As he left the front door of his office building, he hunched over, stiffened up and admired the cold. In Percy’s mind, the icy weather made arriving home a pleasure, but sadly, no weather would be able to improve tonight. After tightly cocooning himself in his trench coat, he stuffed his left hand in his pocket and ventured outside with the other hand holding his brief case. It took a full ten seconds for Percy to stop swearing about the cold and to focus his energy into ignoring it. Once acclimatised, Percy meandered through the streets, observing shop windows, windows that he had seen thousands of times before, but had always paid extra attention to on Thursdays. It did not matter what the window contained, children’s toys, household items, today Percy would pay them extra attention for he was in no rush, today was the day his mother-in-law comes round. Over time, Percy developed the worst of luck on Thursdays, and, like clockwork something would always happen, delaying him and sadly cause him to arrive thirty minutes before his mother in law leaves. Last week he blamed the trains, he used that one often, it was so easy in London. Tonight’s wonderful lie was the Australian branch of the business he worked at needed to talk to him urgently, and due to time differences he’d have to stay in work till late. He would argue with his boss but in the end he won’t be able to get out of it. Percy had no idea if this lie was factually correct, he had no idea about time differences, but neither did his wife and mother in law, if he thought it was believable, so would they. In reality, instead of this high-powered business call he would be at his desk reading and waiting until it was the right time to leave. The plan would of worked had it not been for the fact that the whole building was evacuated that night, a fire alarm had gone off and they had to check the whole building. The building was out of bounds for quite a while and he knew he had nowhere else to go except home… on time. Percy never told a soul about his Thursday antics, he knew how people worked, how they thought and more importantly how they would react. Percy hated those popular comedians whose entire sets were based on material about their mother in laws. If word got out, he would be seen in the same light, and that upset him. He didn’t want to be seen in this way, It wasn’t his fault things are this way, he actually liked his mother in law, it’s just she hated him.

Joan hadn’t liked Percy from day one; he was only allowed to marry her daughter because he had a good job, an accountant for a wallpaper-printing factory in south London. Born into a penniless family, her upbringing had been extremely tough, so to Joan the importance of wealth in her child’s life was of upmost importance. She hated Percy from the ground up. She thought he was a fool, a weakling, but on the other hand, he earned good money. So, luckily for Percy, his job allowed him to marry the woman he loved, a fact that always amused him, mainly because that wasn’t his job at all, he had lied about his job for years.

Percy actually worked for the secret service. Nothing glamorous, he wasn’t a spy, he worked in the services library. The library was the central hub of all intelligence in the service. It was where all the written files circulated around the service, inevitably came to be archived for future reference. All the secrets, all the intelligence of Her Majesty’s Secret Service, ran through his grey fingers at some point. Everyday he had access to the most valuable knowledge and this was why he got paid so much, and in turn, why his mother in law thought he was an accountant. He had often wanted to tell people. It would have been nice to be regarded as some sort of James Bond character, instead of the man that hung around after work for an hour and a half just to avoid his mother in law.

It was always with that single thought that the secrecy of his job made sense. He lied enough already without pretending to people he is a spy. “I’m a librarian, a very well paid librarian,” he thought, “that’s good enough for me”. As he snapped back into reality, it appeared he’d been stood for some time gazing into a window of a pregnant women’s clothing shop. Unfazed he moved on quickly and decided to stop daydreaming about spies. He picked up his briefcase from between his legs and continued on his way, totally unaware that he’d been followed ever since he’d left work.

As he finished taking the last photograph, Maxwell reached deep into his pocket and clasped onto one of his many lovingly rolled cigarettes. Content with his cigarette of choice, he placed it to his lips, lit it, breathed deeply and exhaled into the cold night’s air. “Well, it seems our boy is a spy, or at least works with them” Maxwell croaked to himself, followed by another long drag on his cigarette. “I’m sure Joan will love to hear about this, especially the fact he’s looking at pregnant women’s clothing”. Apart from being a chain smoker, Maxwell was also a private investigator, previously an ex policeman. Instead of retirement, he decided to become self-employed and help anyone that needed it, as long as the price was right. This turned out usually to be women wanting to see if their husbands were lying to them. In his youth he had been trained in surveillance and taught how to stalk his victims with great care. He had been following Percy for three days now and quite frankly, had been surprised he hadn’t been caught. The irony that he could be spying a spy was not lost on Maxwell, so with this case, he decided to tread lightly.

Today was the last day of his vigilance and was due to check in with Joan any time after she arrived at her daughters. She hired Maxwell to see why Percy was always late, she distrusted him, and in short, she presumed he was cheating. She wanted to know his daily routine, what he did and most importantly, his whereabouts in the evenings. Up to this point, Maxwell thought Percy wasn’t cheating, he was almost sure of that, but after seeing him stare at ladies clothing for so long — especially pregnant woman’s clothing — he was unsure, he’d best report it. The only other discrepancy was in found in Percy’s Job, a wallpaper manufacturer definitely didn’t employ him; he had lied there, but for obvious reasons thought Maxwell. If he works for the secret service, of course he’d lie about his job, the clue was in the employer’s title. Still Percy’s window shopping habits confused Maxwell, “was there more to it?” he thought, he had no idea, but he must report everything he discovered. He stamped his cigarette out onto the floor and popped into a public telephone across the road. As the door closed he noticed the slight temperature shift as he was now shielded from the wind. In his pocket, next to his cigarettes was a beaten up notebook, he grabbed it and his battered wallet and preceded to dial the number Joan had given him four days ago.

As Percy got off the train he was furious about how early he would arrive at home. The coward inside him couldn’t face Joan. He debated visiting his local pub and killing time there, this was ruled out almost as immediately as he thought it, as he decided it’s too close to home. That, and he didn’t have the confidence to enter alone. The idea of him portraying himself as this heroic spy character seemed hilarious to him now, he couldn’t even muster up the confidence to drink by himself. At this point all he could think of was Joan, how she would look at him with such scorn, how he could see in her eyes that she waited for his downfall. He knew she looked for an excuse, anything to encourage her daughter to find a new husband. He wasn’t sure he could handle her tonight, why did the office have to close early? It was pointless, he couldn’t waste time anymore, his plans had fallen flat and he just had to quit his silliness and be a man about the situation. Would his father hide from his mother in law? He thought to himself, of course not. Percy’s father was a genuine man and more of a James Bond figure than he ever could be. It was time he faced his fears. Joan was an old lady, and although she hated him thoroughly, she was at least no physical harm to him. “This is going to be a long night”, he thought to himself. It was times like this when he wished he had a flask of whiskey on him, part for the nerves and part for the cold. Swapping his briefcase from hand to hand, he made his way home, this time avoiding looking into any closed shop windows. Instead he strode in a direct route towards his home, towards his loving wife and his hateful mother in law. “It will be fine, it will be fine,” he repeated constantly to himself under his breath. He finally arrived at his home mentally exhausted. He shuffled up the steps, placed his keys into the front door and took a deep breath. “This is going to be a long night” he thought again whilst twisting the key and entering his house.