Christian A. Camerota

Expectancy was in the air, no doubt about it. It hummed and bounced around between cubicles, volleyed this way and that by the many fans whirring on low, made even the felt on the desk dividers stand on end. Computer screens buzzed louder than usual, static electricity sent shocks through handshakes, held pants against legs in odd places, revealed guts and bosoms and muscular and flabby thighs alike with its cling.

The whispers were audible; the groups around the water coolers larger and more animated, the copiers were hubs of gossip, not facsimiles. Everything was vibrant, though not in color, but more in candor. The undercurrents of guarded conversations wove their way through different departments, up stairwells, down elevators, cruised the information superhighway atop surfboards made of email fiberglass.

Jane, down in accounting, was flushed and waved a memo excitedly, fanning herself. “And just in time, too…” you could hear as you walked by, “We should have all seen it coming.”

Yes, this was no ordinary Monday. Gone were the overly full second and third cups of coffee, bordering on hues of beige, transformed by exorbitant amounts of faux-creamers and sugar substitutes. The bags under everyone’s eyes had, if not disappeared altogether, at least tightened, making their retinas shine under the sterile halogen ceiling lights. Bran muffins sat crumbling by themselves, toast burned in several toasters, slim fast shakes warmed to room temperature. Even David Ettelman’s two apple pies from McDonald’s, which were usually gone before his computer had time to boot, sat congealing and standing guard over his keyboard.

Managers, as a whole, had vanished. This was clearly part of the impetus for the hubbub. Meanwhile, you could see dust enjoying free reign in the sunshine of corner offices, settling on monitors and dancing in the updrafts of central air vents, the edges of paper files fluttering and flirting with one another, inboxes chiming out “new mail” soundtracks.

Eventually, as interests peaked, there began a general movement towards the third floor. Stan “Shuttlecock” Valley (so named due to his #2 status on the world badminton tour) had gathered some intel on the whereabouts of the decisive, last-minute meeting involving all the company’s higher-ups. Since he was the first to know (because he was the first to catch a glimpse of the forwarded message on Tammy Ascot’s desktop), he was also the closest to the conference room’s keyhole. His ear was glued to it like a plunger’s mouth to a drain.

Quite a few others had crowded around Stan at various angles. Constance Wentworth leaned against his back, her chin lowered till it almost touched the top of Stan’s comb-over, her control-top panty hose creating some friction against the pills of his cheap suit’s fabric. Dana Schottmeister was situated facing Stan, kneeling at his level, also forcing her ear towards the keyhole (although Stan’s was, as we’ve established, just not budging) and was craning her next in such a way that it appeared as if she were trying to get Stan to bite her. Gary Craven, famous for his consumption of thirty-six Twinkies in fifteen minutes a few months back, was leaning precariously over Dana’s back, his monstrous frame hanging in the balance. His purple silk shirt strained to hold back his belly, the indent of his belly button visible at the forefront of the mound, and his tie rested on top of the whole mess like a paisley toupee. Perspiration had already gathered in droves on his forehead from the exertion of holding himself thus and, though she didn’t know it, had been dripping onto the back of Dana’s pantsuit to form a little collage of dried sweat.

Danny Davis stood off to one side, feigning relaxation, posing for no one. One hand was slipped into the pocket of his Armani trousers, part of a suit that had cost him an entire month’s paycheck, and the other was holding an expensive looking cell phone to his ear as his yammered something into it to the effect of “Nelson, babe, just take it eeeeeasy. She’s not worth the salt on a margarita. I mean, COOOOOOME OOOOON…”

The ladies from HR all stood off to the other side of the gathering, they being the only ones who had had the foresight to bring along snacks for the festivities. The rims of their Styrofoam cups were stained all different shades of pink from their lipstick and looked to have been assaulted by a feminist paintball team. They were obviously engaged in comparing notes on their respective dates from the past weekend, otherwise why would there have been so much tittering? Deedeee Jacobs could be heard throwing her head back in mock disbelief and crowing, “that Tom is a REAL handful.”

