I'm awake without the assistance of an alarm. Cool breeze washing my face at a steady pace. The window must be open. It smells like newspaper, jam, butter, grease, and perfume. Cherry Lilac mixed with vanilla. My favorite. I open my eyes, glancing down, there's a spread of breakfast and the Wall Street Journal prepare on a wooden slab. Betty is sitting beside me. I cannot 'see' her, but I can feel her breath against my skin. A feeling of confusion runs through me. There's no chair in the bedroom. Is she sitting on the nightstand? She couldn't have brought in a dining room chair without scratching the paint on the door frame. Anger replaces the confusion for an instant.

"Happy Birthday," she exclaims, running her arms against my body. Her face is creased, wrinkles around the eyes and edges of the cheeks, and genuinely happy.

"What's all this?" I ask with false naivety. I know what 'all this' is for. My birthday. Not just because she stated that as the intention, but because she's done this same exact same stunt three times before now. The past two years and that minor incident for Father's Day, I would instead not think about. On the naivety, although I know the circumstances for 'all this,' is because I want to make Betty happy. There's little else I know how to please this woman aside from entertaining her pathetic attempts at making me happy.

"It's your birthday silly billy." she's pulling back her hands and running them through her hair. Strands had started to fall in front of her face. "Look at the toast sweetheart." I see the first signs of innovation from her. The jam and butter covered strips of bread were carefully arranged over the mess of food to resemble a number. Twenty Nine. All-seeing this causes is to remind me that it's been four years at my 'starter job.' I feel melancholic, and my face mirrors the feeling all by mistake. "Sweetheart, what's wrong?"

Although I'm now angry by Betty's stupidity, she should know day by day I grow more and more disillusioned by this garbage job, I keep up the now false depressed facial expression I have and instead respond: "I can't believe how old I'm getting."

"Silly billy I'm thirty-one, it's good to get old." I smile, she really is a fool. Thirty-one and still an accountant for the same firm she'd been working for when we met at Good Times.

"How so?" I'm picking up a cut of the toast as I talk. Betty elaborates and rattles out a line of Kirkiregard or Nitchize on growing older or wisdom. As she speaks, I'm digging into the rest of the platter before me. I don't care for her ramblings. Half of the garbage that spews from her mouth is self-obsessed ramblings her hair, make-up, or wrinkles. The slight layer of fat that rolls in and recedes like the tide of her diets. Maybe those enlightening subjects mixed with gossip. The other half are these broad and unfocused diatribes defending each of her life choices. Mingled in these are quotes from philosophical works she reads in between Nora Roberts novels. I can keep track of what exactly she's going to quote by keeping track of new additions to the living room bookshelf.

She finishes and looks to me for confirmation. Like a dog dropping a stick before their master's feet for another throw. "I love how descriptive you are."

"I love you too," she says with a grin. "Are they planning anything for you at work?"

I only laugh at this. To imagine either the self-focused kids or the egotistical old men to stop and care for even more than once a second makes me grin. No one in computing cares for anyone except themselves and their work. A rule I've tried to teach someone as empathy centered as Betty time and time again. It's much like showing a dog to be a callous killing machine. If you don't get the lessons in when it's a pup, it will never learn that empathy is your natural enemy.

"I'm serious, Jerry," she looks hurt, "It's so weird to me that they wouldn't get you cupcakes. At least something for your birthday."

"They don't care, Betty," I smirk, "We have work to do. Programmers have to try and present themselves as real workers. If we don't, the heads treat us like replaceable cogs. They get to thinking we're like, burger flippers. Does that make sense?" She responds with a confused, 'no.' "That what we do anyone can do. We have to be like the old steelworkers. Where we have all these techniques and specialties that you can't just train a new guy to do."

"So really anyone can do what you do."

"Not me, but the others very much so. I will enjoy the environment if we have a-a veneer of a normal sort of workplace. I don't even know. Forget it."

"Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced." she's looking at me like she's outsmarted me for once with inane philosophy, "I just said that Mr.Big Brain. Were you even listening?"

"I was enjoying this wonderful meal." I wiped my mouth with a napkin studying her reaction. She beamed like a star entering supernova, as I expected. "Thank you very much, do you mind clearing this off?" I lift up my arms, and she carries away the platter. She struts her way out swinging her hips as she walks as if she was dancing her way to the kitchen. I sit in bed, face greasy and wet with a grim expression on my face. I should clean up, get ready for work, but I'm not sure what time it is precisely. I glance to my side. The digital alarm clock is unplugged from the wall. A level of graceful planning only achieved by someone like Betty. Pushing aside the covers, I let the cold air wafting in from the open window run over my entire body. The uncomfortable warmness of the comforter wavering off.

Groaning as I walk I enter the adjoined bathroom. The tiles are curled in places, the mirror cracked and crooked, the sink stained with a layer of toothpaste residue that no amount of scrubbing will dissipate. Two and a half thousand a month conditions alright.