11:34

[CW: Death, exploration of grief and mental health]

“Who’s on rotation today?” I asked.

Martha’s head popped up above the cubicle in front of me, halfway through her midday snack. She took another bite and said, “Kristoff, I think.”

I glanced toward the closed door separating our room from the other team. They worked past them, but there was no way to see inside from here. Not that I planned on going there anyway, not on my own.

Without a second’s hesitation, Martha dumped the rest of her tuna-and-mayo sandwich onto my desk, sending crumbs across my keyboard. Most of the mayonnaise landed on her side, a scene no different from a multiple collision on M-25. My wristwatch, of course, an innocent bystander caught in it by being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I wiped the mess from the watch face with my sleeve, making sure the new cufflinks Martha gave me for my promotion did not scratch the glass. I rubbed and rubbed, my eyes slowly settling on the hands. Those little hands… they seemed to tick louder the longer I stared at them.

The hands reached 11:20. I had only fifteen minutes before the end of my break.

Maybe I could bump into him by the front desk. No. Too rash. Maybe after work. One minute. One minute could change an entire day. Maybe tomorrow.

My fingers tightened around the edge of the desk. I took a breath, then another. My brain called my lungs for help, but they had no signal to pick up the phone.

Breathe, Sarah. Breathe.

I almost forgot how. By the time I realised I’d zoned out again, another minute had disappeared. 11:21.

Paralysis by analysis, they called it. Fittingly so.

I blinked rapidly, gave myself a quick shake—anything to ground myself. I turned back and reached for her shoulder.

“Sorry. You were saying? Today has been—”

The gentlest kick, barely a kick at all, really, was all it took. Martha… well, marthaed. There she went, despite my best attempt to stop her, drifting across the floor, wheels threatening to smoke as she headed for the lift.

One blink and I would have missed it. Head low and phone in hand, she kept texting someone as she spun in the chair. Her thumbs typing faster than the wheels turned. Every tap closed the gap between her and the lift. She leaned into the turn just centimetres short of the doors. Then, the chair’s back slammed into them, its rear support absorbing most of the impact.

The Morale Board, hanging by the entrance, rattled. But, just like Martha, everything pinned to the board managed to stay put: the costume-party pictures, the bold notice reminding staff they were “encouraged to participate,” Martha’s infamous list of things not to do during official meetings, and, of course, the post-it note collage, covered in thumbs-up and silly faces.

Oddly enough, the only piece that kept trembling was that picture of me from 2023.

“HEY, KRISTOFF.” Her voice bounced off the walls, across the floor and into the building across from us. “YOU IN TODAY?”

Every cubicle on the floor spawned heads, and all chattering came to a halt. Not a soul around me could resist looking. They glanced at her and then at me, and then back at her.

I let my head fall onto my desk, avoiding eye contact with everyone, pretending to make sure nothing toppled off my station. No one said a thing. Not a single word. The sudden silence… it lingered longer than I wished it would.

Martha skidded to a stop beside me as, one by one, everyone went back to their conversations.

She grabbed her belongings—sorry, belonging, singular—from my desk, then moved closer and whispered in my ear.

“Kristoff’s not in. His tag’s at the front desk.”

“Weird. I saw him this morning grabbing coffee.”

Her tongue clicked, followed by a sharp breath through her teeth. It was subtle, but not subtle enough.

“Oh, is that so?” Her eyebrows rose as she brought a hand to her chest, tilting her head slightly to the right. “Have you been… you know…”

“No.”

Mid-conversation, two white coats walked past the entrance, clipboards tucked under one arm and fountain pens in their chest pockets that never seemed to stain their clothes. Martha’s eyes widened. The corners of her mouth tightened as she glanced at them, then back at me.

Martha gasped. “Sarah, you think—”

“I hope not.”

“Yeah. Me, too.”

One death already. We hadn’t made it to lunch yet.

Scribbling on paper. The clicking of pens from the halls. I knew it was all procedure, but it felt cold, too clinical.

Martha noticed how I stared down the hall. And I noticed her looking at me.

Her hands became the unstoppable force no thirty-two years of life could have prepared you for. They danced around my desk, tidying everything in their path. Each pencil went back in the drawer with utmost precision, almost as if this were her own station and she knew exactly which pen I preferred. She grabbed my senior ID tag and wiped it until it sparkled. I hadn’t even noticed it had been caught in the crossfire. Resisting was not an option.

“Thanks,” I mouthed.

She winked at me.

“Listen up. It’s 11:30.” She stood, addressing everyone in the room. “I want everyone online and ready to go before 11:35.”

No more plastic forks snapping over overheated meals or low-voiced conversations. Break time was officially over.

“Sarah?”

“Huh?”

She adjusted her manager ID tag, then, with a reassuring smile, looked at me and said, “Don’t forget to breathe.”

I leaned back in my chair and followed her advice. Then I took one big stretch—the kind you only see in yoga routines online or on some high-tech gym LED screen. One vertebra cracked. Then another. By the time the chair couldn’t recline further, every little bone whose name I couldn’t remember from high school biology had introduced itself.

Back in a what-human-looks-like position, I stared at the black screens in front of me.

Kristoff…

Like a personal sun, my phone felt like it was burning a hole through my pocket. I pulled it out, my eyes hovering over his name.

I heard about this morning. If you need to talk, I’m here.

Too much. Delete.

Coffee when you’re free?

I stared at it. Too casual. Or maybe not casual enough. How could I know?

Delete again.

No matter what I wrote, I couldn’t find the right words. Maybe it was better to leave him alone. Give him some space to decompress. After all, that was our job. I knew what it was like, having someone die on you over the phone. Not many people know what that’s like. A few seconds and it’s over.

Maybe it brought us closer, as it should. Well, no. Not really. We knew what it was like. We shared an uncommon language. That’s enough, I guess.

Eventually, I gave up and put my phone down beside the keyboard. Something didn’t sit right with me. Maybe Martha was rubbing off on me. Just maybe.

I looked at the clock one last time. 11:34. Then I circled back to my phone.

The stupid phone was in my hands again, as if the opposite of paralysis by analysis had taken over my control. I typed the first thing that came to mind. My thumb floated over the send button, as if gravity had decided to work backwards for once, pulling it away from the screen.

I hit send.

I put the phone back in my pocket and ignored what I’d just done. Then, with a slight tap, I turned on the screens and readjusted my headset, ready to take the first call.

USERNAME: Sarah Williams

PASSWORD: *******

02/03/2031 11:35

The first alert came in, blaring through my headset loud enough to make me jump. I opened the line.

“1-1-2, what’s your emergency?”

My phone vibrated in my pocket. There was only one possible message coming through, wasn’t there? It made me smile.

One minute. One minute can change an entire day.