When Sammy woke, he was still in his office. A pounding headache greeted him and he had barely any feeling in his appendages. He quickly gained recollection of his past memories, and Sammy scrambled to hide any evidence that he had been drinking. He had to do so quickly and efficiently, because it occurred to him that there was a large window into his office; anybody who happened to look in the direction of Sammy's office would see that he was in a panic. Attempting to act in a calm and orderly manner, Sammy placed his empty bottles in the bottom drawer of his desk, where he found them.
He walked to the door to his office, only to find that he couldn't get out; there was too much ink flooding his doorstep. The ink would ruin his new and expensive shoes. Sammy groaned and clutched the side of his head. There was still acute pain in his forehead, making him want to avoid all bright lights. At the same time, he was hungry for the greasiest substance he could find and wanted to spill out the contents of his stomach. Sammy crawled under his desk and turned off all the lights- though the huge window still brought light in from the outside. He hoped to sleep some more and let the effects of the hangover take their course, but it was clear that Sammy was done sleeping. His body was wide awake and though not feeling its best, functioning. That was usually good enough for him.
A few moments passed, and Sammy spilled the contents of his stomach out onto his new shoes. So much for not wanting them to get ruined. They weren't really expensive, though; Sammy bought them at the thrift store and transformed them with shoe polish.He sighed and curled up as comfortably as he could. Perhaps he could force himself to sleep.
"Mr. Lawrence, I've got to- whoa!"
Sammy looked to the source of the noise- Wally Franks. He should have recognized that (definitely fake) New York accent. If he weren't in the middle of the worst hangover he'd ever had, Sammy would probably be angry. Instead, he tried to act casual, as if he hadn't just crawled out from underneath his desk in order to avoid bright lights.
"What is it, Wally?"
"I was coming into your office to tell you that we can't get out! Then I step in your puddle here, and you've got the same problem!"
Sammy muttered something under his breath before finally speaking. "I can't get out of the office, Wally. You should clean it up. You are the janitor, after all."
Wally sucked in a breath, as if to bear bad news. "You see, boss, I would, but I kind of lost my keys."
"Again? Next time you lose your keys, it's a write up. But this time, just take mine." He grabbed the spare keys he kept for the janitor's closet and tossed them in Wally's direction. His generosity was definitely brought about by the intense pain.
Wally unlocked the janitor's closet, and pulled out every supply he had. Unfortunately, Sillyvision did not put too much thought into their janitorial equipment, and all the janitor was able to pull out of his closet was a mop and a bucket full of dirty, stagnant water.
"Sorry, boss," Wally called through the window in his obnoxiously loud voice, which made Sammy's headache worse. "It's not gonna be enough."
"I can see that, Wally. How about we get Joey on the phone, then?"
He made a saluting gesture with his hand. "Aye aye, captain!"
Wally marched off to go find a phone, while Sammy dug through his drawers for pain medication. This headache was enough to drive him insane. He found some interesting contents just sitting around in his desk- a stress ball shaped like a human heart, a slide whistle he took from a band member during a staff meeting, and a blank CD. That's when he finally found a bottle of pain medication. They were just a day away from their expiration date and Sammy was surprised to find his pain medication completely full. He took almost half the bottle before finally deciding that he couldn't swallow any more without some sort of liquid. By the time his search and retrieve was over, Wally had returned.
"Ok, so Mr. Drew is doing what he can. He says that he's gonna send some people from upstairs to fix the ink machine?" Wally said the final three words quietly, as if it was a taboo subject- which, at Sillyvision, it was. People knew about the ink machine and how Mr. Drew installed it for seemingly no reason. Nobody liked to go near it, not even the mechanics specifically hired to make sure it was in proper working order. Sammy nodded.
"Hmm. It seems that we always have to suffer for Joey's mistakes. Why is that?"
"I don't know, but the guy sure is weird. Whenever I'm upstairs, just sweeping up in his office, I see things. Weird things."
Though Sammy did not believe most of Wally's whimsical tales of things he found while sweeping up, he couldn't deny that he was intrigued. "Alright, I'll bite. What did you find?"
"Well, I don't really know what it was. I saw this huge book on his desk called 'The Illusion Of Living'. It was written by him!"
"Joey never mentioned writing a book to me," Sammy said to himself, suddenly feeling betrayed. "The Illusion Of Living?"
"Yessir, that's definitely what it was called. I lifted up the cover just a tiny bit to see what was inside, and all I saw were these scribbles all over the page. Like he was trying to cover something up."
While Wally could have just been playing a practical joke on Sammy because he was known for being gullible, Sammy knew he wasn't all that clever. Sammy would know if Wally was lying to him. He knew he wasn't. Now, Sammy was at a fork in the road. He knew his longtime friend and boss well; Joey wouldn't become secretive like this if he was planning something bigger. However, he did have to admit that Joey was a little eccentric. Sometimes he said things that didn't make any sense. He had these voices in his head that he would tell Sammy about. They all had different personalities and would often make Joey act as if he was bipolar. It definitely was not easy to be friends with Joey Drew.
"I'm gonna go see if the stairwell is cleared out," Wally said, trying to get away from the awkward silence Sammy created while in deep thought.
As the pain medication began to take its effect, Sammy began to rethink his relationship to Joey.