Page 1 of Revenge Brunch and Other Disasters

Chapter One: The Day It All Went to Hell (and Stayed There)

Linda

IT WAS A Monday. That was the nicest thing Linda could say about it—and that should’ve been the first red flag.

Linda kicked open her apartment door like it had personally insulted her eyeliner.

She stood in the middle of her bedroom, glaring at the enemy: her brand-new, overpriced, allegedly “smart” alarm clock. The sleek, modern traitor sat there on her nightstand, smug and silent, as if it hadn’t just ruined her life.

Smirking in LED.

“Fifty dollars and you can sync to a satellite, track lunar phases, and monitor my heart rate—but you can’tdo the one thingI bought you for?!”

She tried to drag a hand through her highlighted, brown hair, completely forgetting it was in a bun. Ended up with her hand half trapped and yanking the bun three-fourths out. She snarled with frustrated drama and stomped toward the alarm clock, finger raised like a righteous god of vengeance and let loose.

“Oh, you wanna play games? Fine.”

She jabbed it. “You.You, are on THIN. ICE. Yourmotherwas a snow blower,” Linda growled. “Yourfatherwas so stupid they didn’t even use his processor in a toddler’s toy calculator.”

The clock blinked 6:33.

“Don’t you ‘6:33’ me.” Her voice rose to a dangerous pitch. “Your insides are so cheap, if I tried to sell them for parts, they’d askmefor money to coverdisposal fees.”

She crouched closer, face inches from the glowing screen. Brown eyes narrowed.

“One more chance. That’s it.One.Either you get it together, or I melt you down and turn you into a spoon rest. And not even agoodone. One that lives in the back of the drawer with the dead batteries and sticky pennies. You hear me?!”

The clock remained still.

Too still.

Plotting.

Linda narrowed her eyes. “I’m watching you.” She sighed, flopped onto her bed, and groaned into the pillow. Maybe this is what happens when you try to build a life that runs on predictability. You get stabbed in the back by a piece of tech with a smug digital face.

The clock blinked.

Menacingly.

This wasn’t over.

Linda decided the thing was demonic. It had worked perfectly for a month, pretending to be helpful, getting her up on time, blinking its little digits like it wasn’t plotting betrayal. But today? Today it had slept in. Just likeshehad.

She woke to full sunlight and dread in her bones —the kind that whispered, “you’ve already screwed it up.” The numbers had glared back at her: 7:18 a.m.

Her interview for the promotion to Administrative Team Manager? A role she’d been working towards for 4 years, practically since she started there. A role that would give her a sense of accomplishment and put her in the next phase of her career—was at 8. Thus began the disaster spiral.

Jam on her only white silk blouse—of course. Locked out of her car at the gas station, because irony is avindictive little gremlin. Tore her last pair of pantyhose, crawling under it like a raccoon with a briefcase to find the spare key. And just when she thought it couldn’t get worse?

Classic.

Meet.

Disaster.

She’d collided with the most infuriating man on Earth, Mr. Arrogant from Accounts.

Arrogant. Smug. Tall. Perfectly combed blond hair and intense blue eyes. Obnoxiously good-looking in a way that made her deeply suspicious. Probably thought irony was for poor people.

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