Chapter 1. Shit day.
Chapter 1: Shit day.
Have you ever had this gut feeling when things were at their worst, but you knew, in your heart of hearts, that they would get worse?
No?
Neither did I, but I like to pretend that I did to make me sound cooler.
Anyway. It all started when I woke up.
The first little sign that this day would be the literal end of me was when I woke up thirty minutes late to my shift. So, my day was already off to a Wonderful start.
Then I found out that the water to my apartment was cut off. I had to forgo my morning shower, and EVEN WORSE, I had to do something that would probably land me in hell. I had to wipe my ass with a sock. I've always had emergency paper towels in case my water was ever cut off, but I JUST ran out of them yesterday because my nephew decided they were his favorite new toy and wouldn't go back home with his parents unless he took the last roll I had with him.
Despite everything, I told myself to man up and get on with my day. I put on my uniform: a sleek blazer over a crisp shirt paired with tailored trousers and polished shoes. Attached to my left breast pocket was a name badge reading Milo.
I rushed out the door and hurried to work. It was a ten-minute walk to my job, and twenty minutes of getting ready added up to me being an entire hour late, a quarter of my four-hour shift.
I assumed I would be admonished for being late, have the hour deducted, and then go on with my day.
I assumed wrong.
The second I entered my workplace, a high-end hotel where I worked as a receptionist for the past 5 years, I was promptly fired, told to hand off my uniform within the next two days, and ushered out of the hotel by one of the guards when I tried to argue back.
Apparently, this was my third strike. When were my first two? I was informed along with my firaing that I was twice late before, approximately 1 minute each.
I was not mad or angry. In fact, I couldn't feel much at the moment; I was just... numb.
As I walked back home, not fully comprehending what the fuck just happened, I saw a little kid running after a ball. He was barely five, his tiny little legs barely keeping up with the ball speeding towards the street.
A few meters behind him, a frantic woman, his mother most likely, was running behind him and screaming for him to stop before he reached the road. She had another child cradled in her arms, which explained why she couldn't catch up with the little boy.
For a moment, my mind blanked out as, from a corner, a red Lamborghini emerged, speeding like a devil.
Inside the car was the menace of all drivers, the bane of all pedestrians, the scourge of the streets, a teenage driver. My mind froze as I envisioned the red smear the kid would leave on the road as the car barely slowed after rounding the corner, continuing its law-breaking speed of 70 miles in a 25-mile speed limit area.
I don't know when it happened, but instead of seeing a kid about to be run over by a speeding car, I was face-to-face with said car. In the corner of my eye, I could see the child flying through the air towards the sidewalk, straight into his mother's embrace.
'This... this is so fucking Cliche,' was the last thought I had before my face kissed the red devil, a flash of pain, and then nothing.