"It's a deal. I need all the cover I can get."

"No problem," Tami replies, putting her hand atop yours on the desk. "I'll let you know when it's time to pay up." She bites her lip briefly before finally taking one of the backed-up calls, and you hurry away.

Apparently the spray still has a little kick left, you think -- Enough to outweigh your coating of sweat, wild hair, rumpled overalls, and probable post-orgiastic smell of more than just body spray...

You arrive back at the storerooms and find the box of AXE cans right where you left it. You carefully take them outside with another load of junk. But instead of tossing them in the dumpster, you hide them behind some hedges around the corner of the building. As you reenter the building, you run smack into Scruffy.

"Oh, jeez, I'm sorry I was late..."

"No problem, kid. Tami told me about it. HR crap. Checking your citizenship or something?"

"Uh, yeah."

You walk down the hall to the storerooms together.

"Mostly I just wanted to make sure you weren't having any problems." He pauses to hack up another wad into his hanky. "You didn't just throw any hazardous stuff in the dumpster, did you? Any flammables? Batteries? Aerosol cans?"

"Uh, no... Why... uh, where should I leave anything like that?"

"At the side of the loading dock. Down that hall. There's separate collection for that kind of stuff."

You look down the hall where Scruffy gestures, and spot Dr. McKenzie walking up it toward you -- not oblivious to your presence this time, but looking at you directly, with a narrow-eyed sneer of disdain on her otherwise gorgeous face. A few paces later you look over your shoulder as she emerges from the corridor and turns on stiletto heels in the opposite direction, probably already having forgotten you.

The rest of the day passes uneventfully, other than your being twice as tired as a normal day's work would have left you. You take your time leaving the building, trying to decide whether to take the box on your way home, or return to get it under cover of night. When you do leave, as you cross the parking lot you're suddenly startled by a loud "HEY!"

Tami pops from between two cars and announces "I'm collecting! Do you have plans tonight?"

"Uh, no. Monday nights are usually pretty quiet for me."

"Aw, c'mon," she winks, her mischevious eyes a pale sea green. "Monday is the new Friday."

"Well, I'm not really..."

"You can go home and clean up first. Meet us at the Beef 'n Beer at 7:00. You know where it is?"

"Yeah, but who's 'we'?"

"A bunch of us like to party there after work sometimes. Well, maybe not a bunch, but a few people. Especially me, and my friends, Loni and Linda. From Documentation?"