Mr. Popkin has a Bad Day

Mr. Popkin woke up one morning, the light filtering grayly and groggily through his apartment’s dirty windows. He stretched and shrugged on his robe and slippers and shuffled into his small, cramped kitchen through his small, cramped bedroom, and small, cramped living room. As he made his breakfast of lumpy oatmeal and burnt coffee, he went to feed his cat, Mr. Cuddlesworth, but then he realized Mr. Cuddlesworth had been dead since last November.
Mr. Popkin finished his breakfast then dressed in his scratchy wool suit and headed down to the subway for work. It was an overcast day and the city was already busy. Mr. Popkin was starting to be late for work and began running to the Subway. On the way down the stairs he ran into a hooded punk. The kid crashed into Mr. Popkin’s shoulder and yelled at him before running up the stairs. Mr. Popkin just shrugged it off and continued to the turnstile. Alas, when he went to swipe his MetroCard, he found his wallet was gone. Mr. Popkin shuffled as fast as his little legs would allow to the ticket booth, but as he came to the front of the line the ticketeer closed the window and flipped the OUT TO LUNCH sign. Mr. Popkin pointed to his imitation Rolex watch and pleaded with his wet little eyes, but the ticketeer just pointed to the sign, his mouth full of deli sandwich and Bourbon.  
Mr. Popkin had to run out to the city streets and hailed for a taxi for fifteen minutes before one stopped for him. He climbed into the leather-seated cab that smelled of Indian food and bile. The cabdriver was smoking a cigarette and ignored Mr. Popkin when he made pleasantries. The cab was caught in traffic and Mr. Popkin was thirty minutes late by the time he got to the office. When the cabdriver demanded the fare Mr. Popkin realized that all his money had been in his wallet. He tried to explain this, but the cabdriver didn’t really speak English. Two minutes later, Mr. Popkin was lying facedown in on the wet sidewalk, the cab driving sporadically away.  
He wiped the mud and gravel off his wool suit and hobbled to the skyscraper that held his office. Mr. Popkin worked in accounting on the third floor. When he came to his floor the secretary stopped him before he could get to his office. She was chewing gum and twisting her hair around her manicured finger.
“Mr. Popkin, right?” she asked between chews.
“Yes.” Mr. Popkin was nervous because he thought the secretary was rather cute, in a fried and painted sort of way.
“Mr. Portak wants to talk to you.”
Mr. Portak was the boss. Mr. Popkin entered Mr. Portak’s office shaking a bit, for this was first time he’d been late in eight years. Mr. Portak was a fat, sweaty man too big for the desk he seemed to live behind. He told an increasingly nervous Mr. Popkin that he had been an asset to the company for fifteen years, but the century had turned, blah, blah, blah, in conclusion, we’re letting you go. Mr. Popkin tried to explain that he wouldn’t be able to keep his respectable one room apartment and was saving up for a new cat, but Mr. Portak said it was out of his hands and recommended Mr. Popkin buy some new suits and try the company on Marsh Street.   
Mr. Popkin trudged out of Mr. Portak’s office and stopped in front of the secretary’s desk. She was making a personal phone call, and twisting her hair around finger more voraciously than ever. Mr. Popkin told her he had been fired, but she wasn’t listening and Mr. Popkin wasn’t accustomed to speaking very loudly. Mr. Popkin climbed into the elevator and waved his hand at the secretary at the door closed, but she just rolled her eyes and kept chewing her gum.  He pushed the button to the top floor instead of the bottom one. The elevator stopped at the sixth floor and a businesswoman got on, she was carrying a stack of files and wrapping up a conversation on her Blue Tooth.
“I’m going to kill myself,” Mr. Popkin told her.
“Gawd, I know,” the woman said, “me too.” And continued her conversation.
She got off at the tenth floor and Mr. Popkin continued to the roof alone. When he got on the roof the sky was still gray and the wind had picked up. Mr. Popkin cautiously made his way to the end of the roof and looked over the edge. The cars swarmed like indifferent ants below him, and as he climbed onto the edge of the roof he felt something warm brush against his leg. He looked down to see a yellow striped cat looking back at him with wide green eyes. Mr. Popkin sat on the edge of the roof and began scratching the cat lovingly.
“Everything is full of foolish people,” Mr. Popkin told the cat, “I’m glad there are more than just people in the world.”
The cat purred and curled up by his feet.  
Mr. Popkin took the cat home and named him Noodles. He later got a job at the public library, which he walked to every morning, and never had to wear a wool suit again.