Pippa had worked as a barista for a national chain of coffee shops for the past three years before accepting a promotion to manage the branch in her hometown. She had been a little concerned by the extra responsibilities, but everything seemed to be going well so far and her staff were very supportive of all her efforts. Her only remaining worry now was passing the appraisal review that marked the end of her probation period.

The review consisted of three parts: a mystery shopping exercise carried out at the cafe, anonymous statements from all her staff and finally a formal interview conducted by someone from the corporate head office. The mystery shoppers had apparently already visited and had given both her and the cafe top marks. The interview was set for tomorrow and all but one of the staff statements had been taken. Thanks to her sympathetic regional manager Pippa had already seen the overall rating she'd received from her staff, and it was an almost perfect score.

So, all she needed to do now was hold it together for the interview and she'd be confirmed as manager. Pippa had already booked the afternoon off work so she could do some last-minute preparations and arranged for a friend to carry out a practice interview with her before hopefully getting a good night's sleep.

* * *

Pippa was in a state of shock as she left the interview room. It had started off well, but she had been thrown when the interviewer had revealed that the rating from her staff was only average. Pippa was stunned and couldn't believe it; she'd thought her staff respected and appreciated her. From that point the interview had gone downhill as Pippa was flustered and couldn't concentrate on the questions. In the end she'd been glad when it came to an end and been told to expect a phone call in the next day or so to confirm or otherwise if she'd passed the probation. She wasn't hopeful.

When she got home, she immediately stripped out of her outer clothing and headed to the shower. Not bothering to remove her underwear she stepped under the cooling water and allowed it to wash away her mood. Soon Pippa was feeling somewhat better, and her thought processes began to kick in and she began to analyse what must have happened. She knew most of her staff had given her top marks but clearly the final one hadn't. In fact, if she now only had an average rating then they must have given her the lowest possible score.

Getting out of the shower Pippa dried off and changed into her pyjamas. But sleep wouldn't come as she tossed and turned trying to figure out who had ruined her promotion chances and more importantly, why. She began to doubt herself: Had she done something wrong? Was she really up to the job? Maybe she should just hand in her notice and walk away.

Walking away seemed extreme but Pippa had experienced harassment on her first job. She had been waitressing during the summer months to make some extra cash between her college years. One of the regular staff had taken an instant dislike to her, taking every opportunity to put her down. Pippa had reported it to the shift supervisor, but they hadn't believed her, so she'd reluctantly left. She hoped and prayed that this wasn't a similar situation.

And then in the early hours of the morning Pippa suddenly realised it should be possible to uncover who was responsible for her poor rating by simply checking the staff rotas and seeing who wasn't working the first half of the week when most of the employee statements were taken. Armed with the knowledge of who it was, Pippa could then confront them and discover why. Finally, with a plan of action decided she managed to get a few hours rest.

* * *

The following morning Pippa got into work extra early so she could examine the rotas. It wasn't too hard to eliminate most of the staff from her investigation which left two possibilities: the evening shift supervisor Sharon and Rob the new guy. Pippa got on well with Sharon, but she was a possible candidate to replace her as manager. Rob on the other hand she hardly knew but couldn't think of any reason why he would want to destroy her career prospects. It had to be Sharon Pippa thought and immediately attempted to phone her.

The call went through to an answering machine and that's when Pippa remembered that Sharon was on holiday and had been for the whole week. Which meant that she couldn't have been the one responsible for Pippa's poor rating and it must therefore have been Rob. Why the hell would the new guy trash her so completely, it didn't make any sense to her as he barely knew her.

Pippa checked his personnel file and unfortunately there wasn't a phone number but there was an address, and it was only a couple of blocks away. Determined to confront him as soon as possible, Pippa decided to walk the short distance to his home. It was a fortuitous decision as she saw Rob just leaving his house as she turned the street corner. She quickened her pace and began to catch him up as he made his way to the local park. Just as he reached the edge of the park he glanced back and noticed Pippa approaching him. He smiled in surprise at her.

"You bastard!" Pippa screamed.

And with that she launched herself at Rob. He reacted instinctively by ducking and Pippa sailed over him and rolled down the nearby embankment. She continued tumbling over and over until she reached the bottom and found herself laying beside a pool of think mud. She attempted to stand up but slipped backwards, landing bottom first in the mud. Pippa tried to pull herself out, but it appeared she was temporarily stuck.

Meanwhile Rob had carefully made his way down the embankment and over towards Pippa. She looked up and noticed his bewildered expression although she wasn't sure if that was due her accusation, the unplanned attack, her current state, or a combination of all three.

"What the hell was that about?" Rob asked.

"Your shitty rating which ruined my promotion chances" Pippa stated.

"But I thought I gave you a perfect score. I'm so sorry, I must have screwed up on the paperwork" he replied.

Pippa glared at Rob for a few seconds before she burst out laughing. Her relief was palpable, it seemed her staff did support her after all, and her worries had been baseless. She wanted to jump by and celebrate but of course she was stuck in the mud. And not only stuck but getting damper as the water from the mud was gradually penetrating through her clothing. There was no help for it, she'd have to put her hands and arms into the mud and roll herself over unless Rob was concealing a mobile crane somewhere on his person.

Reaching her arms into the mud it felt cool and giving. She managed to turn on to her front, dirtying her blouse in the process, before pushing up and managing to get herself into a kneeling position. From there it was a simple step to actually stand up in the pool. Looking over at Rob she could see he was trying hard not to laugh at her appearance. She had to admit it must look comical with the bottom half of the body stained with the mud.

It felt good to see Rob smile especially after she'd tried to attack him. It was then that the weirdest thought entered Pippa's head and she couldn't shake it out. As she took the next step she pretended to stumble and threw herself face first into the mud. It was certainly an unusual sensation but not an entirely unpleasant, in fact it was almost like burying herself in a face pack. Then after her brief submergence she lifted her head out of the mud and looked at Rob.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

He reached out a hand and grabbed Pippa's arm and began to pull her to the dry land. She did briefly consider resisting his efforts or even attempting to pull him into the mud alongside her, but the moment passed and Pippa allowed Rob to pull her from the mud. He then escorted her all the way home despite the strange looks they got as they walked down the street. He left her at the doorstep as she went inside to get cleaned up.