David's heart had been pounding since he'd gotten the message to report to HR.
Three flights up, alone in the elevator. Hands shaking visibly. The feeling of desperately needing to pee. A sense of foreboding. Impending humiliation of an unknown kind.
Not very deep down, he had a horrible feeling he knew just what it might be about. There had been a few occasions he had been surprised from behind in his cubicle, while engaged on his phone in his secret fetish. Scrolling. Findom. Sometimes, sending money to hot women. Hoping for a moment of their attention. His addiction had gotten to the point he could no longer resist indulging at work, while sitting at his desk. He always tried to be discreet. Kept his phone at the correct angle, concealed from the view of anyone approaching from behind. He even wore underwear and pants designed to conceal the engorgement of his small penis as he browsed, or the full erections he got when sending a woman money, or being told to send more.
He prayed that it might be something mundane. A tax issue. A safeguarding training session. "This is nothing to worry about. You're not in trouble."
The elevator doors opened. He rushed out past a blur of unknown colleagues who were chatting together animatedly. He found the bathroom and went to pee, but nothing came, after all that. Pure nerves. Nerves didn't cover it. Terror.
He'd been told the office number. 709. The sign on the door read "Human Resources Director". This was the director he was being sent to? There must be a mistake. He'd never met the HR Director, did not know who it was, or whether it was a man or a woman.
He decided he had to knock, and say he'd been sent here in any case. He could explain and apologise if it was a mistake. He was still trembling a little as he knocked at the door, a swift double-knock, tap tap.
"Come on in."
He pushed the door open, and saw a beautiful, feminine, businesslike, rather intimidating woman sitting behind a large desk. Her auburn hair was down, but behind her shoulders, away from her face.
"It's... it's David..."
"Ah yes, David. Come in and close the door."
David obeyed and stood awkwardly for a moment.
"I... I'm sorry, I don't know your name ma'am."
"You can call me Rose. This is a friendly chat. Have a seat."
"Thank you. Thank you Rose."
David sat in one of the two chairs in front of her desk and tried to remain calm. She looked at him with something that seemed like intrigue, sizing him up perhaps. It did nothing to help his nerves. He was looking down, and caught a glance of her elegant grey high heeled shoes under her desk. After a long pause, she spoke.
"Do you know why I asked you here, David?"
"No... no I don't."
"Oh, I think you might have some idea."
"I... I really don't. If I've done something wrong I'm sorry."
"Well, I'm not sure if you have. But we've had a couple of reports from your colleagues that are a little... concerning."
"Oh... I... what were they?"
"Well, I'll try to summarise. We've had several colleagues say that you spend a lot of time looking at your phone and that you are very distracted and unable to focus on your work. We have had another report of a colleague catching a glimpse of what looked like soft pornography on your phone while you were working. More than one person has used the phrase 'addictive behaviour' to describe you, when we started looking into it. Does that sound like you, David?"
He was dumbstruck for a good minute.
"This conversation is confidential, David. I'm here to help you."
"Well, I... I guess it does sound like that could be me."
"Do you have an addiction, David? Like gambling? Or pornography, perhaps? If you do then you need to talk to someone about it. Whatever it is, it is affecting your work in a way that your colleagues are noticing. It can't go on."
David felt a sickness and a cold fear all over his body. She was so calm, so reasonable, but he felt like he was in a cage, and could not see a way out. Rose was peering at him questioningly. Almost involuntarily, he glanced at her soft grey blouse and caught a hint of the magnificent shape of her breasts.
He could not get the words out that he needed to, and could not think of a way out of the situation he was in.
"Whatever it is, David, you can tell me."
David felt a strange calm descend on him as he looked into Rose's eyes. He found himself speaking, clearly, as though another person had taken over his body.
"I do have an addiction."
"It's good that you've admitted that to yourself David. That's progress. What is it that you are addicted to?"
"It's... it's called Findom."
"Findom?"
"Yes Rose. Have you heard of it?"
"I think so. But you'll have to refresh my memory."
"It's... I can't even explain it. It's a kind of fetish for sending money to women."
"I see. And what do you get for this money?"
"That's it, you get nothing. Just sending them money is its own reward. Its an act of submission. It's a form of submission. Ultimate submission."
Rose looked up at him, and sat up in her chair a little. She was interested. She raised an immaculate eyebrow.
"And you do this on your phone? While you're at work? How does that work?"
"It... mostly through social media. You find women there and then there are payment apps that allow you to send money to them."
Rose crossed her legs. David caught another glimpse of her pretty shoes under the desk.
"How much money are we talking about, David?"
"That depends. Sometimes I send to reimburse something that a woman has bought, sometimes it's just a lump sum, sometimes it's a lot of smaller amounts in succession, if she tells me to send more. That is sometimes called a 'drain'."
"I see. Interesting. Well well well."
David felt nervous again, worried that he had revealed too much.
"What is going to happen to me?"
Rose didn't say anything for a while, just sat pensively for a moment, then stood and walked around her office. David could not help glancing at the smooth line of her skirt and her shapely stockinged legs.
"I'm not going to send you a formal letter today, David. But consider this a warning that you can't do that on your phone in the office. What you do in your own time is your own business, but if you have an addiction that affects your work then you have to try to control it."
"Yes Rose, I understand. Thank you."
"That's OK David. I'm here to help you, and I'll try to help you. I want to have a review with you a week from today to see how you are progressing with controlling your addiction. Then if I can help you in any way, I will."
She sat down again, and crossed her fine legs.
"Thank you Rose. Really. I'm so grateful."