My name is Li Mo. I’m the head of marketing, and I’ve completed 73 percent of this quarter’s KPIs.
At dawn that day, I saw the air wrinkle at the subway station on my way home. Then I got a second job: temporary assistant to three things that weren’t quite human. No salary, no benefits, just three rules: don’t investigate, don’t touch, don’t call the police.
The worst part of this job isn’t the danger. It’s how hard it is to take a day off.
I can feel that stone now. Even two blocks away, something tugs between my ribs. It’s there on my way to work, over dinner with clients, and while my boss pins me in the conference room to revise the proposal for the fourth time.
By the way, someone is specifically assigned to clean up their messes: accidents get written up as mishaps, overspending as fluctuations, and the dead as “loss assessment: one person.” My job on the side is to make all three sound believable.
I wasn’t doing much better at my last job, but at least that company paid into my social insurance.
