Title Goes Here

Just another long, low night in the office. Must be what, thirty IBM Selectrics in here? And all of them that ugly, light grey. Thirty light-grey typewriters on thirty dark-grey metal single-pedestal desks. Seven rows of ‘em, four deep. Plus the two double-pedestals at the back of the room, that one over there and this one over here.

To the untrained eye, this one rules over this half of the room and the other one has the other half, but that ain’t the way it is. That one is middle management. This one is the boss of the whole outfit. That’s why it’s closer to the door. This desk bein’ the same size is just a way for her to prove she’s no more important than anyone else in the company. Solidarity and all that. Well, at least solidarity with that desk over there. Doesn’t say much for the twenty-eight little ones up here in the front.

Perceptions are a funny thing, especially startin’ with self-perceptions. I mean, what you think of yourself, that kind’a radiates out to what you think of everybody else. It goes to pecking order and perceived threats and everything else.

Just for example, she thinks she’s showing everybody what a trooper she is, hangin’ out with the little guy and all that. But what she thinks of herself doesn’t say anything about what the guys in the glass office over there in the corner think of her. I mean, it ain’t like they’d just fire her for being annoying. Not these real he-men in the corner office with their patent-leather Guccis and their manicured nails. That’s why they played to her solidarity thing, you know, to get her out of the office and out here on the floor with the others.

What she thinks of herself doesn’t say anything about how she is at home either. I mean, can you imagine havin’ to live with some really ball-bustin’ chick twenty-four seven? I’m sure the guy’s glad she works, but even that maybe ain’t enough I guess. I mean, who am I to judge? Her bein’ gone a few hours a day wouldn’t be enough for me. But then I wouldn’t get mixed up with a power-trippin’ head case like that anyway.

Anyway, I’m glad I ain’t here during the day. All that clattering all the time on the typewriters, don’t know that I could handle it. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I could do what they do, easy. I mean I could do what one guy does at one desk. Maybe that’s the trick. Maybe if you’re sittin’ at your own little single-pedestal just hammerin’ away on the keyboard, writin’ stories for this stupid little supermarket tabloid, maybe you don’t notice the racket from all the other machines.

Still, there’s somethin’ comforting about the sound of those little letters on metal arms hitting the paper. Well, it used to be letters on metal arms. Made a sound kind’a like a thwup. You know what I mean if you’ve got any age on you at all.

Nowadays all the typewriters have one’a them little ball dealies, and it’s got all the letters and numbers and the hyphen and the quotation marks and all that on it too. I heard they make ‘em in different languages or with science or math things on ‘em too, so you just buy whatever balls you need for the kind of typin’ you’re gonna be doing the most of. (Yeah, I know. I heard that, but that ain’t the way I meant it.)

Anyhow, the way it works, when you type somethin’ that little ball spins around to the letter or number or whatever you typed and smacks the paper. It ain’t quite the same sound as the sound made by those little metal arms hittin’ the paper on an old manual like a Remington or a Royal or an Underwood, but it’s close.

I took typin’ in high school for two years. Won’t go into why it was for two years, but let’s just say the teacher was really young and good looking and she used to sit on the front of her desk a lot and I was fifteen. Anyway, first part of the first year we had manual typewriters, but then the school district got some extra money and we got the very first IBM Selectrics. The keys moved easy under your fingers, but like I say it wasn’t quite the same when it come to that little ball smackin’ the paper. I always felt like I ought’a double check to make sure it hit hard enough to drive the assignment through the carbon paper.

Man that rain on the windows there, that’s kind of a comfortin’ sound, ain’t it? Night like this with no moon, the rain comin’ down like that, we could be down on the first floor as easily as up here on the twenty-ninth. Can’t imagine why anyone would want to work this high up every day. I guess in big business the higher you are in the building the more important you are or something, but I don’t get it. Maybe it’s so if the whole thing comes down the more important people will land on top of the less important people. Wonder if they’re thinkin’ that on the way down.

Well, I said the rain is kind’a comfortin’ on the windows, but when the wind gusts and it comes in sideways like that, not so much. You happen to be lookin’ when that happens, the rain comin’ in straight from the side like that, it causes some’a that sideways vertigo stuff. Feels like the building’s movin’ a little.

