

He stared at her, willing her to die, as if he had eyebeams like in the comics. Sadly, he was not in the comics and it just made her titter in amusement.

“You,” she said, “are the most stubborn man I know.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” he replied. “Now, please go away so I can work.”

She made a gun shape with a hand, fired off an imaginary shot, and left with a grin.

He would get her, somehow he would, and she would be the one to apologize.

===

It was at lunchtime that he set his devious plan in motion. When she left he went to the kitchenette, conveniently right in front of her cubicle. No one ate at the kitchenette, it was just for making coffee. Coffee for everyone but him, apparently.

From there, he glanced around the edge of the doorframe, making sure no one was looking in his direction. With a toothy grin, he crouched, and made his way back over to her desk. There he took the pile of files she was working on, and hid under the desk. With perverse pleasure, he removed all the sheets from their folders into a single neat stack, which he tapped on the floor to line up. Then he made three piles, assigning pages to those three piles in order. Once done, he split the neatly randomized pages back into folders, placed them back on top of the desk and made his escape.

The Tim Hortons croissandwich he savored a few minutes later across the street – extra tomato, no mayo – and the coffee – black, two sugars – these tasted like victory.

Upon his return, he went to the washrooms, conveniently placed near the elevators to the floor he worked at. Wouldn’t do to bring any kind of bacteria from outside, he reasoned as he washed his hands.

It was with a smug smile that he sat at his desk, confident in having caused her untold grief. And this is just the beginning, he mused.

“Roger,” she said, startling him.

He wheeled around and looked up, his palms suddenly sweaty, guilt assailing him as his heart pounded.

Sarah scolded him with a finger, her expression neutral.

“You can’t prove it I didn’t do it there is no proof connecting me,” he rambled.

She started laughing, and said, shaking her head: “You are the most fastidious man I know. Really, mixing up my files? That’s the extent of your revenge? Didn’t you realize that by following a careful and methodical way of resorting them, I could just as easily re-sort them into their proper place? Silly man.”

His jaw dropped. It had seemed like the most efficient way to do it. Clearly, he would have to be more of a rogue next time. Think wild. Be wild. That would be his new motto as he learned to channel the forces of chaos. Perhaps, he pondered, he should make a little sign on the wall over the computer to remind himself of this.

“Really Roger,” she said, “you could just apologize for messing up the client data instead of blaming me for transcribing it wrong.”

“Never!” he exclaimed. “That would be admitting I was wrong, and I am never wrong.”

“Sure,” she said with a lopsided smile of amusement. “Whatever you say, Roger.”

He stared until she turned and left. Grabbing a fresh stack of pale blue post-it notes, he wrote in his best handwriting: “Think Wild, Be Wild.”

Carefully detaching it from the pad, he raised his hand to put it up on the wall, then frowned. It was a slightly different shade of blue than the forty-two other post-its already in place. Moreover, it would have to be placed outside the six by seven rectangle of post-its already there, thus breaking the symmetry. This distressed him greatly.

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As always, comments are appreciated 🙂