The sort of day....

 

‘I need the complaints backlog to be fixed ASAP so we can concentrate on new sales.’ Clive’s pale grey, codfish eyes widened, ‘Do you think you’ll get through all those customer emails by lunchtime?

 

How could I possibly know that? Thought Bernadette. After all, she had no idea what the customers were asking and how long it would take to find the relevant information. That had been Ben’s job but he’d left, walked out two weeks ago, never to return.

 

‘This is what I’m trying to get away from, stuff not getting finished. How can I drive the business forward when we always seem to have all this administrative baggage weighing us down!’

 

He’d been in a bad mood all morning; rolling his eyes as he spoke, huffing and puffing as he fiddled with things on the desk; picking up the stapler and slamming it down for no particular reason. She remained silent as she observed him tapping the nib of his biro with the sort of pudgy smooth fingers which had never carried out manual tasks and had no capacity for fixing things. 

 

Clive won’t survive when the apocalypse comes, she thought and a sliver of a smile passed across her face.

 

The morning was frustrating. Each complaint was complicated by missing information, involving calls to third parties, chasing up suppliers who didn’t reply. It was no good. It was already midday and Clive was constantly interrupting her with other tasks and requests for help with non work related things. Ideas for a gift for his nephew, recommendations for a good tiler, which men’s deodorant smelt best to women.

 

His bad mood didn’t improve. Little things would push him over the edge, especially mislaid items, his phone, his tissues. The entire contents of his desk was like a tapestry of bitty things, lists and receipts, product samples, Jock Itch cream, lipsalve, protein shake sachets, pens and scissors. He roared as he picked things up and rifled through drawers searching for whatever.

 

He gave up on whatever he’d been looking for and stared at her until he caught her attention. ‘How are the complaints going, have you cleared the backlog yet?’

 

Bernadette had been working flat out but she’d barely dented it. ‘No. I’m only about ten percent of the way through Clive,’ she said without looking away from her monitor. ‘I’m waiting for people to call me back.’

 

He lifted his hands up then let them drop so that they slapped the sides of his body. ‘What? We need to get this cleared up. A new start. Either tackle them with competence or delete them, up to you but I need them gone.’

 

 

She laughed a little. ‘Delete them? They won’t go away. They’ll only send another email and another and another. I’m doing my best but I’m on my own now that Tracy and Ben have left.’

 

Tracy and Ben hadn't even worked their notice, that was the level of desperation they’d felt to get the hell out of there. The thing was, instead of appreciating the fact that Bernadette had stayed on and was trying her best, Clive was doing the opposite. He was taking all his frustrations out on her and expecting her to miraculously absorb the extra workload without complaint. 

 

He rolled his eyes, let out a huge sigh and disappeared outside to vape and do some doomscrolling. It was a hot day, the sort of day when things could get out of control, people could come off their hinges and do damage, real damage. 

 

Clear thinking in the chaotic work environment that Clive had created was near impossible. It was tempting to just follow his crackbrained instructions and delete all the emails of complaint but hang on, it wasn’t the customers fault that Clive was a bad boss, a bad man even. Their complaints were legitimate and they deserved better. It was Clive that was the problem.

 

The next email she opened was from Melanie at the local newspaper asking a representative of the company to comment on an ongoing customer grievance from a Mr Bennett which had been going for two years with no efforts made to resolve it. It explained that an article was set to be published on the issue in next week's paper.

 

She sat back in her chair and felt the stress knots in her stomach and remembered how much she was being paid or rather how little. The stress had burrowed into her physical body and she got up and did some stretches. Clive’s half drunk mug of coffee placed just on the edge of his desk caught her eye. It reminded her of a cat she had when she was growing up, how it loved to simply push things off the edge of a table or a shelf and observe the damage without the expense of emotion. 

 

It was so tempting. Her fingers began to itch for the sensation of pushing the edge of the mug. She looked out of the window and observed Clive, round-shouldered hunched over his phone, blowing out bubblegum flavoured vape fumes like some sort of corporate dystopian, infantile man-dragon.

 

There was a slight barrier to pushing the mug, a split second of hesitation but its fragility surprised her as she swiped and watched the liquid contents splash onto the carpet. It was as if some inbuilt safety mechanism had been removed and immediately she was hungry for more. She recalled Clive’s frustration at losing things and she picked up his keys from the desk and flung them into a random drawer in the filing cabinet, slamming it shut. Then she moved several other items around on the desk, some just a few inches from their original position, others she swapped places.

 

‘Shall I tell Mr Bennet that the replacement is on its way?’ She said as he returned to the office smelling like Charlie Bucket.

 

‘What? Who’s Mr Bennet?’

 

‘Mr Bennet, the guy who’s been threatening us with court action. Shall I tell him the replacement has been ordered?’

