A Fair Copy

Two years in the same cubicle, and she still doesn't know her coworker's first name. She's never thought to ask what that means. The bulb above her desk has been dying since before she started. Nobody's replaced it. Nobody's supposed to. Monday looked like Tuesday looked like Wednesday. The portrait by the elevator has always been blank. She stopped finding that strange sometime in her first year, the way you stop finding your own furniture strange. 8:53 a.m. Seven minutes from a break that isn't coming. "Ms. Bennett — sorry for the bother. But the boss is here." He's never been anywhere. Not the parties. Not the announcements. Not the frame that should hold his face. As if the position itself was more real than any person who might occupy it. "So?" she says, when the explanation doesn't come. "What is it?" Hayes exhales first. Explains second. That's always been the order. She'll spend one minute deciding this is good news, and the rest of her life finding out it wasn't a decision at all. "He wants to see you."