As the minutes passed, more and more people converged on the gathering and added to its astoundingly complex geographical structure. There were heads tucked into armpits, pressed in between sets of hips, peering over bleached coiffures that were gelled up into rigid statements of this or that person’s fashion identity, pasty legs entangled, rings caught on blouses, cell phones set on vibrate going off and producing some splendid looks of surprise on those a little too close, and a dizzying meritage of inexpensive perfumes and colognes and deodorants floating out from the chaos. The whole thing was just slightly orgiastic.

Kent Stoddard put things into perspective for himself with a “well, this is all just too much,” throwing his hands in the air, and disappeared around a corner to manage his fantasy football team.

Tension reached its apex when a startlingly loud bang reverberated through the door of the conference room. A few rookies in the game of office politics instinctually turned away and tried to act as if they were just passing by. Of course, they sheepishly turned back towards the group when a few seconds passed and no manager had come out to chastise them. Everyone began to prod Shuttlecock for information.

“Hey, Stan, whaddya hear?”

“Yeah, Stan, what’s going on in there?”

“Hey, yeah…”

“Yeah, what’s the deal, Stan?”

Stan was visibly annoyed by everyone’s interest, although probably greatly enjoyed the attention he was receiving, and seemed to be concentrating intently on whatever it was that he could not actually hear through the keyhole.

“Quiet,” he hissed, so that Dana Schottmeister shivered from the breathe on her neck.

Things went on like this for the better part of an hour, with a few vagrants and techies coming and going, but with the majority of the group remaining compressed against the double doors like a warm, middle-class quiche. By now, Gary Craven had perspired through both his undershirt and his dress shirt and was working on his dress pants, evidenced by the inverted, heart-shaped sweat stain that stretched across his wide, flat bottom. Cheryl Obermueller stood behind Gary, mostly unnoticed, transfixed by the ever-expanding stain. Her face spoke of her horror and she maintained a respectable distance from the very large, very wet man in front of her, although was really staring hard at his posterior. If you could have removed the two of them and put them against a white backdrop, it would look like Cheryl was watching a reenactment of her own conception taking place on Gary’s rear, such was her utter disgust.

Eventually, about the time the crowd was reconsidering its allegiance to the conference room vigil, the door handle turned downward, poking Stan in the eye. As he recoiled, and everyone else scattered away trying frantically to act casual, Dean Reardon led the solemn managerial progression out of its lair. Those who stood by to look probably noticed the downcast eyes and cold expressions on all the manager’s faces. It had evidently been the most serious of meetings.

“Alright, everyone, back to your desks,” ordered Reardon with a hint of exasperation. “You’ll all be filled in in due time.”

What “due time” meant was anyone’s guess, but clearly no one would dare force the issue, what with the gravity of the situation practically pouring off all the managerial demeanors.

The tension bubble having burst, each department moseyed back to its respective office amidst further whispers and positing. Stan bumbled around the abandoned conference room for a while afterwards, nursing his eye, and running into things. Gary took the long way back to his desk, around past the coffee shop, where he picked up two cheese-filled croissants for good measure, one of which he ate in two bites and chased with a Cherry Cola.

As the vivacity of the morning began to wear off, everyone fell back into his or her daily routines. Printers chirped, pagers buzzed, and phones rang, announcing that business was most definitely getting done. David Ettelman warmed his McDonald’s pies in the office microwave, failing to notice their subsequent explosion and their coating of the inside of the oven with pie filling that might as well have been crazy glue after it dried. David then took the pies back to his desk and burned his mouth not once, but twice in trying to eat them too quickly, and also managed to get what was left of the filling to squirt out the back of pie number two, and lodge itself between the “h” and “j” keys on his keyboard. For the rest of the day, he typed sentences like: “And we’ll need thjat contract righjt away, if we expect to hjave everythjing taken care of before thje meeting tomorrow afternoon. Ok, Jhohjn?” Needless to say, his clients were unimpressed…particularly John Jennings.

Later that day, however, at precisely 2:31 in the PM, around the time everyone’s food comas were kicking into full effect, everyone’s inbox chimed simultaneously. The “You’ve Got Mail” announcement was deafening, for sure, and came in stereo.