 

‘Yes, tell him what you like, Love, whatever it takes to get him off our backs. Hopefully he’s old and he’ll be dead soon. Oh look, coffee all over the floor, how did that get there?’

 

‘Oh, sorry I didn’t want to say…but you caught it as you walked past on your way out. I’ll clean it up later when I’ve got through this list.’

 

Clive didn’t answer. He sat at his desk and went through the motions of checking supplier prices but he struggled to concentrate and kept interrupting Bernadette with random comments and questions. ‘Do you think you could pop out and get me a ham sandwich? It’s a bit too hot out there for me today,’ he chuckled, ‘I don’t really like the sun.’

 

She thought of his yearly holidays to Malaga, how he returned looking like pastrami, she pictured him vaping in the full glare of the sun while he doom scrolled. I’ll give you something to doom about, she thought as she whipped the five pound note out of his hand.

 

‘Get me some crisps too, beef and onion flavour.’

 

The sandwich shop had started to do a wide selection of vegan foods, not that she’d tried any of them because she always brought her own lunch and didn’t have much spare change in her salary after paying for rent and bills. Vegan fish, that looks interesting, if not disgusting, she thought and she picked up a large bag of carob coated raisins too. It came to five pounds sixty and the extra sixty pence she had to shell out from her own funds only served to galvanise her mission. 

 

The goodies were placed in a cute little brown paper bag which she placed in front of him on the desk. ‘Change?’

 

‘There wasn’t any. Prices are going up, Clive.’

 

He gazed at her but didn’t respond. There was an atmosphere in the office now. Something had changed. She didn’t flinch as she heard the rustle of the paper bag opening and the moist clicks of his over lubricated mouth opening to consume his over-engineered vegan delicacy.

 

‘Oh,’ he exclaimed as he held the sandwich away from his face to inspect it, ‘that’s different, the ham. It tastes….I dunno...’

 

‘It’s free range,’ Bernadette said casually. ‘And there’s been a product recall on beef and onion crisps so I had to get you a different snack.’

 

‘Rabbit droppings?’ he said as he held the cellophane packet of carob coated raisins.

 

‘They’re chocolate,’ she said, ‘healthier chocolate. We need to look after you, Clive. There’s only one you.’ She smiled at him. He looked thoroughly confused but then slightly pleased. ‘Oh the local paper emailed me, someone called Melanie on the admin@ account,’ she said, ‘someone’s nominated you for a local hero award, Pride of Dickborough or something like that, it’s an award for small businesses..’

 

‘Oh really?’

 

‘Yes I know, sounds amazing doesn’t it? Anyway, they asked for you to take a really good selfie of yourself outside the premises, along with the company motto and some secrets to your success and we’ll email it to them for their article by tomorrow morning.’

 

Bernadette saw from the corner of her eye, her boss’s whole demeanor change. He immediately began straightening his collar and fiddling with his hair. ‘I knew it,’ he said, ‘I had a funny feeling this would happen, you know. Show those bastards, the ones that complain about everything. Show them how it really is.’

 

‘By the way, I need to leave early today Clive. I’ve got to have a test at the doctor’s.’

 

‘Okay Love, leave whenever you need to. I’m just going to the loo to smarten myself up a bit.’

 

Clive was gone for a while. He returned with a spring in his step and began to tidy things up a bit in the office and on his desk. ‘That’s funny, I’m sure I put that over there,’ he muttered.

 

Meanwhile Bernadette had composed a cut and paste email response informing all complainants that they would receive a full refund on their orders as well as five thousands pounds in compensation from their ‘remorseful boss, Clive Pettifer.’

 

Then she went over to the printer, removed the ink cartridge, wrapped it in toilet paper and flushed it down the toilet. She removed the spare cartridges from the stationery cupboard and dropped them into the tank of the toilet and replaced the lid. In the kitchen she made a tiny tear in every one of the teabags and poured eighty percent of the milk out of the bottle and replaced it with water and a bit of salt. 

 

As she left work for her phantom appointment, Clive was outside the front of the premises, posing in front of the company sign. ‘Oh do you want me to take one?’ she said.

 

‘Yes, if you don’t mind.’ Clive gave her the phone from his clammy hand. ‘Do I look sweaty?’ 

 

She pointed it at him and frowned. ‘Not too much but you’ll want to turn to the left slightly so it hides that thing on your right cheek.’

 

‘What thing?’ he said, lifting his hand up to feel his face.

 

‘That mole or scar or whatever it is, I don’t know. Is it a skin tag? Maybe it’s just food…’

 

Clive shook his head in dismay. ‘Sorry I don’t know what you’re talking about..’

 

‘Look Clive,’ she handed the phone back to him, ‘I’ve got to go now and have my test at the doctors. Make sure you take a good photo and write up all those things for the newspaper. It needs to be finished, okay. Do it properly, make us proud. That’s how we drive the business forward.’

 

 

 

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