4. A Fraud

During the time there, Draven exited his office a few times, but did not glance even once at Eric, who examined the colouring, the design and the storyline of Draven's characters in Cold Shoulder.

Frankly enough, he was unsure whether he was supposed to be honest to him, since what he read was complete garbage. The characters made not a single sense, as if they were running around as chickens with their heads cut off. There were extreme grammar errors that a bunch of sentences needed to be re-written. He even had difficulty reading those paragraphs, since multiple lines were run-on sentences, awkwardly written, or simply did not make at all any sense whatsoever.

He certainly needed a drink, maybe coffee, hence why he deposed his pen and headed towards the elevator. No editors had yet greeted him, and they did not seem to favour him, a few glancing with narrowed eyes in his direction.

He descended to the main floor, and was seconds from marching to the cafeteria when Justin walked by, his briefcase in his palm. They met each other's gaze, and Justin's eyes widened.

"Why are you here?"

Eric shrugged his shoulders, "I'm not sure myself, he came over today and made me come back."

Justin raised an eyebrow, "Seriously? He must really favour you — Draven never rehires people he fired."

"He's making me work on Cold Shoulder—"

Justin's eyes seemed to be seconds from falling from their sockets, "No way! Really? That's exciting, that's his biggest project at the moment. Can't believe he gave that to a newbie. Anyways, I'm in a hurry, I'll come by tonight."

"Sounds great—"

"Eric."

He heard his name being called behind him, and the familiar low voice caused all his muscles to become rigid. Justin had already exited the building, and he turned around to face Draven, who did not seem content.

He raised an eyebrow at him, "What are you doing?" He was holding his phone in his hand, and continuously glanced at it, typing at the same time.

"I was thirsty so I wanted to get something to drink—"

"You could've asked me," he said, "I have a small fridge in my office, you're right next to it so you can use it as much as you'd like."

Eric was surprised, and he nodded his head, "Thanks."

"Yea no problem," he paused for a moment, typing into his phone before finally shoving it into his pocket, "How is the work coming along?"

Eric raised his eyebrows; he couldn't say it was completely garbage, could he?

"I'm almost done the chapter."

"By the end of your shift, you think you'll be done?"

Eric nodded his head, "Definitely."

"Could you come talk to me about it after you're done?"

"Certainly."

Draven smiled, "Alright, let me know if you need any help."

When Eric headed back up the elevator with a can of soda in his palm, and when he reached the floor, he was surprised to find that a few of his co-workers were surrounded around his desk.

He frowned, approaching them and they raised their eyebrows at him, before scurrying to their seats faster than he could speak to them. When he sat at his desk, staring across them strangely, a man that had been walking by for photocopies said, "They wanted to know what the newest project looked like."

It was Jason.

"That makes sense," he replied, reaching for the papers and continuing his reading.

Jason stopped at Eric's desk on his way back, "Where did you work before?"

"I didn't," he said casually, "I used to write short stories for a magazine some time ago but I quit a few months back."

"That's not bad at all," Jason commented, "I used to write for the local newspaper. It was horrible work, I like I better here."

Eric smiled; he was the first to speak to him.

He extended his palm, "My name's Jason by the way. Jason Lorne."

"Eric Valence."

Jason nodded his head, and walked away from his desk,  carrying all the photocopies he needed back to his own desk. Eric sighed stressfully, and continued his look over the chapter. It grew even more horrendous, to the point that he started having a headache and leaned backwards in his seat. By that time, Draven returned to the floor and rushed back to his office, closing the door behind him.

He continuously entered and exited throughout the day, to which everyone seemed accustomed to, by Eric somewhat jumped every time, and he knew Draven was glancing over his shoulder whenever he passed by Eric to see how the work was coming along.

It was his newest project, hence why he was much more protective over its editing.

It was not until five p.m came alone, and many staff members stood from their seats, Jason being one of them. He approached Eric, "I'm about to go out for drinks, you want to join?"

Eric's eyes brightened, "I need to talk to Draven quickly, then I'll head out."

"We're at Bons and Beers," Jason said as he walked towards the elevator, approaching a few of his friends.

That caused Eric to stand to his feet, excited about the invite and pack all his belongings. He was scared of hand Draven what he had done, since he had not written anything on it. It was insanely horrible, that he was afraid of saying it was, hence why he did not correct anything, since he believed in correcting all the mistakes or none of them.

He knocked on Draven's door, and when he heard him respond, he pushed the door open.

Draven raised his eyebrows, "Eric, what's up?"

"I finished your chapter," he handed the drawings back, and when Draven noticed there was not a single correction, he frowned.

"You didn't write anything, was it all good?"

Eric gulped; he could not lie or else he would lose his job. When he did not respond, Draven raised his eyes, meeting his gaze with his piercing blue irises, "Eric?"

"I can't really say," Eric lied, "I'll have to read it again—"

"Then why are you leaving?" he seemed angry, "Read it again right now."

"But sir—"

"You said you'd be done by the end of your shift."

"And I am done."

"By what you're telling me, it doesn't seem like you're done."

Eric inhaled sharply; he had to tell him.

Draven's eyes narrowed even sharper, "I don't know how you worked at other places, but with me you don't lie about finishing your work and you don't leave before you're done the work I hand to you, unless you let me know when you'll complete it. For christ sakes, I pay you. And I don't pay you for bullshit."

"The chapter was trash."

It blurted from his mouth, and Draven's eyes widened when he said that. Suddenly, he slammed the chapter close on his desk and stood to his feet, "What did you say to me?"

Eric stood to his feet as well; he was passionate about writing, but he never assumed Draven did not even know how to write and his editors did it all for him, "I said the chapter was trash."

"Who do you think you're talking to?"

"It was complete garbage. For one, the grammar was horrifying. You missed up the smallest thing like there their and they're, and some characters spoke as if they never passed grade three, which was detrimental to the entire chapter." He reached for the booklet, and opened it to page nine, pointing to a sentence, "He raced. He jumped, he smiled and he cried. What the hell does that even mean?"

"Eric you better—"

"And even more, you can't even draw. The characters look like snakes, some look like pigs. The whole chapter seemed to have been written by a fifth grader, and I even think a child could do better work than this. You take full credits from your editors, don't you?"

Draven scowled, but did not say anything.

Eric shook his head with a scoff, "You're an inspiration to me, but I never thought you'd be this much of a fraud."

There was a short silence; Draven was fuming, his vessels flowing with venom as he stepped around his desk, coming close to Eric intimidatingly; Eric squeezed his eyes shut, having noticed Draven's hands clench into fists. Then, after a moment, he heard Draven speaking on the phone.

"Yes, come in."

The secretary entered the office, and handed Eric a badge. He examined it; it had his last name and first name, and a number.

Draven sat down at his desk, "The chapter I gave you was a fake. If people aren't willing to tell me the truth about my work, then I cannot trust them to work with me. That could cost me my job. Hence why, you passed."

Eric raised an eyebrow, "What?"

"This chapter was purposely made to have multiple mistakes in a range of different ways. I only wanted to see if the editor was honest enough to tell me about it, or simply correct a few and say it was overall good, which would of lead me to fire them immediately. You would be surprised how many failed."

Actually, Eric was not surprised, since Draven was an intimidating man.

He smiled, "Welcome to the team."