Elias liked order. He loved the quiet hum of his apartment in the moments just before dawn, the predictable click of the thermostat, the gentle weight of his cat, Jasper, sleeping on his feet. His life was a neat stack of well-planned days, and this Tuesday was meant to be the most important one of all. Today, he would present the biggest project of his career.

The first crack in the smooth surface of his morning was silence. A deep, unnerving silence where the cheerful chirping of his alarm clock should have been. Elias’s eyes snapped open. Sunlight, bright and accusatory, streamed through the gap in his curtains. He glanced at the digital clock on his bedside table. The screen was blank. A power cut. His phone, which he had dutifully plugged in beside it, was also dead.

“No, no, no,” he whispered, scrambling out of bed. He found Jasper in the living room, looking annoyed that his breakfast was late. The oven clock confirmed his fear. 7:48 AM. He was supposed to be in the office by 8:30 AM, final presentation notes in hand.

A cold knot of panic tightened in his stomach. He abandoned his usual calming routine—no stretching, no mindful ten minutes with a cup of tea. He raced to the kitchen. He needed coffee, the blacker the better. He filled the kettle, flicked the switch, and nothing happened. The power was still out.

“Fine,” he muttered, his voice tight. “Cold shower it is.”

The water was a brutal shock, stealing his breath and making him shiver violently. He washed in record time, his movements jerky and clumsy. Out of the shower, he grabbed his favorite navy-blue suit, the one that made him feel confident and capable. As he pulled on the trousers, he heard a sickening rip. A long, gaping tear appeared right along the seam of his thigh.

He stared at it, his mind refusing to process the disaster. This was his lucky suit. He didn’t have a backup that was clean. A frantic search through his wardrobe produced a mismatched set of a charcoal grey jacket and trousers that were just a shade too light. He looked like he had gotten dressed in the dark. Which, he supposed, he had.

Dressed but feeling deeply unsettled, he rushed back to the kitchen to grab a granola bar. He took one bite and his tooth screamed in protest. A filling, loose for weeks, had finally given up. A sharp, metallic crunch echoed in his mouth. He spat the mouthful into the bin, a wave of nausea washing over him. The pain was a throbbing, insistent distraction.

“You have to be kidding me,” he said to the empty room. Jasper meowed, winding around his legs, a furry agent of chaos. As Elias turned to leave, he tripped over the cat, sending his leather briefcase flying. It landed with a loud crack, the latch breaking. His carefully organized papers, his presentation notes, his spare pens—all spilled across the floor in a messy heap.

He knelt, his hands shaking as he shoved the papers back inside. There was no time to reorder them. He would just have to hope for the best. He slammed the broken briefcase shut, tucked it under his arm, and ran for the door.

Outside, the world seemed to be conspiring against him. The lift in his building was out of service, forcing him to clatter down five flights of stairs. He burst out onto the street, his breath ragged, and saw his usual bus pulling away from the stop. He sprinted, waving his arms like a madman, but the driver didn't see him.

Defeated, he slumped against the bus shelter. The pain in his tooth was now a pulsing agony. His suit felt strange and ill-fitting. His hair was a mess. He felt a hysterical laugh bubbling in his chest. What else could possibly go wrong?

Just then, his boss, Mr. Henderson, called. Elias fumbled for his resurrected phone, which he had managed to give a five-minute emergency charge using his laptop before leaving.

“Elias! Where are you? The clients are here already.” Mr. Henderson’s voice was sharp, impatient.

“I’m so sorry, sir. My alarm… the power… I’m on my way. I’m just five minutes away,” he lied, his heart hammering against his ribs. He was at least a twenty-minute walk away, and a taxi was nowhere in sight.

“Just get here. Now.” The line went dead.

Elias felt a prickle of tears behind his eyes. He had worked for months on this presentation. He had sacrificed weekends, missed dinners with friends. It was all meant to culminate in this one perfect, successful day. And now, it was all falling apart.

He started walking, a fast, desperate pace. Every step sent a jolt of pain through his tooth. The city felt loud and hostile. Car horns blared. People pushed past him. He felt small and invisible, a mess of a man in a mismatched suit.

He finally stumbled through the revolving doors of his office building at 9:15 AM. He looked a wreck and he knew it. His colleague, Sarah, saw him from the reception desk. Her eyes widened.

“Elias! What happened to you?”

“Don’t ask,” he croaked, his throat dry. He headed straight for the boardroom, bracing himself for the worst. He imagined Mr. Henderson’s furious face, the disappointed looks from the clients. He was ready to be fired.

He pushed open the heavy glass door. The room was full. The clients, a group of serious-looking men and women, sat on one side of the long table. Mr. Henderson stood at the head, his expression unreadable. He saw Elias and his eyebrows shot up.

Elias opened his mouth to apologize, to explain the catastrophic series of events that had led to this moment. But before he could speak, Mr. Henderson smiled. A wide, genuine smile.

“Ah, Elias! There you are. We were just telling our guests from Sterling Corp about the power surge that hit the whole district this morning. It seems it’s knocked out our main servers.”

Elias stood frozen in the doorway, his broken briefcase clutched to his chest.

“The presentation?” he managed to whisper.

“Postponed until tomorrow, of course,” Mr. Henderson said cheerfully. “Can’t very well show them the digital models without a server, can we? In fact, you’ve arrived at the perfect time. We were just about to head out for coffee. You look like you could use one.”

One of the clients, a woman with kind eyes, chuckled. “Looks like you had the same kind of morning we did. Our hotel had a fire alarm go off at five AM. I think the universe is telling us all to take a break today.”

Relief, so potent and overwhelming it almost buckled his knees, washed over Elias. The tight knot of panic in his stomach finally, blessedly, uncoiled. He looked down at his ripped trousers, which he'd hastily tried to pin, at his mismatched suit, and felt the throbbing in his jaw. It was all still wrong. Everything was a mess. But suddenly, it didn't matter so much.

He met Mr. Henderson’s gaze and managed a small, shaky smile of his own. “Yes,” he said, his voice stronger now. “I think I could definitely use a coffee.”