The Office Worker

He is waiting for his ride at the entrance of his office building. The automatic light near the lobby is broken, so the only light is far down the hallway. He leans against the brick wall.

Rain pounds on the windows and the doors. The elements of the nighttime storm thrash the air outside, thrash the trees, thrash what little moonlight there is into hard rays of nightlife. The owl and the mink are hard at play. The elements do not touch him in the office building.

The clock overhead is one of the old ones painted with radium. He watches it and listens to it as it tick, tick, ticks round and round the ghostly green face. His ride is as late as it always is. He should just walk. He doesn’t live too far away, but he can’t move. The office building keeps him.

Then, he tips, briefcase and all, into the wall. The bricks swallow him, vanish him, take him whole.

The hallway is empty. The office worker is gone. His ride is not coming. The office building thinks quietly to itself in the raging night.