Broken Tears 7

Broken Tears 7

Melody and her group of friends noticed that their 25 minutes had flown by and that they had to leave their lounge area. She tried not to worry to much, but she still had a small knot in her stomach. She felt a little concern for her good friends who also had a family and bills to pay. One of the reasons that the people stayed on for such a long time was that they were loyal to the top manager Mr. Lamont Williams. He had personally hired everyone who had worked for the company for more than 10 years. He also paid the employees first before the department leaders got paid when times were rough. The only reason that Mr. Williams was not here was that he was in the hospital in intensive care for a heart problem and not expected to make a recovery. His petite wife, Sandra was at his side whenever the hospital visiting hours allowed. Melody had never seen such a caring boss.

Melody walked to her desk and saw Vera, the second assistant to Mr. Blocker. She also noticed that there was an electrician working in a cubical that Cathy Newton usually sat at. Vera walked to Melody’s desk and laid a big file on top of the other work that was laying there. Vera looked up and saw Melody. Vera shrugged her shoulders and went back to her desk.

Melody followed Vera to her desk. “Vera, I just started a big file that I got yesterday. Isn’t the next file of complaints and other forms supposed to go to the next person in line?”

“I’m sorry Melody. Mr. Blocker said that you work so well that he wanted YOU to have it. He also said that he wanted it finished by tomorrow. I’m sorry but I’m just following orders.” Vera replied with a look of sincere compassion.

“Can I ask if everyone is getting the same work load?” insisted Melody with a certain level of anger beginning to show.

“Oh you know that I can’t tell you who has what kind of work.”

“Is Mr. Blocker in so I can have a conference with him?”

“No he left for a business lunch with someone downtown. He mentioned that he may not be back until later. I am sorry but I was just the messenger. Please don’t get mad at me.”

Melody looked at another thick folder that was on the corner of Vera’s desk. It was for Cathy. She was out of the office that day to attend the funeral of her mother-in-law. It looked as if Cathy might have long hours ahead of her also. On top of the folder was a special pink memo that had Mr. Blocker’s initials on it. There were only two words on it: SEE ME.

Melody felt that she was not going to get any answers at this time. She went back to her desk and tried to start her computer. As she waited for the program to load she tried to do some deep breathing exercises to calm down. She had tried some other methods of releasing stress, but none of them had done a good job so far.

Melody waited a minute and looked at her computer screen. The computer did not seem to be working properly and then suddenly froze. “Now that is strange, I don’t remember this before.” she said to herself as she tried to get a tool bar to exit this program.

“Everybody shut down your computers. Immediately save whatever you are working on and close any window that you are currently using. We are having a virus that has invaded or is in the process of invading our system.” yelled Brad. “If you have a flash disk in it, get it out now!”

In the air Melody heard a few other workers screaming and groaning about the work lost and the fact that they were too late.

“Okay stay very calm and do not panic. I think we can try to get through this but you must not panic,” repeated Brad.

Vera ran over to Brad and looked at his screen. It looked as if it was frozen. He also pointed out that there was an unidentified icon that showed up on his screen. He whispered something to her and she nodded back. Vera went to her phone and made a call to someone in a very low voice.

“Oh why did this have to happen now.” cried Ursula. “I know that the work I have done will be lost and it will take hours to redo it.”

“You think that yours is bad, I have not backed up my data for this morning because I did not have the password to get on line. I am new in this department and needed to get a good evaluation,” said Violet almost in hysterics. She kept pressing the enter key and was hoping that something would get her data in the right folder.

Vera returned to Brad and whispered something in his ear. “Hey did anyone just happen to open an e-mail?”

Mandy stood up in her cubicle and looked around to see if anyone else was standing. “Well I had one that said ‘I Love You’ and I opened it. I thought it was from my fiancé. He’s always sending me love things like flowers, notes, candy and emails everyday. Why?”

The other employees’ heads came up just a few inches and stared directly at Mandy. Brad and Vera looked at each other and then shook their heads. Brad walked over to Mandy’s computer. He looked at her screen and shook his head. “No, I don’t think that you had the virus. But for anyone else’s information, there is a virus that comes from an ‘I Love You’ message. Don’t open it.”

Everyone sat down and waited for further information. They knew that Brad was the most computer savvy person here and would help them through this disaster. They hoped.

Just then the phone on Vera’s desk rang. She walked slowly to her work area and picked up the receiver. “Yes. Mr. Blocker? Okay. Yes we got the same problem here.” She picked up a pencil and started writing some words. She put down the receiver and exhaled slowly. “We are to remain here until the end of our scheduled day. The main office is sending someone to check us out. Do not call anyone. I’m sorry.” She looked at all of the people who were her friends. “Those were his exact words.”

The employees were stunned. They wondered what ‘check us out meant.’ And for those who had families that needed them after 5:00 it might be more than an inconvenience.