I’ll tell you, that’s not somethin’ I like to think about, a sixty-some story building swaying in the breeze, though I’ve heard tell they do. Heard tell they’re made that way so they sway and don’t break. Tell you one thing, if I was in on that plannin’ meeting I might’a suggested they make ‘em strong enough not to sway or break either one. I imagine somebody must’a suggested that, or asked why they couldn’t do that or somethin’. Guy’s probably workin’ as a janitor now.

I mean, you can do that. You don’t believe me, go get yourself a steel rod about one inch through the middle and try to bend it. And yeah, I know you could supposedly bend it if it was long enough, but these buildings ain’t put up on one-inch steel either. Anyhow, I suspect any kind of reasoning might make too much sense for those guys to get it. If it was that easy to figure out they wouldn’t need all the meetings and they might have to actually do a job of work.

Now these guys who work here, even up here on the twenty-ninth floor, they work. I’ve been by here a time or two in the day goin’ to talk to my handler in an office a few doors up the hallway. Whenever I come by, the racket from in here’s just amazing. ‘Course I only ever see ‘em sitting down typing. Anyway, I could do what these guys do. The hard part would be sitting here all day in one spot. But doin’ it for a little while would be okay.

Here, see? I’d do it just like this. Just leave the mop in the bucket and lean the handle against this upright. Then I’d just sit down, turn on the typewriter and put my fingers on the keyboard. Y’know, as long as I’m here without anything really to do, I might as well leave you a note, right? Index fingers on F and J, right? See? I remember. Then just start typin’. That’s all there really is to it. Just write down whatever story’s in your head. That’s what a lot of the famous writers did. Okay, so I’ll just do that.

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Okay, here goes. Man, this is the first time I’ve typed in a long time, maybe since way back in class with Miss Clark. Since I don’t really have a story to write, I’ll just write this, you know, what I’m doin’, and maybe a little bit of a story too. I mean, maybe it’ll just come out.

Oh, you know what? Long as I’m just messin’ around here, I’ll write this up for you guys to read. I’ll just leave it in the typewriter and you can read it when you get here. That’ll be good. Might get to ramlin’ a little bit since I’m just killin’ time here, but I think there’ll be some good stuff here too.

Okay, anyway, the first line, you know, that’s where the title goes. Since this isn’t a real story, I’ll just type Title Goes Here. Okay, so there we go.

And then hit the Return key and then the Tab key to indent the first paragraph. And then what? Well, then that’s where the story would start, right there. Okay, and I’m writin’ for this stupid supermarket tabloid newspaper-magazine thing, so it doesn’t really matter what I type.

Here... here’s a little personal commentary on personalities for you. I mean, the guy at the big desk that’s farther from the door—you know, if I was typin’ this for a real story and not just a gag—he’d look over what I typed and if he liked it he’d take it over to the boss woman. And if he didn’t he’d give it back to me and have me re-do it. That’s his job, right?

But I wonder if he ever gives back any of ‘em? I mean, maybe he gives one back now and then just to make it look like he’s really doin’ something, but I bet he doesn’t give back very many. I bet he’s just like all the others. I bet he’s just tryin’ to get through the day and the week and the two weeks. He just wants to get his paycheck and pay his bills. I don’t think I could work like that, you know, day-on, stay-on, stuff like that. I mean, you guys have a real job, but that guy’s a dweeb.

But for now, you know, while I’m just killin’ time and waiting, pretendin’ won’t do any harm. So on the second line... well, wait. Actually I’ll hit the Return key again and leave a blank line after the title. Yeah, that would look better. That’s what Miss Clark used to call “white space.” Said it makes it easier for the reader to read. To be honest, that didn’t make any sense to me. I mean, how could white space make it easier to read when there isn’t anything to read in the white space? But I knew what she meant. And hey, I’d believe anything she wanted me to believe anyway if you know what I mean.

Okay, so I hit the Return key again to leave that white space. Then I hit the Tab key again to indent the first line of the paragraph. So I need to start the story here. Okay, so what to write about? ‘Course this ain’t a real story anyway.

