He lifted his thermos, now completely cold, and took a sip. The tea had steeped too long, bitter enough to numb his tongue. But he didn’t move. He just sat there, staring at the screen without taking anything in. On it was the report he had started writing that morning but never finished.
There were seven people in the office. The fans of six computers whirred, mixed with the occasional clatter of keyboards. At the workstation across from him, Xiao Zhou wore headphones and nodded his head now and then. Maybe he was listening to music, or maybe he was dozing off. Liu, diagonally opposite, was browsing Taobao. The page showed children’s clothes. Her son was six this year. Old Zhang by the window was reading a newspaper.
16:52
He put down his thermos and rolled his neck. His cervical vertebrae cracked. Three years of sitting here had done that to him. Three years ago, when he had just passed the entrance exam, he was young and full of ideals. He still thought he could change something. Now all he wanted was to leave work on time.
16:55
He started packing up. First, he screwed the lid tightly onto his thermos and put it in the left drawer. Then he returned the pens on his desk to their places: the black ballpoint went back into the pen holder, and he capped the red one and placed it beside the black one. He stacked the memo pads neatly and tucked them under the monitor stand. He smoothed out the mouse pad and slipped his phone into his pocket.
16:58
The atmosphere in the office began to change. Xiao Zhou took off his headphones, Liu closed Taobao, and Old Zhang folded his newspaper and tucked it into a pile of files. Everyone was waiting for the second hand to finish its final lap.
16:59:30
Lin Mo already had his hand on the computer’s power button.
Thirty seconds, twenty seconds, ten seconds
Xiao Lin...
Very close to life