workday

Suspect number one: apparently sweet-natured, talkative. Buck-toothed and almost too innocent-looking for a woman of thirty years.
Suspect number two: soft-spoken, prone to outbursts without warning. history of family violence. Not many close friends.
Suspect number three: twitchy, small, sharp-eyed. Always looking over his shoulder...

She paused, and looked over her shoulder. The bustle continued. As long as her screen was filled with periodically expanding text, nothing was amiss. In reality, she hadn't worked for the best part of this month. She wasn't needed and took advantage of the chaos around her. An island of order and cleanliness in a dust storm. On really quiet days she would take her book and read in the little-used top floor lavatories.

The snapper turtle lurched from his glass-walled office, gurning and screeching. Legs jointed awkwardly to stiff hips and numb feet. Adjacent, the frog sits, sqaulid, dripping stagnant water onto the carpet and upholstery. His throat billows as he calls across the room.

Intent on the screen, glasses slipping down her nose. An escaped lock of hair dances in the breeze from an electric fan. She is motionless in a deserted room, quiet but for the tapping of fingertips against plastic.

Suspect number three is sleepless. He has attributed this to mythical 'nerves'. Pressing his face into the pillow, he breathes erratically and tries to stop thinking.