Marcus felt old.
His shoulders hunched and there were knots in between his shoulder blades that had been there so long that he had forgotten what life was like without them. His hips ached, most days, and it took a good hour and a hot shower for him to get properly moving in the morning. Even though he walked to the office every day, part way there his shins inevitably started to feel like the muscles were tearing from the bone and his calves were rock by the time he finally sat down at his desk. He remembered, vaguely, telling himself a couple of years ago that the pain would go away if he kept doing it. If anything, it had gotten worse.
Thirty-four going on eighty, he thought to himself as he settled back into his chair, stretching back against the spring in the backrest and willing his body to relax. No matter what he did, he just lessened the tension. It was never really gone. With a sigh, he gulped at his coffee and realized that it was cold, left over in the carafe from the day before. Shit. What a start to the day. No matter now, he thought, and hauled out the latest report on water quality in the tailing ponds. He knew what it would contain, that the liners had decayed and that the near lethal mix of chemicals that were the byproduct of their process was leaching into the water table in microscopic amounts. He'd known it for nigh on a decade, but no matter how many times he tabled this report past the board, they simply refused to listen. This was version seven and the PhDs out in the field kept running it up the flag pole, hoping it would stick. I guess they think of me as their point man, he chuckled. If they only knew.
By noon, he was lost in the details of the report and could feel the beginnings of a real doozy of a headache coming on, the type that sent him home for the day and made him lie in the bath with the lights off, his head nearly completely submerged. Sometimes he could head it off by drinking enough water, so he heaved himself out of his chair and stumbled off to the lunch room to fill up his mug from the water cooler.
"My God, you look like shit."
It was Maureen Dowd, up from four pulling microfilm from the library. She glanced over her shoulder at him, looking concerned. Maureen was a tall, expatriate American with a blond bob and a healthy dose of common sense. She had a decent body and beautiful eyes, certainly enough to warrant some flirting at the least on most days, but today, flirting was the last thing on Marcus' mind. From Maureen's perch at the microfilm machine, she could see right into the kitchenette.
"I feel like it. Headache." Even speaking was a chore, now. Just getting out of the chair and walking to the kitchenette had started his headache in earnest and fifteen feet later it was downright throbbing. His vision was watery and the pain in his sinuses was excruciating. With one hand he deftly filled his mug while the other circled on his temple, pressing hard.
"Are you sure you're OK? You really do look terrible." She swiveled in the chair, to face him.
At that moment, he suddenly knew that he wasn't, not really.
"I think ... I think I'm going to be sick."
He could feel his gorge rising and then suddenly there it was. He bolted to the sink in a rush, spilling water from his mug onto the floor in a stream, barely making it to the sink before he threw up in heaves. With his head buried, he could smell the acid and the stainless steel of the sink. By the time he was done, his throat burned and so he rinsed out the sink and drank directly from the tap, rinsing his mouth as best he could. He felt better, a little, now that he had vomited, but it was only a few seconds before the agony in his head started up again. With his head hanging in the sink, he felt like crying out of frustration. This happened four or five times a month and he was well and truly tired of it.
"Good God ... I'm sending you home. I'll call Duncan and let him know for you.", Maureen tutted.
Duncan was Marcus' boss and Duncan had just reamed out Marcus for his string of recent sick days. Duncan had counted them off right in front of Marcus, an act that made Marcus think of Jesus being whipped by the Romans, because they always counted the strokes. Duncan had implied that Marcus' position with the company was in jeopardy, despite the fact Marcus had twice the seniority of his supervisor, twice the education and twice the work ethic. Duncan hated people with degrees, especially those with more of them than he himself had, like Marcus. In fact, he had told Marcus to his face that he hated people with degrees, knowing full well that Marcus had three of them. Duncan was a dick.
"No.", Marcus managed to croak from within the sink, his voice sounding harsh and deep from the belly of the sink.
"Give me a break, you just puked!" He could hear Maureen get up and come over.
"Too many sick days."
"You are going home and that is that. You leave Duncan to me."
Marcus vaguely noticed that Maureen's hand was on his back, making tiny circles there. It was comforting and so he let her do it for a while. She even helped wiped up the spilled water for him while he hung there in the sink, nearly scalding water running over his head for relief as he worked up the courage to walk home.
The walk itself was a few minutes of hell that he barely remembered, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other in the snow. Just one more foot. Just one more foot. When he got home, he was well and truly prepared to vanish to the tub for a couple of hours with some ibuprofen and a two hour bath, but he noticed that he had an email from Maureen, the first time she had ever written him privately, and so he clicked on his email program in passing. The message was short and in it, she gave the number of a masseuse, Rubina, that she highly recommended. She had taken the liberty of booking him an appointment for the next morning at 10 a.m., tomorrow, which was Saturday. She reminded Marcus in the email that the work benefit plan paid for the entire thing and had included as an attachment the form he needed to claim it.
He printed both off because he was a little old school and still liked paper lying around and then went to the tub for relief, thinking that a massage might just be the ticket these days.
---------------
He rode to the holistic health centre on the bus the next morning, disconcerted a bit when he saw that the "centre" was in an industrial area, in a strip mall, with a store selling truck accessories as a neighbour. The sign was small enough that he almost missed it, hesitating at the side door of the bus before finally stepping off when he caught the irritated look from the driver in the mirror. His headache was back, but as a dull ache rather than as stabbing agony. Thank God. This was at least tolerable.
Inside the centre, however, he could see that the illusion was complete. Vaguely ethnic music, barely audible and largely inoffensive, wafted through the waiting room through hidden speakers. The room itself contained a faux fireplace, some leather couches and several metal shelves for the various products they sold. Everything was very tastefully appointed, with glass and steel being the central motif. The colours were neutral and muted, but again, tastefully chosen, and so the appearance of the whole was peaceful and calm, a stark contrast to the hectic thoroughfare just out front.
The girl behind the counter was young, 18 at most, and had a couple of tattoos just poking through by her ears, over the top of her white, buttoned up mandarin jacket she wore. She had nearly perfect teeth, luminescent white skin and hair black as jet, clearly dyed. It was pulled back into a neat pony tail and Marcus got the impression that this was just her day job and that things got decidedly darker when she was allowed her own free will again.
"I'm here to see Rubina. I'm her 10 o'clock."
"Do you know which Rubina?"
"You have more than one?"
"Yes."
"I have no idea. I was just told it was booked for me at 10. My co-worker Maureen Dowd booked it for me."
