Tuesday

The next morning Brian wakes up with sore shoulders, a tired mind and an aching back begging to be put back to rest. He spent most of last night hunched over his desk and not at all in the positive, life-affirming sort of way. Working until close to midnight, only receiving 3 hours of sleep, Brian drags his tired sleep-deprived body out of bed and into the bathroom. In the shower, he leans against the glass doors, letting the warm water soothe him for a few indulgent minutes before jumping out to begin another tortuous day.

Putting on clothes is more of a hassle than usual because of his stiff joints and throbbing limbs. But by the grace of all that’s divine, Brian manages to puts his clothes on, take the elevator to the ground floor and hobble over to his car.

Driving to his business takes the predictable seven minutes in the ripe morning. Parking in the company lot and jogging over to the coffee shop across the street, takes less than three minutes. If Brian’s lucky, he’ll be back at Kinnetik and looking over emails in a little over five minutes. Fifteen minutes’ flat; this has been his routine for the past two weeks.

Brian finds his preferable shop, Coffee Monster, nearly empty. Clean tables and chairs wait forlornly for occupants. Calling out to the few customers within the small building ‘to take a seat’ and ‘relax’. Brian usually bypasses these urges to hang around the shop with the persistent clouds of obligation and duty loitering above him. Due to the weakened state of his body and mind, he stares dumbly back at the chairs and the idea of ‘relaxation’, as he joins the two-man line. When he orders his coffee, repeating his name excessively to the young curly haired woman at the cash register. She smiles sneakily up at him as he pays for his coffee.

Brian sighs in relief at the 'BRIAN' written boldly on his coffee cup.