Whirling Dervish

A man in his late twenties emerges from a labyrinth of hallways filled with unmarked doors and darkened windows into an office filled with bright florescent light. There are rows of cubicles and people bustling about with their work, moving too fast for him to see any of their faces or even say hello. He lifts his hand only to let it fall to his side. He walks to his cubicle that he had only been shown to the day before. There is no hint about the person who once worked here before except a small yellow note on the far wall that he must have omitted when he left. Written on it was a solitary question, “What did I do today?” That was three years ago.

I sit looking at the small digital clock that read “4:55P” on the grey terrycloth wall of my cubicle, though I know it is impossible, I think that I can hear a ticking sound coming from the clock. Tick. I have nothing to do. Tock. I have been done with all my work for the day for quite some time, but for some reason I cannot not bring myself to leave my tiny working space until the second the display reads five. Tick. Just like every day. Tock.

I look about; everything is neat and clean inside my little square of allotted personal space. It’s almost perfectly empty. There are two small trays stacked on the corner of my desk. One tray is for incoming papers that have not been finished or reported yet, and the other tray is for the same papers going out to at the end of the day to be filed in a storage room somewhere. Right now there is only one tray that has anything in it. The out tray has exactly twenty-two reports ready to be taken away. I have no idea who exactly does this task, but every morning the old work is gone and a new load sits awaiting me. Maybe there is a different person for each task. That wouldn’t surprise me.

Tick.Two minutes. That is all the time that has passed; I thought I had burned up at least the entire five minutes letting my mind wander like that. I guess I was wrong. Tock. My mind focuses on the rapid clicking of keyboards that replaces the restless ticking sound in my mind as all the people around me are busy in their own way. I suppose we could all be doing the same thing, but that wouldn’t make much sense. If that were true then I could disappear and practically nothing would change. We must all have our own individual tasks.

Yes, there are probably two different people, one that delivers the new papers and one that takes the old ones away, I decide, thinking back. For some reason this thought gave me a little comfort, though I don’t know why.

There is only an inch of wood and cloth on either side of my computer desk that separates me from the co-workers on either side of my cubicle, but I have no idea what their names are or even what they look like. I have this vague memory of a faceless man in a shirt and tie and a faceless woman in a navy suit. I see them every day, but my eyes never really take them in. I could just stand up and take a peek around the corner, but I really don’t see any point to doing that. Knowing what they look like does not change the fact that I have worked next to the same people for three years and I have no idea who they are. I realize again that my cubicle is almost perfectly empty. Almost. Perfectly. Empty.

I wonder if anyone even knows what I look like. Probably not, I conclude after a moment of thought. Since I have never spoken with anyone here there is considerable chance that they might not even know my name. Why should they? After all, I don’t even know their names. I begin to think when exactly the last time I heard my name was. Somewhere in the background of my thoughts I begin to hear the ticking of a clock again, but it is interrupted by my thoughts before it begins to rise in pitch. The general manager said my name. I think. It was the day after I was hired, when he showed me to my cubicle. Before he left he wished me luck and I think he said my name. I have not seen him since, maybe he does not even work here anymore. Tick. That was three years ago. Tock.

It’s been three years … am I even alive?

I don’t know where that question came from. It just arose out of my subconscious and slid to the forefront of my thoughts. I know that I exist, I have to because I occupy this space here, but am I really living? Three years. I have gone three years without anyone even saying my name. I think vaguely about typing my name into the computer, but I already turned it off. I turned it off twenty minutes ago, at 5:38. I slowly drift out of my stupor, demystified; demystified of what exactly I don’t know. As my head clears from its haze it is suddenly filled with a loud clashing sound; I don’t know if my eyes are open or closed. I don’t see anything either way. I decide to blink. Slowly I become fully aware of a beeping sound, I look at the digital clock across from me that reads “6:30P”. I don’t know how that could be. I physically cannot comprehend how that is possible. It was only 5:57 only a few minutes ago, but I dismiss the thought before it could fully form in my mind. I get up dusting myself off like an antique, turning to take my jacket off the back of my chair.

The office is quiet and I am alone. Did anyone even notice me; even think of patting my shoulder thinking I had nodded off? It is well past time for me to have left. I lumber out of my empty office into a vacant corridor, my footsteps echo like the ticking of a clock. Why is it that I cannot escape this sound? It doesn’t logically exist, it can’t. My footsteps are not the well metered ticking of a metronome. Why then does it sound like I am wound inside the movement of a clock? I could not get this thought out of my head as I follow the same well-worn path that I take every day in and everyday out. I eventually emerge out into an empty parking lot were my lone car sits awaiting me. It is past time for me to go.

I manage to drive out of the underground parking lot onto the same paved streets that I follow every day. Finally there is silence, no sound nor motion of time fill my mind. Something is still different though; everything seems to be moving out of sync. The wheels and cogs of my mind seem to be disjointed, nothing is fitting in place as it should. Some things speed by like streaks of color, others move at a snail’s pace. I move my hand in from of my eyes, thinking that I might only see a blur or motion. Nothing. I look out of my window again and watched a single car for an eternity as if it were a drop of condensation slowly sliding down the side of a glass of water. The slow drip of cars became hypnotic to me. Time and even place lost its meaning. At least the sound of the clock is gone from my ears.

