The Fifteen Minute Novel is an attempt to take a single prompt and use the last sentence written each day as a start for the next day. This year I had several prompts circling around a similar story, so I have combined them. However, the story starts the same way each day, with the last line from the day before and a timer set for fifteen minutes. The hope is to end up with a complete, if very rough draft by the end of the year. Some stories are better than others, but I always learn a whole lot about my own writing when I do this so for me it is not only a nice way to work out a story, but it is a tool for helping my writing get better. And so, we continue this story for 2024 with…
Day 16: Mr. Evers again paused to take in her reaction.
Mr. Evers again paused to take in her reaction. Her look of surprise seemed to relax him.
“About me?” Sophie said. She couldn’t imagine any reason for the top execs to be interested in her at all. Her job mostly involved inputting data into the various data bases. She did it well and in a timely fashion and even managed to do more than her job actually called for.
“You don’t know why they want to speak with you?” he asked.
“No idea,” Sophie said.
“Right,” he said. “Well, the fact is they do want to see you and you need to go the top floor. They are expecting you.”
“I see,” Sophie replied. “I …suppose I had better go.”
“Yes,” Mr. Evers said. “Best not keep them waiting.” He made little shooing motions.
Sophie turned and left the office. Instead of heading back to her cubicle, she went back down the hall to the elevator. She pressed the button and as she waited saw several people lean back slightly to look at her past the walls of their cubicles. The elevator dinged and she got into the box, pressing the button for the top floor. She tried not to feel like she was on display.
As the elevator glided upwards, Sophie wondered what she was being summoned for. Perhaps there were rules against staying late that she was unaware of. Perhaps one of the files she entered that had her code instead of someone else’s had gone wrong. She had never heard of an afterhours policy so she thought it had to be something related to the files. With each second, Sophie tried to go through all of the files she worked in the last few weeks. There were so many of them that she didn’t quite know where to start.
While there were always a few extra things sent her way it was only since Mr. Evers took up with Cassie that people felt more comfortable leaving more than the occasional file with her. ‘So, two months ago,’ she thought.
The doors opened and Sophie stepped out wondering what in the last two months could have gone wrong. ‘And what am I going to be blamed for.’ She wondered if she was going to lose her job after all. ‘I have savings,’ she thought. ‘Hopefully that will be enough until I can find a new job.’
Unlike their floor where Mr. Ever’s office was to the right as they stepped out of the hallway and the room full of cubicles was to the left, here the elevator opened into a small lobby. There was a desk towards the wall and chairs for those waiting. The desk was occupied by a receptionist who was currently on the phone.
Sophie walked forward.
“I’ll make sure she gets the message,” the receptionist said into the phone. She hung up and made a note on a piece of paper before looking up at Sophie.
“May I help you,” She asked politely.
“I’m Sophia Daniels, my supervisor sent me up,” she said. She wished Mr. Evers gave her the name of the person she was supposed to see.
“Of course,” the receptionist replied with a smile. She gestured to her right. “It’s the first door on the left.”
“Great, thanks.” Sophie said. She walked towards the indicated door as the phone rang again and the receptionist answered. The door was open when Sophie reached it.
Ten til Midnight 