The Storm We Make

The coiled cable behind her desk had always been a metaphor for us — tangled, impossible to straighten, shocking when you touched it wrong. I stood in her doorway watching her pack her box, the lightning from the storm outside flashing through her blinds like paparazzi.

"You're still taking those?" I pointed at the vitamin supplements on her desk. The bottle was nearly empty.

She laughed, bitter and sharp. "They're supposed to help with stress. Turns out they don't fix sleeping with your boss."

So that was it. Not the merger, not the offshore team, not my failed promotion. Simple, tawdy, human error.

I remembered her hands — how they'd felt when she'd placed her palm against my cheek that night after the company party, both of us drunk on possibility and expensive champagne. We'd gone swimming in the executive pool at 3 AM, clothes abandoned on deck chairs, both of us convinced we could stay above water forever.

"I didn't know," I said, because what else was there to say?

"You didn't want to." She slammed the box on her desk. "We're all swimming in the same tank, Marcus. Some of us just figured out which way is up."

The thunder rattled the windowframe. I thought about how I'd spent three years taking vitamins I didn't need, working toward a promotion that never came, believing in a fairy tale about meritocracy and loyalty. Meanwhile, she'd learned the real rules of the game.

"Where will you go?"

"Startup. They offered me equity. Real equity, not the bullshit kind they give us to keep us docile." She picked up the box, her eyes distant. "You should come too. Once you realize the game is rigged, there's no dignity in playing."

I watched her walk away, the storm inside me finally matching the one outside. The cable behind her desk lay there, still tangled, still waiting for someone brave enough to touch it.

My phone buzzed — another vitamin reminder. I turned it off and started my own box.