Fantasia

II

The alarm rang way too early, shrill and immensely irritating.

Eddy glanced up, his arms too heavy to properly reach for his phone without causing it to fall on the ground. He barely flinched at the sound of his device hitting the wooden floor.

Normally, he'd go running now. Jog his morning round of ten kilometers in fourty minutes before work and he barely left out a day. But today, exhaustion overcame him just thinking about it and as soon as he closed his eyes, he drifted off.

Eventually, Eddy did make it out of bed to get ready. Getting ready was good. Getting ready let him forget the recurring dream that had visited him last night yet again. Getting ready gave him a sense of usefulness, reminding him of the countless times his mum used to emphasize this particular characteristic as one of the most important in life. Not passion, not joy, not meaning. Usefulness! "What does anyone do with himself if one's not useful?" And he'd agree with a silent nod.

So, putting on a clean, ironed pair of trousers, a white, uncreased shirt and a black blazer at least made him look useful.

Breakfast was skipped, like every morning. He'd get a coffee to go on the way to work after a fourty minutes bus ride, annoying bus changes and smelly body odour or way too strong perfume from numerous fellow commuters included. It was the same coffee from the same coffee place every day. Not particularly good, but also not super bad either. Acceptable. And first and foremost: useful.

It also made HIM more useful.

With his coffee fix in hand, Eddy arrived at 7 a.m. sharp at the office. A glassy, tall, thirty floor building, standing in the central business district of Singapore. Like all his countless co-workers, he held his keycard against the electronic lock next to the glass door, waited a fraction of a second for the familiar 'beep', before he could open the door and enter his workplace.

The interior was clean and neat, lots of black, grey and white combined. A rather unsurprising, uninspiring sight for anyone working at a financial office like Eddy did. The people walking around busily in such a building didn't stick out in anyway. They were rather blending in, adding their own undistinguishable colours to the mix. And Eddy was no different. Blending in had always been his forte, in fact.
So, he blended in in the elevator, where around ten people flood in smoothly and found their little space in the moving box right away, a rehearsed shift of position, refined over years. And then, they would blankly stare in front of them without speaking a word until the lift reached their destination.
He blended in on his floor, where he headed straight to his cubicle, put the coffee on his office table and let himself slump down on his half comfortable chair, already exhausted from his commute.

It was always like this. Every. God. Damn. Morning.

At least, his co-worker next to him would bring some colour, some change into Eddy's daily life. Like this morning.

"Morning, man. Slept well?"
"Mhm", was all Eddy said. No need to tell him about the dream, was there? The one which made him hurl every time he woke up from it.
"Me too. Thanks for asking", Theo said with a grin, "overtime is killing me lately though! How come you still always stay longer than I do? I'd die man if I'd be you!"
"Just have tons of work", Eddy sighed half-heartedly and started his computer, commencing his work day.
"I mean, so do I. But don't you have a life outside of that? Girlfriend or wife or something?"
"I told you, nah! No time." Eddy logged himself into his account and started a program which showed him the stock and financial developments of the night all over the world of all their business customers. One glance and he could see, it looked bad. He frowned, knowing he'd get called in by his boss this morning.
"Then you should look for someone! Or something. Work-life balance is important, man." Theo turned around on his chair and typed something on his keyboard. It was good advice, Eddy knew. Still, he answered with a quiet "No time!" again.

Theo Lee was one of the few people in this office Eddy knew. Not like super close, but they greeted each other, would go eat lunch together and wished Happy Birthday to the other when the anniversary arrived. He was around the same age as Eddy, but had been here longer and was more experienced. Theo was quite an upbeat, positive person and thus the only thing brightening Eddy's existence at the moment. Him and the occasional phone calls with his sister.

As Eddy said, he had no time for more.

"Chen!" Someone yelled from the other side of the room after two hours of him typing numbers for clients into his computer. Eddy knew this slightly irritated voice, so he got up instantly and made his way to the source, ignoring the looks of his co-workers as he passed by them.
"Yes?" Eddy stepped into the office and closed the door behind him.
"Take a seat."
He did and looked at his superior's frown, trying hard not to match it.
"Have you seen the stocks plummeting this morning?"
Eddy nodded.
"We have to do something about this."
"I'm preparing the charts for our clients."
Mr. Rogers shook his head. "It's not enough. Talk to the clients involved. Get them to sell those stocks and buy others with better perspective! Like frontiers for example. Real estate companies always work these days. But I trust you can figure something out?"
Eddy held back a heavy sigh. "Of course."
"You know we need the money too? The fifteen percent we get from their profit..."
"I know." Of course he knew. How couldn't he with Mr. Rogers reminding him almost every day since he'd started here three years ago.
"All right!" Mr. Rogers leant back into his chair, causing it to tilt dangerously while supporting the enormous weight of the man. "You can go now."
Eddy made a small bow and left his bosses office to check on better fitting, hence more promising stocks and make some very important calls.

"What did he want?", Theo asked as Eddy sat down.
"Shitty stocks. Wants me to talk to our customers."
"As if we can foresee what they should buy!", Theo groaned, "It's random anyway, at some point."
Eddy knew that. After all, he had gotten a degree in economics and statistics before he'd started here. Still, that's what they were employed to do. So he'd do it.

"You leaving already?", Theo asked in a surprised tone at around 5.30 p.m..
"Didn't you want me to have a better work-life balance?" Eddy turned off his computer and packed his bag, a pounding headache tormenting him since the tenth phone call he had made this morning, talking to very noncooperative businesses not understanding how something like this could have happened.
"I just suggested it would be better for you", Theo said a bit more quiet. Eddy felt a pang of guilt. It wasn't this guy's fault his life was... well, dull. And he couldn't blame Theo for being curious. After all, it was probably the first time in a year or so where Eddy left before seven. And before him.
"Sorry", he mumbled, "have a doctor's appointment."
"Oh, everything alright?" Theo raised his head again.
"Yeah, just stomach stuff. Gonna have a check up."
"Ohh", Theo made again, "okay... hope everything's fine."
"Pretty sure it's nothing. See you around." Eddy waved and was off.