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 187: “A new manual?” Sophie asked.
“A new manual?” Sophie asked. The elevator doors dinged open and the three of them stepped inside the silvery box. Linda pressed the button to go down to the lobby. She had become more relaxed as things settled down and the drama with Kristen faded, but today Linda looked tired.
“Its because of the whole mess with your old department,” Henry said.
Linda sighed heavily. “Hopefully that will never happen again.”
“You spent the day thinking about it didn’t you,” Sophie guessed as the elevator took them down. It reached the floor and the doors dinged open.
“Yes,” Linda said. “I was fine right after, then my mad faded and I thought about all the things that could have gone wrong. I had nightmares but they faded. I don’t want them back.”
“You should see someone about that,” Henry said. Sophie nodded.
“I am,” Linda admitted. “The company is even paying for it since it was work related.”
While Sophie was sorry that Linda was once again risking nightmares, she was glad that the craziness of the office was not anything to do with her.
‘And I doubt I’ll find any of the changes onerous,’ she thought as she said goodnight to the others and headed off to her car. ‘After all, I wasn’t having an affair with anyone in the office. I’m not having an affair with anyone at all.’ She thought. She allowed herself a little sigh of disappointment and promised herself that the next time Janine suggested they go out someplace to meet people on a Friday or Saturday night, she would go.
‘Although that is probably going to be disappointing as well,’ she thought recalling the last time she said yes. Both she and Janine were in that strange age range where most of the people in their general age range were either settled in a relationship or too busy with their own lives to go out looking for someone to mesh those lives with. The last time out Sophie felt out of place in the crowd.
She shook the thoughts away. At the moment, with things progressing smoothly, she was doing well on her own and relatively happy with her own life. She went out when she wanted and wasn’t worried about much. It was rather refreshing and she hoped the period of calm lasted.
‘No reason why it shouldn’t,’ Sophie thought.
She went through the evening in her set routine and wa feeling happy and content when she went into work the next morning. She settled herself at the desk and turned on her e-mail. She was surprised to find that there was a message from Elizabeth waiting for her. As it was a Tuesday and she generally only saw her supervisor during their Friday meetings, she knew something was up.
‘Please let it be something simple,’ she thought ass she clicked on the e-mail. Sophie felt her hopes fall as she read that Elizabeth wanted her for a meeting that afternoon. There were changes to the employee manual that would affect her.
Sophie sighed heavily for her own benefit and then clicked the reply button. She let Elizabeth know she would be at the meeting as requested. She sent the message and turned to her stack of folders. Because of the extra activity in the main office affecting her, Sophie was actually ahead of where she planned to be. ‘But with a meeting and god only knows what after it, I suppose getting further ahead wouldn’t hurt.’ Instead of a podcast, or her language lessons, Sophie put on her high energy play list.
Ten til Midnight 