I blink again. The clock on the dashboard says “8:02P”; I do not know when I even began watching the time move slowly by. I look out the window on my left. There is a tall white SUV looming over me. Sometime ago I must have finally arrived in the parking lot below my apartment. I must have been dreaming. My life has become regulated by my own mechanical movements that I can drive from one place to another without conscious effort, maybe without even being conscious. This thought sends a prickling sensation down my spine, like an electrical impulse. I feel my arms and my legs wondering if I am any more alive than the car I sit in. I feel my skin stretch tight as my hand tightens over my forearm; I feel the slight ticking of my pulse under my fingers. I wonder if there is there something controlling me just as I control the movements of this car? I think that I am going to find a hint of something mechanical beneath my skin. I am made of flesh and bone. That is all. Struck by a sense of urgency I kick open the door and stumble out into the parking lot, running up the stairs to my apartment. I think that I am beginning to form an understanding that is still beyond my grasp. Not willing to let go of my newfound sense of purpose I press on though I still do not know why.

I finally arrive at the door that should be the entrance to my home, but it is a foreign place to me. The shiny brass numbers on the door seem like characters from an alien language. Even my key feels heavy and cumbersome in my hand. Nothing feels right about this place. I am finally able to push my way into the dark room. A dark room that is supposed to be my own. It is the same thing though; it was like looking at the evidence of someone else’s existence. Everything in its appropriate place, it is like no one lives here at all. This is just an imitation of life. The room is something you would picture coming out of a catalogue and most of it probably did. Though I paid the rent on this apartment I did not live here. This room is merely the place that I have occupied for three years; it is not where I live. All the things in here do not belong to me, they are all the things that you would expect to see in an apartment. Everything in its appropriate place. Thing bought out of the mechanical habit of life. Nothing is really mine. I finally understand; I need to start over, I need to shed this shell of an existence.

I cannot do that while clinging to the things that only imitate life; I want to actually be alive. I want to know that I am alive. Before I know what I am doing or what is happening, I watch a lamp fall slowly down three stories shattering on the inside of a dumpster below. More things follow, and begin to follow at a greater pace. More windows are flung open. I am a flurry of motion; perspiration stings my eyes as I am filled with an unknown purpose. I am not moving out of a mechanical need, but a human urgency. Table, rug, a second lamp, magazines, another rug, another table, and so on. They all make the same quiet journey before shattering below. I have lost my sense of time as I move back and forth across the room pushing, dragging, ripping and tearing. Nothing can stay. Everything goes.

Eventually I become still, nothing is left. Still the nagging sensation that I am forgetting something persists. What is it? There is nothing left in the apartment but the hardwood floor. What can I be forgetting? My hands begin to claw at the buttons on my shirt and tear at the tie around my neck. I begin to breathe in a new kind of air I have never felt before. I am finally breaking from my cage which has held me and drained my life away. I hear buttons being torn from the fabric, but everything I see and feel seems so distant. I feel a soft breeze on my skin. At last I am done.

Finally I stand in the middle of my empty apartment naked and alone. I can pretend that I am not even here in the darkness, that this room is completely empty – perfectly empty. There is only a small amount of light coming in through the open window. I realize that this entire time I have still been holding my tie loosely between two of my fingers. I walk over to the window and let it drop outside. It doesn’t belong to me – it isn’t mine – it belongs to the man who has been living my life for the last three years. I move so that I am standing in the middle of the room again. I slowly turn about looking at all the bare walls. Places that once held bought photos or were obscured by a shelf or a couch. I rotate completely around once, but I don’t stop. I do it again seeing the walls for the first time again. I begin to spin. Turning faster and faster. My heart is racing, my breath comes in deep gasps. Still I spin faster. I spin so fast that all I see is blurs of color and motion punctuated with bright flashes from the outside world. I don’t know how long I can do this for, or even how long I have been spinning now. I do not care, I am finally free. This is my fist action as a free man. A consummation of mind, body, and soul.

My body begins to feel heavy, but I can hardly tell. My arms droop, and my motion slows. All of a sudden my eyelids feel so heavy. My thoughts that were racing only seconds ago begin skipping beats, slowing down. Blackness. I feel cold as my body hits the floor, my head rebounding off of the hardwood. In the blackness I realize that I have been reborn. I feel warmth flowing over me, I am finally at peace. One last thought forces its way into waning consciousness. I have no idea what I am doing tomorrow, but at last I know I am alive.

Inside an office filled with cubicles and the rapid staccato of keyboard chattering there is one empty space. A single cubicle that has no occupant. It is filled with all the things that you would expect in any office: a desk, a computer, a chair, and other similar items. The three terrycloth walls are completely unadorned except for a small digital clock and a single note posted on the far wall. Written on the paper is a single question, “What did I do today?” No one remembers the man who left it there; no one even knows he is gone.