The rain on the windows... I’ll type a little story about the rain on the windows and me bein’ up here on the twenty-ninth floor. The pattern of the rain on the windows and that sound is kind of gentle most of the time. But when the wind gusts come up and the rain hits the window too hard, then the rain is kind of spooky and annoying instead of soft and comforting. Then again, even if I am too far up on the twenty-ninth floor, at least I’m inside and it’s dry.

I mean, it ain’t like I’m in my car driving to get here. That’s gotta feel a little insane, leaving a warm dry house to get in the car and drive all the way downtown this early in the morning. And then park and walk in the rain to get here. Well, she probably has a space in the parking garage and it’s attached to the building, but still. Just knowing that I was driving through the wind and rain to get here and then just sit all day, that would be the worst part of my day, guaranteed.

And then when she gets here she doesn’t even get to make up the stories for the stupid tabloid. All she gets to do is read the crap all these other guys write. I don’t even know if she gets to pick what goes in the magazine. All of that might be up to the guys who still have desks in the glass office over there in the corner. Man, I would not like to have her job. Think it’s worth the little bit of extra money in her paycheck every two weeks? Guess it depends on who you are. Wouldn’t work for me.

I mean, sitting here making stuff up, you know, that wouldn’t be a bad way to make a living if you like making up stories. I mean, what could be better than that? Just entertainin’ people, and without having to put up with actually bein’ around ‘em. Not a bad gig. Then again, if a guy took this job just for the money, you know, that might not be so good. I mean, if you could do anything else other than making up stories, and if you don’t like making up stories, then why would you do it? I mean, janitors make big bucks compared to these drones.

Meanin’ no disrespect. Like I said, if that’s what they like doin’, more power to ‘em. Wouldn’t be a bad way to make a livin’ at all if you like it. Makin’ up stories, I mean. Now janitorin’, that’s hard work. Shovin’ that stupid bucket around all day, swabbin’ floors, dumpin’ trashcans, whatever else they do.

Anyhow, this ain’t all that hard, just typin’ stuff in a story. And then if it was real I’d turn it over to Middle Management Robot Boy and then he’d turn it over to what’s her name. You gotta forgive me if that sounds like a slight. It isn’t. I just don’t like knowin’ their names in advance. Keeps the whole thing more professional.

I mean, it ain’t like I’m some kind’a corporate hatchet man comin’ down here to fire her. Those guys, they want to know the name and whatever else they can know in advance, you know, so they can butter up their victim and get her feelin’ all warm and fuzzy before they drop her in the icy waters of Unemployed Land. Bunch’a fakes is what they are. Probably hand-picked from the best of the guys in the glass corner offices. So not a large gene pool to start with.

No matter what anybody thinks of me, one thing I ain’t never been is a fake. Guess that’s another reason I’m kind’a liking this opportunity to just sit here and make up a story for you guys to read.

Anway, I thought I heard the elevator ding. ‘Course it’s on the other side of that glass door and down the hall a ways, but I’m pretty sure that’s what it was. Okay so I gotta wrap this up. I don’t know what you’ll think about this story. You know, like I said before, it’d be a pretty good way to make a livin’ if you liked makin’ up stories and then if you were good at it. You know, we’re all good at different things so... not sure what else to put right here.

Ah there she comes. Her high heels are clickin’ and clackin’ on the tiles out there. Pretty soon she’ll be puttin’ her key in the lock. Guess I better get back to the mop before she sees me sittin’ at this typewriter. Sure had fun with this for a little while though.

Wait... just to help you guys a little, I’ll tell you what I think I’m gonna do: I think I’ll be up and reachin’ for my mop where it’s leanin’ against that big upright when she comes in. I’ll dump a trash can or two on my way toward her desk, and when she gets set down good, I’ll act like I’m going for her trash can. That’s when I’ll do it.

Maybe when she’s swapping out her regular glasses for her reading glasses and reaching for the top of that pile of manuscripts on her desk. That’s it. The end game is always the best part because that’s the part that you can’t plan. Just gotta play it by ear. But if I could plan it, she’d get a manuscript and then lean back to read it. She’d put it up in front of her face and that’s when I’d do it. Right then.

Okay, so that’s what happened, probably. You’ll be able to tell once you read this and then look around.

Oh, and you’ll find the gun in the trash can, so the ballistics and the firing pin imprint on the casing and the mark from the ejector port, all of that stops here.

Okay, so see you around. I gotta go.

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