My lips curl in disgust as the smooth taste of bourbon floods my mouth, burning my throat before warmth settles in my gut.
Me:
So what? That’s when joy sells. No excuses.
A full minute passes before I see her typing bubble fade.Good. At least someone is working. I glance out the window above the sink, and the forest is a blur of white. The storm eats the horizon, and the porch light carries a halo around the snow. For a heartbeat, I swear I see a figure in red standing beyond the tree line still, head tilted as if he’s listening. A gust of wind knocks a branch free, causing the vision to shatter with the snow.
“I need to sleep,” I mutter as I pour myself another drink and head back towards the living room with my laptop. Grabbing the remote, I turn on the TV—the news plays in the background. A news anchor pops up on the screen, dressed in a green ugly Christmas dress, blonde curls cascading down her shoulders as she smiles beside footage of a neighborhood wrapped in yellow tape.
“Police respond to another string of Christmas Eve break-ins...” I turn it off before I hear the rest. I simply didn’t care, chugging the rest of the bourbon, then taking a quick glance at my reflection, watching as it distorts and fades into a ghost in a suit due to the glow of the laptop monitor. My dark tone loses the melanin and color fading to a pale shade. A buzzing sound has me running a hand down my face and letting out a yawn I’ve been holding for far too long.
My eyes burn from staring at screens, but the buzzing is another text from a man I should have blocked weeks ago, butgood sex kept me throwing bones at the desperate dog. Shane lounges in a bed naked with a bow wrapped around his thick and veiny length.
Shane:
Still working, Toy King?
I smirk despite myself.Aren’t I always?
I want to say, but I leave him on read like I always do, despite the blood rushing like a freight train straight into my cock. My hand instinctively moves towards the bulge growing in my pants just in time for the signal on my cellphone to die, and the lights flicker as the wind shreds through the chimney.
Ignoring my erection and slamming my laptop shut, I stand there not knowing what to do with the delays. I want to shower, but the constant pinging on my phone interrupts the need. For a second, I think of fucking my hand to relieve some of the stress tensing my muscles and taking root at the base of my neck.
A groan escapes my lips as I pour another drink.
More notifications roll in, more delayed orders, shipping errors, and a frozen truck somewhere outside Denver. A sigh escapes my lips as I open up the laptop and start dictating responses, watching as the numbers climb.
Even now, on Christmas Eve—end of the quarter—everyone else is slowing down while I’m still building my empire. My stomach growls, the pang of hunger slamming into me. Pulling myself from the screen, I walk to the fridge, pulling out a ready to eat meal and microwaving it. My back rests on the wooden edge of the counter as I wait for the microwave to stop, still looking at my phone screen while typing out responses and looking at the warehouse cameras.
Beep! Beep!
The sound alerts me that my food is ready to eat, and of course, I eat the sorry excuse of meatloaf standing up, myeyes flickering between spreadsheets and the security feeds. The factory cameras show silhouettes moving under the fluorescent lights—my people, still assembling happiness by the hour. Their faces somber and their movements rushed.Good. Work keeps the world warm.
A blur of red catches my eye as it moves around in the corner of my feed. I rewind. Nothing. Play. Nothing. Rewind again. Still nothing. Then the image crackles once, like static, and clears. Placing my phone down on the counter, I bring my fingers towards my temple and rub the tension away.
When another message comes in, Emily again.
Emily:
Power outage in sector B. The crew wants to head home before the roads close.
My response is immediate.
Me:
If they can drive, they can deliver.
Thankfully, Emily is a smart cookie and doesn’t question my response. Placing the phone back onto the counter, the sound of a log shifting and the flame spitting catches my attention. The sound startles me enough that I spill the bourbon on my keyboard.
“Shit!” I curse as I blot the liquid with my sleeve, and freeze when I notice the reflection in the dark screen. A tall shape by the window, holed in red light from the fire, but when I spin around, there’s nothing—just my own coat hanging on the peg.
Snow howls against the glass, the television flickers back to life on its own, the volume whispering just loud enough to bleed through the room:
“He sees you when you're sleeping…”
I shut it off and focus back on my screen. The company dashboard has gone red—every shipment marked delayed, every worker status offline except one.
The ID code blinks 1: NG-01
