The Cubicle

A screensaver of a generic mountain range flashed on, displacing the Excel spreadsheets that had taken up the view for hours on end.

There was no such thing as a generic mountain range. Someone somewhere had taken pains to leave their comfort zone, head up the mountains and shoot it.

But back to the cubicle.

Which one was mine? Oh, yes.

One wrong turn and you would land in someone else's space.

Mine was the one closest to the all-important pantry, where gossip as was free-flowing as company joe, a fresh pot every morning, afternoon and evening.

From my early days, I had learnt there was no real difference. We were on shifts that could be preceded by breakfast, lunch or dinner. Company's pick.

As for the gossip, a kernel of truth obscured by rumours would germinate at the beginning of the week and take root by the end of it. It was like Chinese Whispers, starting so innocently (or not) and ending up an amalgamated behemoth tangled in lies.

The tangled behemoth paused and looked over at me expectantly.

"What have you heard lately?"

I mumbled a nondescript reply and returned to my cubicle with a mug of coffee in hand.

I sat down and hit the space bar.

The generic mountain range disappeared from the screen.

Give me mountain ranges and spreadsheets any day.