Delays

Clara clatters down the hall, one heel on her battered shoes an eighth-inch shorter than the other, the rubber lift having worn off. Her blue and red dyed hair clashes with her traffic cone orange jacket, but she doesn’t care. She loves color and revels in visual cacophony. 

She reaches her office door and bumps it hard with her hip as she turns the knob. Reluctant hinges grudgingly stutter the door to a partial open. She meant to fix that last week. 

Clara pushes through and drops her sack lunch (today it’s egg salad on rye along with a side of mincemeat pie, dangerously close to expiration) on her desk. The floor is cluttered with boxes and files. The grimy high set windows allow the barest trace of sunlight through. Maybe next week she'd climb the rickety office ladder and take a swipe at them.

With a sigh she plops in her ancient, creaky office chair. Missing the bus had made her late for work. Again. At least there were no meetings today that she'd need to rush off to.

A knock on her door startles her and she swings her chair to the left, banging both legs in the process. She swears a blue streak as a head, topped by lustrous black hair above a handsome face and startling blue eyes, peeks past the door and into her domain. It is at this precise moment that the seat of her chair chooses to disengage from the bottom (the large screw that had come out yesterday sat atop her desk waiting for re-insertion), and she toppled backward, legs akimbo. Clara instantly and irrevocably regretting her decision to delay shopping for new undergarments.