Filing Duty

Shuffled back into the ground floor office through the creaking back door, boots leaving damp scuffs across the linoleum. God, it smells of cold ash and damp carpets in here. Perfection. Hauled myself onto the swivel chair behind the steel desk and dumped my takeaway bag next to an overflowing metal ashtray. In front of me sat a dented filing tray stuffed with misfiled requisition chits from three months ago. I leaned forward, squinted through my spectacles, and pulled out one crumpled carbon receipt. Somebody claimed ninety quid for dry cleaning in 2018. Pure fiction. I tossed it straight into the metal wastepaper bin, let out a slow, gravelly wheeze, and kicked my feet onto the desk.