To everyone’s great surprise, an all-company meeting had been scheduled for that afternoon. It was of great importance, this much was obvious. No ordinary meeting would include all departments, never mind require such an invasive procedure as the synchronized scheduling of the 4 to 4:30 block of every outlook calendar in the building. Such a thing was unheard of.

So, once again, the undercurrent of conversations flooded the building, conspiracy theories were unveiled, water-coolers were encircled, and MIS, if asked, could probably have told you that somewhere in the neck of six-hundred and fifty emails with the subject line “Meeting?” zipped through the data centers in the basement.

It was one heck of an unproductive afternoon after 2:30, that was for sure, much to the delight of many employees and the chagrin of most managers.

With daily quotas falling by the wayside and attention spans long having been exhausted, 4 o’clock finally arrived.

Conference Room West, the only one with the capacity to hold all the company employees at once, was packed to the brim and hotter than blazes. It looked very much like the page of a “Where’s Waldo?” book, overcrowded with everyone similarly dressed (with slight variances in attire, of course), and Waldo Banterbreen was dead-center, feeling very claustrophobic, and trying to suppress the sensation by playing Tetris on his PDA at a feverish pace.

Because it had taken all day to sort things out and come to a decision, the matter had had an inordinate amount of time to fester and grow to unimaginable proportions and depths in the minds of all the employees. No one could fathom what the announcement might be, much less guess at the penalty for the transgression. Someone simply had to be getting the axe for this.

Dean Reardon finally appeared at the back of the room and made the long walk down the center aisle, his every movement traced by the many flushed-faced attendants. A quiet fell over the crowd, interrupted only by a few awkward coughs and pants-adjustments, and the steadily declining beep-beep-beep-beep-beep of cell-phones being turned silent. Reardon had their attention before he even reached the front of the room.

“Afternoon, everyone,” he began, without waiting for a reply, “thank you all for coming. I’m glad you could make it.” As if this were even an option. “We’ve brought everyone here today for an announcement that is going to affect each and every one of you. I’m assuming you’ve all gathered that the issue is of the utmost importance.”

There were nods of agreement, mostly in the front half of the room, where those employees sat in the hope of being noticed and, thereby, promoted on the basis of their unwavering attention and contagious enthusiasm for speakers at any and all meetings.

“I just want to preface this by saying that we cannot thank you enough for your continued dedication to this company. It is only by and through your efforts that we have reached the heights we are now at. We have come a long way through the years, jumped many hurdles, climbed many mountains,” and suffered through a great many clichés and redundant speeches, was the consensus in the back of the room.

“Again, we want to thank you for everything. But, now…we are at a crossroads.” This statement prompted a ripple to run through the crowd.

“We need to make some decisions that will keep us moving in the right direction. And we are putting one into your hands.” Again, an even larger ripple. What a fantastic event! What a progressive, open-minded decision by management! They had finally realized the importance of their employees’ voice!

“We have realized the importance of our employees’ voice.” It was true!

“And, so, in order to help us make sense of your collective opinion, we will be sending out another email to which we expect each one of you to respond. It will ask you a single question and will require a single response. Based on what we determine to be the voting majority, we will make the appropriate changes. Now, I wish you all the best, have a fantastic afternoon, and when you return to your desks, you should find the matter already waiting for you. Thank you!”

Bidding adieu, Reardon saluted his audience and the room emptied quickly.

No one could contain his or her curiosity.

Though it would be impossible to tell precisely who saw the message first, it can be logically gathered that at least a few people had the foresight to check their inbox through their PDA…and, so, were able to read the news while even still seated in the conference room. Judging by their reactions, the news was quite unexpected.

It went something like this:

“We, here, at _______ understand the importance of our employees having a say in our business. As a result, we have decided to put our future in your hands. Please respond to the following matter as quickly as possible, and we look forward to implementing the necessary changes, pending the results.

_______ is considering a move to 100% recycled paper.

Let us know yea or nay by replying to this email.

Thank you, kindly.”

And that’s when Tim Mann started shooting.