She walked into the office building, which seemed to have seen better days. It wasn’t horrible, just scruffy looking in it’s almost lazy attempt to fit in with the times. The elevators dinged noisily announcing its arrival and she stepped into it, feeling a slight apprehension as it looked to be from the early 19th century and she half expected an old-fashioned bell-hop, with his little usher hat, to pop-up and ask which button he could push for her. She smiled to herself as she pushed the three button and held her breath as the doors closed. As the elevator ascended she felt herself grimace as a groaning noise could clearly be heard and when the slow elevator got to the intended floor she jumped quickly out of the slowly opening doors onto the firmer floor of the dimly lit corridor. She shook her head as the elevator doors stood open for more than a minute, as if checking if she wanted to risk her life again by stepping back in. She felt herself sigh with relief as the doors closed and it made it’s groaning noise, going back down to the ground floor. Shaking her head, she walked down the rather long, pale-yellow painted corridor to the glass door at the end, with the words ‘Abbots and Bollems Subsidiary’ in bookman old style lettering. The door had a card swiper on the side and a cracked grey button above it. She peered at the large L shaped desk which no one appeared to be attending. Pushing the button, she could hear the odd low echoing buzz that was obviously sounding from below the empty desk and she waited as the office remained silent. She felt her forehead getting slightly sweaty as she wondered if anyone actually worked in the building. The silence felt threatening and she started creating horror stories in her mind about how they might lure people to come into the seemingly abandoned building in order to kill them. She waited with bated breath as she heard the terrifying elevator groan to collect someone. The doors opening on the floor, made her hair stand on end as she had become convinced from the wait, that they were going to murder her. But a short and rather stocky, middle age man with dark brown hair cut very neatly and making his head look oddly square, came out and fumbled with the numerous items he seemed to be carrying. He was wearing brown suit pants and an un-ironed white shirt which was haphazardly tucked into his pants and belt, emphasizing his large belly hanging over them. He looked at her curiously as he approached and stopping by the door he moved his coffee to the opposite hand, to hold his other out to her, after putting his access card between his teeth. She shook his hand with a slight hesitation as he then removed the card from his teeth to say, “You must be the new girl? Good to meet you. We need to get you set up in the system first, so you can get into the office, Jody should be along soon, she works reception.” He swiped the card along the reader and the door slid open and she stepped into the office and noticed that the door had hidden the two small passageways to either side which opened out into an open floor plan behind. There were numerous rows with three desks in each, one after the other. A sad looking plant leaned drunkenly to one side in the corner and the lighting was dimmer, due to the smaller and fewer windows than should possibly have been used for the large office.
He escorted her to the front row and closest desk to the window, where he sat on the chair and turned on a laptop. He motioned for her to sit at the desk next to him. He tapped away on the keyboard as she felt an intruding sense of impatience at the wait. She glanced at her phone and frowned as the clock was showing that it was seventeen past eight, “Where is everyone?” She asked the man, who she had only just realised, hadn’t given her his name when he had greeted her.
He blinked at her, owlishly as he considered what she had asked, “You mean, why hasn’t anyone arrived yet?” He looked around, as if just noticing the place was empty and frowned, “Well some choose to work from home, now a days, and most of the office types generally roll in around ninish” he looked back at his computer and smiled, as if he had found the last answer to the Sunday times crossword puzzle, “Here we go, let’s get you added into the system. What’s your name?”
She frowned, perturbed that he didn’t know, “Um, Chelsea Rhodhutch.”
“Address?”
“The house came with the job, is this not in the system?” Chelsea was feeling a growing sense of dread and looked towards the passageway to contemplate running away. She realised that the dangerous elevators would hinder her getaway and she had previously planned to use the stairs instead of risking them again.
He looked genuinely surprised by her question, “It’s in HR’s system, but not in ours. I’m not your direct boss, so I don’t have the paperwork they provided. If you wait for Garry to come in and set you up then it might be after lunch before you can login to your computer.”
“Oh right, sorry. I guess I’m just feeling a bit nervous, I apologise. My address is 13 Connor Street, West Margret.”
“Oh, thats a lovely area, Jody lives close by there. When she gets in she’ll be talking your ear off about the neighbourhood!” He continued with the form and she proceeded to give him all her details, phone, birth date, photographic identification, next of kin details. When done, he rummaged through his desk draw and without warning took a camera out and snapped a picture of her face.
