What the Hat Remembers

The corporate costume party was her idea. Sarah's idea. Three years ago, when she still believed team building could fix anything. Now I'm standing by the refreshments table, nursing lukewarm champagne, watching my colleagues in various stages of manufactured enthusiasm.

Gary from accounting is wearing a bear costume—full brown fur, plastic snout, everything. He's been nodding off in corners all evening. A metaphor for our department, really: heavy, lumbering, permanently endangered.

"You look like a zombie," a voice says. It's Julie, my rival-since-2019. She's not wrong. I haven't slept properly since the layoffs started. My reflection in the banquet hall mirror shows dark circles, skin pale enough that foundation couldn't hide it. "The walking dead," she adds, almost kindly.

I adjust my fedora. Sarah gave me this hat before she left—promoted to VP in London, as if geography could solve what ailed us. "I'm just tired, Jules."

"We're all tired." Her eyes drift to the coaxial cable snaked across the floor, connecting the CEO's portable PA system to whatever hotel sound equipment they'd rented. She nudges it with her patent leather. "You know this whole setup is held together by metaphorical cables, right? One loose connection and..."

She doesn't finish. She doesn't have to. The quarterly review results drop tomorrow. Everyone knows who's on the block.

Gary-bear lumries past, steals my champagne, downs it. "Bear necessities," he mumbles. The costume's headpiece makes him sound like he's speaking through a wool blanket.

I wonder what Sarah would say if she could see this: her carefully orchestrated team building exercise reduced to staff members in rented costumes, drinking away the pre-execution anxiety. She'd probably quote something about resilience. She always did.

Julie touches my arm. "Whatever happens tomorrow—" she starts, then stops. The unspoken words hang between us: we could be competing for the same survival slot. We should hate each other. We should be gathering ammunition, not camaraderie.

Instead, I find myself straightening her crooked witch's hat. "Whatever happens tomorrow," I echo, "at least we'll have this." The absurdity of it: a bear, two corporate zombies, bad champagne, and a room full of people pretending nothing is wrong.

Gary-bear cheers, spilling champagne on his fur. Some things, at least, are still worth celebrating.