The Invitation

©2004 Ian Hobson

It was only after clicking 'Send' that Rebecca realised what she had done. Damn! She had meant to delete her boss's name from the office list. Now he would get the invitation to her birthday party, as well; the little shit.

How she'd managed to put up with him for the last eighteen months, she didn't know. Everyone else at Parkinson's was pleasant enough, but Roland J Garner was the most rude, ill-mannered, bombastic little toad she had ever encountered. Except when the MD was around, of course. Then he was as nice as pie; not to mention, on all fours, licking the MD's boots.

Rebecca checked her watch and compared its time with the digital clock at the corner of her screen. Both said eight, fifty-two. She glanced down the length of the open-plan office. The production meeting wouldn't be over for at least ten minutes yet, so she had plenty of time. Taking a brown folder from the top of the pile on her desk, she eased out of her chair and set off along the isle towards Roland's desk, smiling at the accounting clerk, Trevor Scott, as he looked up from reading his mail. He smiled back then returned to his reading. Everyone else seemed to be engrossed in their work too; mostly clicking away at their keyboards. Oh¦ except for John Stone, who was on his way back from the coffee machine. He stopped in the isle and took a sip from his steaming plastic cup.

'Morning, Rebecca. Lovely morning.'

'Yes.' Rebecca tried to avoid getting into a conversation.

'Good forecast for the weekend, as well.'

'Oh, good.'

'I'm doing the fun-run.'

'Oh, yes; for the hospice. I was forgetting about that. Perhaps I'll come and watch.'

A telephone began to ring, and John's ears pricked up. 'My phone. See you later.'

'See you.' Rebecca was glad to have been 'saved by the bell.' She continued on down the office, clutching the folder and trying to look businesslike. There was no sign of Roland, or his secretary, Janis, who would also be at the production meeting, taking the minutes.

As Rebecca reached Roland's desk, she glanced back down the office. No one was watching, so she ducked behind the partition and sat at Roland's large L-shaped desk. Good. His computer was on, and with her back to the wall there was no chance of anyone approaching unseen. She nudged the mouse to interrupt the screensaver's monotonous doodling but immediately a small dialog box sprang into the center of the screen. Oh, shit! The little turd uses a password.

Rebecca was about to give up and return to her desk when she noticed the tiny yellow Post-it note attached to Roland's monitor. It bore three words, neatly printed in blue Biro: 'generator', 'compressor' and 'inverter'. All company products, but¦ Rebecca put the folder down on the desk, typed in the first of the words and then hit the return key. Bingo! The idiot can't be arsed to keep his passwords somewhere safe.

The screensaver and dialog box vanished to reveal a spreadsheet filled with text and numbers, and then immediately, the 'You have mail' box appeared. Rebecca reached for the mouse again. Then she moved the cursor over the word 'Yes' and gave it a left click, and immediately the screen was filed with Roland's inbox, complete with a list of his most recent e-mails; the top one of which was highlighted in red. Rebecca moved and clicked the mouse again and then hit the 'Delete' and F9 key, and with a final click of the mouse, her name and the words 'Come to my party!' disappeared from the list. Yessss!

With her mission accomplished, and stifling a giggle, Rebecca clicked again to minimise the e-mails window, but then realised her mistake: If the screensaver didn't return to the screen before Roland returned to his desk, he would know that someone had been into his computer. Oh, bugger!

The timer! Change the screensaver timer!

Rebecca grabbed the mouse again and clicked the 'Start' button, followed by 'Settings', and 'Control Panel'. Now what? System? No. Passwords? No. Display! That's it; Display! Rebecca double-clicked 'Display', then a click on the Screen Saver tab took her to where she needed to be. The timer was set to ten minutes. What to reset it to? One minute? No, he'd be sure to notice. Five minutes? No; too long; he might be back by then. Three minutes; that should be enough.

Rebecca reset the timer to three minutes, then after shutting down the Control Panel, she picked up her file, slipped out of the chair, and checking that the coast was clear, she set off back to her desk, just as Roland walked through the door. Oh, Shit!

'Morning, Rebecca.' Roland was his usual brisk and businesslike self, in grey suit, shiny black shoes and insipid tie. 'Looking for me?'

'Oh, no, well¦' Rebecca glanced back towards Roland's computer, knowing the screen saver wouldn't have started yet. Then as she looked back towards Roland, whose obvious intent was to return to his desk, she let the folder slip from her fingers and its contents cascade onto the floor. 'Oh, sorry.'

Rebecca did her best to block the isle as she bent over to pick up the papers, whilst an obviously impatient, Roland, tried to step around her.

'Sorry, Roland. I'm a real butterfingers this morning.' Rebecca stuck out her bottom to prevent Roland from passing. Her mind was racing. How can I stop him? What can I do? As she picked up the last of the papers and Roland finally managed to pass her, she grabbed at his sleeve.

'Just a minute, Roland. I did want to ask you something¦ Err, I'm having a party next week and wondered if you'd like to come.'

'Oh.' Roland looked surprised. 'I'd love to, Rebecca. Can you send me an e-mail about it? You know what my memory's like.'

'Okay,' replied Rebecca, smiling. Damn!