He then uploaded to the computer and she grimaced at the half deranged look that he had managed to capture her looking like. She half wanted to ask for another one to be taken, but he was back to concentrating on the computer and she didn’t want to distract him, in view of how long the set up was taking. He stood and walked to the far corner where he played with the large photocopy printer machine and after cursing twice, got it functioning with a loud whirring noise as it printed. He came back to the desk holding the label paper triumphantly and pulled out a grey card, which was similar to his and pasted the larger than need be sticker of her face on it. He got a little plastic slip and a neck cord to attach it to and handed it to her, “There! Now you can get into the building and through the doors. Lets go test it!” He got up and she followed him back to the reception area. He motioned for her to go out as he hit the big button to open the door and when she stood on the other side, feeling a bit silly as he was smiling so excitedly as they had to wait for two minutes and a half for the door to close completely again and she swiped her new card with the unflattering photo. She shook her head as the door didn’t open and he mimed to hold the card a bit further away from it. She tried and it beeped, then slowly opened. He clapped his hands like an excited child, “It just needed to recognise you. I knew it would work!”
“Peter, what are you doing?” A bored, voice queried behind her. Chelsea spun around and saw an odd-looking woman. She had numerous piercings all over her face and Chelsea tried to count them as the woman moved passed her and into the office. The woman put her big backpack down on the reception desk and turned to Chelsea with a raised, double pierced, eyebrow. Her hair was white blond and short with a single tuft that was bright blue. Chelsea could see the tattoo’s peeking out from the long sleeves and the back of the round neckline. The look suited her slim frame and if you didn’t look too closely at her, you’d mistake her for a teenager. But the slight wrinkling around the corners of her eyes and her hands skin, not noticeably, but still detectable, not being as tight as it used to be belied this. Chelsea saw the woman’s dark eyes assessing her, in turn, and she could feel herself getting uncomfortable under their scrutiny. The woman turned to the suddenly sheepish looking man, revealed to be named Peter, and barked, “What were you doing Peter?”
“I set up Chelsea’s card, so she could come in!” He stated like an animal, not sure if he was about to be eaten or praised. The woman paused for longer than was necessary before nodding. When she had nodded, Peter scurried back through the passageway.
“He asked for your address, didn’t he?” She asked with a sigh.
“Yes, why?” Chelsea felt the same growing dread again, wondering if she was in any danger.
The woman saw this and smiled a side smile which was condescending, yet oddly reassuring, “Don’t worry, he’s not dangerous, he just sends out millions of Christmas cards each year and I have to then reassure all the new employees that he’s harmless. I’m Jody by the way.”
“Oh, he told me about you. I’m guessing that is why he knew that you lived near me?” Chelsea laughed.
“Yeah, he is a bit full on, but it’s ok. We all get a little crazy at times,” she shrugged.
“Cool, so anyone who is dangerous, that I need to avoid?” Chelsea joked feeling a bit more relaxed.
Jody’s face dropped and she suddenly looked pale, saying in a quiet voice, “Don’t ever go to the main office. Make an excuse, take a sick day, but just avoid it.”
Chelsea felt her stomach drop from the scared look that had taken Jody’s eyes and she took an instinctive step back from the desk to try remove herself from the conversation. Then slowly Jody’s lip started to curl back to the condescending side smile and Chelsea giggled in relief after the intensity she had felt.
“So, is no one coming into the office anymore true, or was he making it up?” Chelsea asked, after glancing at her phone and realising it had past nine.
“Not many people come in after the fire,” Jody answered, looking intensly for something in her backpack.
“Fire? This place doesn’t seem to be fire damaged?” Chelsea looked around and went through her memory from entering the building to see if she could remember any signs.
“Nah, the old one. Was a mistake. Nothing to make a big deal about. He just got put in the wrong place a fire broke out and we corrected it,” Jody shrugged.
“Someone lit an office on fire and it was just ignored?” Chelsea queried, aghast.
“No, he moved to a different place and we moved buildings. It was a one off. They generally don’t allow it to get that far!” Jody rolled her eyes and shook her head.
“Who doesn’t?” Chelsea asked, almost wishing she hadn’t.
“The head office,” Jodie shrugged and after her computer screen came to life she said, “Lets get you ready for our mad office!”
Chelsea felt the dread rise up and tried to squish it back down, but something niggled at her to be on alert. Something felt.. off…
TBC 27/02/2026
Maxine the Magnificent 