Friday: lunchtime.  In the pub, getting drunk.  Goodbye drink – have another – leaving work.

Sitting crushed into the corner of a table-for-ten at the Tiger.  Feeling slightly sick.  Always hated leaving dos.  Two too many gins.

Been here over an hour already, the others come and go in shifts – someone has to keep the office open.  We’ll all be ill by half past three.

Not really listening to their chatter; no need, they aren’t talking to me, as though I’d already gone.  Anticipating freedom, my pulse is racing, waiting to be on the train, waiting to go home, waiting to leave.

Read at Liars’ League London 2009, published in London Lies Arachne Press 2012

© Cherry Potts 2009