Chapter 4 - thinking of her

The alarm buzzed. Red awoke he had a moment of calm, before he realised the madness he was getting into. He spent his time over the previous few days fixating on a woman he'd spoken to twice. He discovered her secret desires, felt disgust ads shock at her lifestyle and shame of his own stalking and now he got drunk and told her to trick him into eating pastries at work, whilst pretending to be FatFreddie from Colorado. This was a mess. He didn't know what to feel about this.

He took a deep breath and sat on the end of his bed, putting his socks on. He looked at the clock. Time was either going faster or he was day dreaming. He pulled himself together, jumped on his bike. "shit" he thought "forgot to have a shower and eat breakfast again" too late. He had to go.

At the office, he jumped off. Five minutes late again. Quickly dashed into he restroom and changed, then sprayed down with a lot of deodorant. He dashed through he canteen. "breakfast..." he put in the coins for chocolate energy bar, bag of crisps. Turning to the coffee machine he saw the usual black coffee button. Instead, he selected "latte with sugar"... Grabbing the meal again he sat at the desk, logged in and started to work again.... "I never realised how boring spreadsheets were" he found himself thinking as he scared at the screen. "I wonder if Carla will need help fixing her machine."

The hours went by, unproductively, he had a headphone bud in and was listening to a podcast about supernatural mysteries to alleviate the feeling of boredom. He found himself occasionally glancing over the monitor to see if Carla was looking confused. But she seemed fine so far. He could not work out why he kept thinking about that.

Lunchtime came. Today he left early to get a sandwich from the shop. He eyed up the range in the cooler. Normally he would look through the healthy tuna or egg salad sandwiches, but today his eye was caught on a large cheese and coleslaw roll, which came with a meal deal offer to be combined with a drink and a snack. He'd never even spotted the deal before. It may have been new. Without much hesitation he picked up the sandwich with a caramel chocolate bar and bottle of cola. Something sugary seemed to appeal. He paid up and strolled back to the office to have lunch and read the online headlines.

It wasn't until nearly the end of the day before an email popped up.

"Hi Red. Sorry, my computer has crashed. Can I come over and use yours for five minutes? Thanks. Carla"

..."Oh my. She did manage it break her computer". He bit his bottom lip a tiny bit. This is so strange.

"Sure, come on over. Just let me save first. Red."

She stood up at the other side of the room, she pre-emptively grabbed her coat and handbag and walked over the office floor to kneel by Red. He saw her scan the desk subtly and she saw the empty wrappers from the two chocolate bars, crisps, latte, sandwich and cola.... Red wondered what she would have thought.

"Hiya! Me again" she said. "now, I just want to go into the head office drive and print out a few forms."

"Oh, sure. I can do that."


"You're a life saver again. I hope you don't mind me using you like this."

Red found the files and sent them to the printer "there. Did you need them tonight?"

"Oh! Yeah, i'll take them home with me, I just forgot to print them out before I shut down the computer"... She stopped. "I mean before it crashed".

"no trouble at all, i'll go get them for you." Red got the print outs, when he came back, Carla had left a big cookie shaped like a smiley face on the desk.

"I always pay my debts" she said... She a little more cautiously than normal and gestures to the cookie.

"Thanks Carla, i'll see You tomorrow. Have a good night." Red for the first time gave her a sincere smile as she left.

"so" he thought "she acted differently today... Was she worried about I noticed she slipped up about turning her computer off? The email obviously came from her desktop so it was an obvious lie. Maybe she's worried I'm noticing all the cakes? ... I have noticed. Maybe she thinks ill be suspicious about why she does it. Maybe she thinks she's that I think she wants to use me for silly errands and buy me off with cake." He ate the cookie at his desk whilst everyone else left. "I will have to see what she says on the forum, tonight." He signed out of his computer and went home.