“I have tested positive for Corvid-19.” I watched her face as I spoke.

“Covid-19. Just call it Corona.” She didn’t even bat an eye.

“I think I heard the doctor correctly. It was muffled from the face mask. It seemed a bit extreme, if I’m being honest.” She just kept on tapping.

“It is safer to wear a mask if he is likely to come in contact with infected people. Which you are not.” She squinted menacingly at me. “If you were. Which, again, you are not; you wouldn’t come in to work to risk making me sick.”

I sneezed, cupping my hands over my mouth.

“God damn it! Into your sleeve!” She stood up and began squirting hand sanitizer across my desk frantically.

“This damned Corvid-19!” I dodged her sprays of gelatinous alcohol goop. “Stop! It’s on my bear claw!”

She stopped reluctantly. “It is Covid not Corvid.”

“It must have been that fucking mask he had on. Again. Unnecessary.” I stated at my bear claw miserably.

“A sheet of paper over his mouth muffled his words that badly?” She made that face she makes when she thinks she has caught me.

“Paper? No. It wasn’t made out of paper. Not even paper maché.” I toyed with the idea of eating the bear claw anyway. I could wipe it off.

“Do not think about still eating the bear claw. You can have mine. What kind of mask was it?” She set the white bag with the delicious pastry on my side of the desk.

“You don’t want your bear claw because you are afraid you will catch the Corvid. Admit it.” I looked at the bag hungrily.

“I don’t want the bear claw because my pants require assistance over my ass. My fupa is straining the zipper.” She patted her belly.

“I don’t think a baby bump can be called a fupa.” I didn’t move towards the bag. Wanted to. But did not. Point for me.

“I am not the one that is pregnant. I just have to eat every time she gets hungry. She is eating for two. I’m just a pig. What was the mask?” She was watching the bag too.

I wondered how long she was giving me before she snatched it back. “It was one of those that covers the bottom of the face. With straps that go around the back of the head.”

“A face mask. That’s what I said. It’s paper.” She dared me to disagree.

I did. “It was certainly not paper. If it were, he would have bit right through the ball part.”

Her jaw dropped. “The doctor had a ball gag?”

I nodded.

“I sincerely doubt the veracity of a doctor with a ball gag.” She snatched the bag.

“Sexual proclivity does not preclude one from being a doctor. And I thought you were woke.” I grimaced even saying the word.

“What does that even mean?” She bit the bear claw and I felt her malice tear through the delicacy.

“I don’t know. But he said Corvid-19. I’m sure.” I watched her slowly chew. My stomach grumbled. I reassessed the one on my desk.

She got up and grabbed the ruined bear claw and threw it away. I groaned in protest but her glare cut it off. “Were you at bondage night?”

I nodded, feeling surly.

“Were you in your Plague Doctor mask?” She raised an eyebrow like a hard boiled detective.

“There is a plague going around. Duh.” I said smugly.

“The one that looks like a crow?” I felt her building up to something.

I was ecstatic but keeping my face straight. I nodded again.

“Was this all an elaborate ploy to make a pun about corvids, the crow and raven family of birds and the Covid-19 virus?” She sounded less impressed than I expected.

I shrugged my shoulders dejectedly.

“I am glad I ruined your bear claw.” She chomped into hers fiercely.

“Petty ass.” I dialed up the hurt.

She didn’t care. I got up and grabbed her coffee cup and mine and went to the breakroom with my shoulders hunched. The boss came in with his mug right before me and I stood and waited for him to pour his.

He looked at me as he let the sugar pour into his mug. “You okay? You look a little dejected, Mike.”

I sighed and listened as common sense screamed to be quiet. “Turns out I have Corvid-19.”

I watched his mug fall to the floor and shatter. I shrugged and looked around the now empty room. I made Mona her tea and poured my coffee with a self satisfied smile making my cheeks hurt. I heard the people talking in panicked tones down the hall. I felt better, a spring to my step as I went back to my desk.

Mona smiled as I set her tea down. “Thank you. Sorry about the bear claw. I kind of freaked. You look like the cat that ate the canary. What happened?”

“You’ll see,” I said, cheeks still hurting.

That was when the email notifications began to chime. A sudden onslaught. Mona looked down and I saw her lips moving as she read. Then she glared at me over her monitor.

“Ball gag or not, he was a licensed professional.”