The Last Palm Reading

The air conditioning in the pyramid-shaped office building had been broken for weeks, leaving Maya and the other junior analysts to labor in a suffocating heat that matched their corporate stagnation. She pressed her **palm** against the cool window of the thirty-fifth floor, watching the city below move with purpose while she felt increasingly like a **zombie**—animate, technically alive, but hollowed out by spreadsheets and quarterly projections that meant nothing to anyone.

Her supervisor, Chen, had called another mandatory team building session at 7 PM. Maya's cat, Buster, would be waiting by his empty bowl again, those yellow eyes judging her absence. She'd adopted Buster during the optimistic first month of this job, back when she'd believed in the company's mission statement about "innovating tomorrow's solutions." Now she understood the **pyramid** scheme of corporate America: fresh graduates at the base supporting executives at the apex who'd forgotten what real work felt like.

"Maya, you with us?" Chen's voice cut through her reverie. The team sat in a circle, that terrible HR exercise where you had to share your "authentic self" with people who'd throw you under the bus for a promotion. Her phone buzzed—Buster's automatic feeder had malfunctioned again. She'd installed it when the overtime became endless, another accommodation to a job that consumed everything.

She stood up, the blood rushing back into her legs. "Actually, Chen, I'm not."

The room went quiet. Twenty pairs of eyes, some sympathetic, most calculating how this might affect their standing.

"My cat's alone," she continued, surprised by her steady voice. "And honestly, I'd rather be a zombie in my own life than alive in this pyramid." She gathered her things, her palm still damp from the window condensation, and walked out knowing tomorrow would bring uncertainty but at least it would be real.