Rufus lent back in his chair, but not so far back to make it tip over, and watched his computer screen. He’d set his mouse to slowly scroll down the screen and now a list of job vacancies was rolling past his eyes.

Job-Search-dot-Com had become one of his favourite websites, every free moment he had at work (which was getting more and more frequent) he’d search through it. Today, it was only ten-thirty and he was already searching it. Tucked away in his cubicle he could view whatever website he wanted to, most of his colleagues went onto porn or social-networking sites, but he always went to job recruitment sites.

Rufus hated his job, endlessly putting together leaflets and email-newsletters for different mail-shots, he could do it in his sleep. He’d be given the text and images, and then left alone to create the required leaflets or whatever. Occasionally his supervisor, the Wonder-Geek Austin, would look in on him to ask if “everything’s all right?” but mostly he was left alone.

He hated his cubicle, one of many arranged like animal cages in long rows across the large office floor. Its walls were cheap screens, just clipped together, so flimsy you couldn’t even pin a picture on them. The only furniture in it was a desk and a chair, nothing else was allowed. They weren’t allowed any personal items in there, no pictures or mugs or planets or anything. The argument was that they would be a distraction, but Rufus felt it was a way to make sure no one got comfortable at work.

Employees were discouraged from hanging out in each other’s cubicles, the excuse was that it would be a distraction but Rufus didn’t believe them. The rule was closely enforced by supervisors like Austin. The only place people could socialise in that office was the staff room, which Rufus hated. The room was tiny, barely a dozen people could fit in it and half of it was taken up with the tatty kitchenette used to make coffee and tea. He rarely went in there, therefore Rufus hardly spoke to any of his colleagues, none of them he could call work-friends.

This wasn’t where he imagined himself when he graduated university, seven years ago now. After his art and design degree he’d imagined himself with a glittering career designing for advertising or television or something. The reality was far harder, he wasn’t alone competing for the handful of decent design jobs available, and most of the people he was up against were far more talented than him.

He'd drifted from one job to next, most of them temporary or dead-end. He’d ended up in this job three years ago. At first he’d been glad of the regular income, the chance to finally work on his own portfolio, but repeatedly the tedium of this job dragged him down. After three years here he now hated every day he had to come to work. He wanted free of this cubicle-slave job that was draining his very creativity.

Soon Rufus had found four jobs on Job-Search-dot-Com that both interested him but also he was qualified for. Now was the difficult part, should he apply for these jobs or should he stay here? Using this web site, all he had to do was uploaded his CV (and he had an updated version there on his work computer) to apply for all those jobs. It was so easy and yet so difficult.

The thing was, if he was offered any of these jobs, he’d have to pass a medical examination, and he knew that wasn’t possible. Part of that medical examination would be a drugs test, and he’d never pass one of them.

He only took those drugs to relieve the monotony of work. Before he'd started this job he’d only taken drugs at the weekend, the occasional recreational E or K, as a way to relax and party. As the tedium of this job began to wear him down so his drug use slowly began to rise. At first it had just been one or two spliffs during the week, just to help him relax in the evening, as a way to unwind when he got home. Soon it was three or four spliffs a week. After a year in this job, it was at least one spliff a night (sometimes even two spliffs in an evening) and he couldn’t enjoy a Friday or Saturday night out clubbing unless he was off his face on E or K or GHB or something, plus the couple of downers or uppers the next day to help him recover.

It was when he started to look for another job that it hit him. To get a new job he’d have to pass a drugs test, but he couldn’t pass one because of all the drugs he took, he couldn’t stop taking the drugs because they were the few things that helped him to survive the tedium of his job. He was trapped.

In his darkest moments he worried he was becoming an addict, but he could reason himself out of that. He only took the drugs to survive his job, he wasn't dependant on them or anything.

The hardest part of it all was that he hadn’t drawn anything, for himself or his portfolio, in nearly a year. If he drew anything it was only at work and usually on the graphics application on his computer. He reasoned it was because of the soul destroying monotony of his job, but in those black moments he did wonder if his loss of creativity was due to all the drugs he took.

The second job, on top Job-Search-dot-Com, looked so inviting, it was the kind of job he’d been hoping to find for so long. Could he risk applying for it? How would he fake a negative drugs test? Could he ever escape here?

He lent back as far as he could on his cheap chair. God he wanted a spliff, but in their strict no smoking building there was nowhere to have a quick smoke, even if he ever had the courage to bring one to work – which he didn’t.