Corporate offices turn into liminal spaces after dark. Even with a clock, time froze under the eternal fluorescent—like lab rats under an experiment table. And like a lab rat on a wheel in a cage, I kept spinning in circles over and over again. The work seemed never-ending.
The hand on the clock kept ticking, the files on the computer kept shuffling, and the cleaners trickled out, yet I was nowhere closer to somewhere.
I kept typing, greasy fingers flying over the keys, until the overhead lights suddenly shut off. It was 9 PM. The dazzling glow from the surrounding buildings flooded through the glass panes, lighting the floor like a Christmas display. Except, being alone twenty stories up didn’t feel exciting or powerful; it felt profoundly lonely.
The work wasn’t done, but I was. One last trip to the restroom and I’d be on my way back home. The lights came back on as soon as I stood.
Calling it a “trip” wasn’t an exaggeration. I swiped my badge through the multiple beeping doors and wound my way down the dim corridor. The restroom entrance had two heavy doors—overkill security for a bathroom.
The front had its lights turned off, but the actual washroom’s lights flashed on the moment I walked in. The bubblegum-pink walls and stalls rubbed against the gray cubicles outside; anyone stumbling in here might think they’d fallen down a rabbit hole into Wonderland. The color got your attention, desperately trying to look elegant while begging to be Instagrammable.
“What an odd choice,” I’d once commented to my office manager.
“Don’t ask me,” she’d replied. “I wasn’t here when they picked it. And those motion sensors don’t even recognize me as human after hours.”
Glad I wasn’t the only one who’s treated like an NPC. Maybe you had to dress as a main character to have the lights stay on. Because every ten seconds, the lights would turn off. Anyone who’s had business in a bathroom knows it takes way more than ten seconds.
I waved my arms like a shipwreck survivor signaling a distant plane until the sensors finally noticed me. I made a mental note to send my manager a complaint, with an end-of-day selfie as proof.
The cotton-candy room, with its sparkling mirrors, made a perfect backdrop—except for the smudge on my phone’s camera lens. Eating at your desk is never a good idea, but sometimes there’s no choice. I wiped the lens, only to shift the smudge to the other side.
As I lifted the phone again to try cleaning it properly, something in the picture caught my eye. The smudge moved—left to right, then back again, drifting slowly as if suspended in water. It lingered for what felt like forever before sliding straight through the wall—the camera-ready background shaking through my lens.
When life marches towards nowhere, I tend to retreat from reality. Earlier, I’d stood at the window, staring at the skyline: men huddled in distant conference rooms, figures pacing with phones to their ears, others hunched over desks—just like me.
Now, a weary figure—packing up a laptop, shoulders slumped—pulled me back to reality. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.