Weekly Drabble #371: Company Man (Patreon)

This week's prompt is from GTAE with 'extended deadline'. Enjoy!

~

Company Man:

It’s over.

Those words, said by two different people, ricocheted through Albert’s head like ping-pong balls. The first utterance was his own as he’d slumped back in his chair in his home office, staring at his computer screen after ungodly weeks of working dawn to dusk, a mixture of disbelief and relief. It was over.

Then, those same words from Maria as he stepped out of his office to tell her the good news, to take her to a nice restaurant as a celebration and a way start to make up all the time he’d spent locked away slaving over a keyboard or in conference calls to workmates around the globe. He’d found her at the door, a pair of suitcases packed and ready to go. She’d been about to set a letter down on the counter for him, but looked up as he approached. Her expression had turned to one of sadness and pain, then hardened. She opened the door and grabbed her baggage, offering those last two words as her only goodbye. It was over.

Albert didn’t know how long he’d stared at the open doorway before he’d finally closed it and picked up the letter. It was hand-written, delicate in pen strokes and in wording, but nonetheless every sentence cut through him like a knife. It outlined what he’d already known, but hadn’t believed was that bad. The weeks of isolation. Of neglect. Of snappishness as his stress mounted and the project’s deadline got closer and closer.

He couldn’t deny any of it, but he was done. It was over. He could make it up to her now. “I did this for us,” was all he managed to say in the quiet of their apartment as he stared at the paper in his hands. The project was a rush job from their biggest client yet. It would pay nearly half the company’s annual earnings alone. He’d volunteered for the task. Doing it on time had seemed an impossible job, but it would have led to promotion. More pay, better hours. They could afford to move out of this cramped apartment, maybe even buy a house. He’d been planning to propose. This project would have let them do so much, let them have the lives they’d talked about...

Albert stared at the letter for even longer than he had at the doorway. He wanted to scream, to rage, to collapse onto the floor and sob. Instead, he carefully folded the letter back up and set it down on the counter. He poured himself a glass of orange juice, looking around the empty apartment as if Maria would magically reappear. He looked at his phone. He should call her, but he couldn’t. He was too upset. It wouldn’t go anywhere. He needed some time to catch his breath, to calm down and then he’d try and get in touch with Maria. They could talk this out. He was done. He’d checked, double-checked and triple-checked everything and kept work up to date on his progress. Mr. Gunderson had been on leave the last few months, but Albert had been in contact with the project planning committee. They’d green-lit everything.

All the work would pay off. He could give her everything he wanted to. He just figure things out from here, but he could do it.

“It’s over,” he said into the empty apartment, but no one answered him. There was only the hum of the printer as it poured out months worth of work, ready to be handed in tomorrow.

~

Maria had blocked him. He couldn’t get through to her on the phone or on her socials. He’d tried reaching out to her friends and family. The latter didn’t answer his messages. The former only responded with scorn and derision.

It was a long, sleepless night as he stared at his phone or read her final letter to him over and over, going through a rollercoaster of emotions until, finally, a few fitful hours of sleep claimed him.

The rain poured down like the sky was well and truly falling, a relentless downpour that hammered the roof of his car loud enough to drown out the radio and reduce visibility to a handful of meters ahead. If he didn’t have to drop off the project, he wouldn’t have left the apartment, but today was the deadline. Everything had to be in. There was no margin for error. Eleventh hour, last minute, Hail Mary. He’d already sent off all the electronic version to Mr. Gunderson, and just needed to bring in the hard copies, mock-ups and concept images.

Albert sprinted for the doors, nearly slipping in the flooded parking lot, but he managed to stay on his feet. He couldn’t fail now. He’d done so much, sacrificed more than he thought he ever would for this project. It was the last thing he had left.

As he’d expected, the office was nearly deserted. Most of the other staff had called in sick or were working remotely once they saw what the weather was like. There were two or three cubicles with workers in them, but they didn’t pay any attention to their waterlogged colleague as he headed straight to Mr. Gunderson’s office. It wasn’t surprising at all that Mr. Gunderson was in. Albert sometimes wondered if Mr. Gunderson actually ever left the building, or he was some kind of revenant, bound to an eternity of meetings, powerpoint presentations, moderately-priced suits and endless corporate bureaucracy. That he’d been on leave seemed to suggest the former, but Albert also wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that disrguntled employees had performed a temporary exorcism.

Mr. Gunderson waved Albert in, tying up a phone call as the younger man waited patiently. When Mr. Gunderson hung up, Albert proudly placed his arm load of boxes and folders on his boss’s desk. “Here it is.”

Mr. Gunderson stared at the folders and boxes with a confused expression. “Here... what is?”

“The... Perkins project,” Albert answered. “I sent you all the electronic copies last night.”

“Oh, I never check my email outside of work,” Mr. Gunderson told him. “Besides, why are you handing it in?”

“The... the deadline for it is today. I have it done. It’s all here.”

Mr. Gunderson took out a few sheets of paper and leafed through them, looking up at Albert. “The Perkins project was pushed back eight months. They had an internal reshuffling and found out they didn’t need it as soon as they thought. Didn’t anyone tell you?”

“No...” Albert said, his guts dropping out through the hole that had just opened inside him. “No, they didn’t. I’ve been talking to the project committee, sending daily status reports and nobody said anything....” Eight months? He could have had eight more months? He could have spent more time with Maria. He could have... he could have...

But it was done, he told himself. Done ahead of schedule. Mr. Gunderson would see that. The promotion would still be on the table. He could still-

“Sounds like a mixup in communication,” Mr. Gunderson said, continuing to look through the papers. “The working committee has gotten a few wires crossed while we go through re-engineering, but last I heard they gave the project to Allan Berg. You know him, right?”

The hole inside Albert turned into a gaping chasm.

“Well, nonetheless, this is still a good starting point. Glad to have a go-getter like you on the team. I’ll make sure to put your name in the running for the monthly commendation for this, Albert. Why don’t you take this on over to Allan? Give him the run-down on your ideas and see what he thinks of them. He might be able to work with some of what you’ve done here. After that, you should take a half-day. You look like something the cat dragged in. Get some rest. Tomorrow will be a new day.”

Numb from head to toe, Albert could only nod as he picked the last six months of his life up and turned to head out the door. “Oh, and Albert?” Mr. Gunderson called.

Albert looked back at his boss, the other man smiling at him from across the desk. Mr. Gunderson gave him a thumbs-up. “Good work.”