ENVY
8.45 pm ....hmm...15 minutes before the ‘big’ man left the office. Yes... I mean the President himself, the puppet master in this pathetic excuse of a workplace. Don’t get me wrong, being the Head of Marketing of a huge company does have its perks. But still...all I could dream of in my inebriated state was having his life! Now, the Boss was one man who definitely had it good. Look at him...He had everything!! Loads of money, good looks, that adds to the glam! His social groups included the rich and mighty. He partied with the new Governor, a personal friend of his. He had a beautiful beach house. He was married to one of the most beautiful women in the world. Rumors had it that he was even going at it with the wife one of the vice-presidents of the company( The wife of the head of Logistics, I hear)
And yet....it seemed unfair. Why was he the Boss and not me? I remember twenty years ago, we were good friends; teenagers with a big dream. A vision, that one day, we would make it big in the world. And by God, did we manage it! But here’s the problem. Everyone knows that I’ve always been the smarter one. Everyone, including him, knows that it was my brains that got the two of us to the top. And yet, for some inexplicable reason, he was the Boss, and not me. I, on the other hand, was made to watch as he soared in the financial circles. I was rich as well, no doubt about that, but just not as rich as him! While he was going around with a multitude of gorgeous women, I had to go home late every night to my pregnant wife ( who, for some reason, just didn’t seem to want me around any longer)
Why?
What had he done that I hadn’t??
And in one fell swoop, I made a decision. Enough was enough. For too long had I been the man in the background; and I was sick of it. Perhaps it was the whisky that was doing this to me. Yet somehow, in that haze of alcohol, things seemed crystal clear to me. It was time to take matters into my own hands. Everything that he had rightfully belonged to me. And now was my chance to take it back.
Except for the two of us, the office was deserted. I opened my drawer and took out my prized possession. Yes, there it was…a .45 Walther pistol. That really did bring back memories. It had originally been part of a set of two. And guess who had the other one? Yes, twenty years ago, when we were still the best of friends, the Boss and I had decided to pick up the set. As a token of our…well, brotherly love for each other. But why go there? All that was important to me at the time was the fact that it was loaded.
I slowly made my way to his office. Everything seemed to happen so slow, and yet inexplicably , everything was a blur. Everything else seemed pointless to me. All I knew was that I wanted blood. His blood.
I walked into his office. He was sitting right there at his desk, staring into space. I called out to him. He looked up, and in his eyes I saw something strange…resentment. Odd! But I had more important things to take care about. I raised the gun, and kept pulling the trigger.
By God, it was loud!! And surprisingly painful…I looked down, and watched the blood spurt out of my chest…. This was not going to be fun.
Boss
Why him? Of all the women in the world , why did it have to be the wife of the man who brought me to the top? The man, who as a boy, and shared a dream with me. A dream to make it big.
Everything had been going fine till last year. True, I had been overworking him, but for a reason. Having mingled with all the right people, I knew some things that most others didn’t. The state needed a new Governor, and They had asked me for a suggestion. And I had given his name. Sadly, to make him seem like a viable candidate, he had to be tested. He had to prove that he could take the pressure. He couldn’t.
And then, as he turned to alcohol, I tried to help him. I went to his wife to see what we could do about him. Oh God!! Everything went so wrong then…I couldn’t control myself. She was a beautiful woman, in an unhappy marriage. They had been trying to have a child for a year, and it wasn’t going so well. She was vulnerable, and I …like a fool, unwittingly took advantage of that…
When she told me she was pregnant, everything became clear to me. I wanted the life he had. It didn’t seem fair. I was the richer one obviously, but it was his wife I fell in love with. I was so bloody jealous of him. He had everything he needed. And I wanted it. I wanted to be able to father that child that was growing inside of her. My child…
It seemed so unfair. I loved her, and he was the one who got to go home to her every night. He was the one who got to kiss her when he got home. Not me… And why?? God alone knew.
All I knew was that I wanted him out of the way. That child would be mine, not his.
I realized what I had to do…and it wasn’t going to be easy. He had, after all been like a brother to me in the past.
And then suddenly, he walked in. And I just lost it. I was mad at him, and I would make him pay. In a flash, I had the drawer opened and I had taken out the Walther. I was going to sever every bond we had. I pulled the trigger.
Funny…I never expected it to hurt so much. I watched as he fell slowly to the ground. And then, I noticed the gun in his hand. My vision started to blur. Everything was going cold.
