Lunch?

The time is 11.45am sharp.

He stood up to stretch his stiff body and took the opportunity to glance nervously around. He realised with a shock that he is right in the midst of a hive filled with various activities.

There are some who walked to and fro with sense of purpose in their stride, while some stared blankly into their computer screen filled with coloured rows of highlighted numbers.

From far, those minute looking digits and characters look sinisterly like fire ants, the fire ants he used to burn with joss stick back at his kampong house.

Shaking his head to clear off this irrelevant reverie, he sat down with a thud on the somewhat uncomfortable, squeaking chair.

He sighed inwardly and thought of the luck he got so far in securing his current position.

As he turned and stared at his computer screen, he realized that his mind is totally blank and could not comprehend the numbers displayed on the screen. Those stagnated numbers kept on blinking like constant heartbeat, taunting him repeatedly.

He closed his eyes, obscuring his vision momentarily. Despite this, the floating numbers remained in his view, burnt into his mind like a charred emblem. He rubbed his eyes hard, swirling the numbers and saw splitting stars at the back of his eyeballs in the process.

Slowly he reopened his eyes and glanced at the wall clock again. He noticed that the minutes arm nudged slowly but surely, time now showing 11.55am.

He nervously shuffled his feet on the carpeted floor, feeling the carpet’s roughness through the sole of his shiny leather shoes. He silently wished that he could take it off and free his sweaty feet from the confines of his shoes.

Slowly he extended his neck above his cubicle wall like a tortoise emerging from its shell. Again he looked around. The place is much calmer now and the bustle of activities he saw earlier has thinned considerably.

His palms grew wet and clammy with anticipation. He fidgeted on his chair, the squeaking sound now louder as the place grew quieter.

He jolted when he felt someone tapped his shoulder and asked him, “So, how was your first day at work? OK so far? Would you like to join us for lunch?”

With that, he felt a true sense of relieve and happily accepted the lunch offer with a smile on his face.