Job opportunities

She had arrived nearly twenty minutes late and whilst they kept her waiting she had gone over in her mind that morning's disasters.

It had started when on her way out she laddered her tights. She went back changed them then rushed out slamming the door, her handbag still inside the flat. She had woken Mrs Rolly in flat six to borrow her key. Because of the delay she had missed her bus. Then she found that her mobile phone was dead. The tube train stopped in the tunnel for ten minutes and of course as she emerged from the escalator she found she had lost her ticket. She tried explaining what had happened to the ticket inspector her words tumbling out before finally burbling to a stop.

He had stood looking down at her and she found herself thinking, why wasn't he in the Caribbean on a sandy beach by a blue sea, then he grinned at her 'Ok lady' he said 'take it easy' there was a click and she was out, scurrying across the road and into the office building for a frosty welcome.

Afterwards she had sat in a small park opposite, they hadn't even offered her coffee and the only woman on the panel had barely concealed her contempt for her turning up late. She realised a man on another bench was looking at her and decided to go.

On the way back she wondered if that ticket inspector was still at his post.

Three months later she found herself on the underground looking at the back of a newspaper, in large type was the name of the company she had gone to for that job, it had gone bust and the fraud squad were moving in. She thought about that day when everything had gone wrong, then grinned, no everything that day had gone exactly right and tonight she would be cooking a meal for Joseph, the best ticket inspector on the underground…ever…