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021408
[Write a fragment of a story that is made up entirely of imperative commands. 500 words]
You are not going to eat the cake in the library. You will wait ten minutes, then get up, walk to the library, and wish your boss a happy birthday. If offered, you may accept one glass of champagne, though it is important that you realize this is taking a risk; alcohol impairs your judgment, which could result in the consumption of said cake in a moment of reckless, half-drunken abandon.
There are three emails that you need to send. Concentrate on those for the next ten minutes. Even if you do not want to send them, even if you do not want to write them, composing email is an essential part of your job, a task you must accomplish. Regardless of whether or not you will be rewarded with a piece of your boss’s chocolate mousse birthday cake, you are paid to do things like send sparsely-worded but unsnippy emails to people unobservant enough not to understand contractual copyright law. You do not receive compensation for cake, or bitchy missives. Keep that in mind as you craft the following three replies.
Reread your response to George F. Humbucker, Jr. regarding the use of James Thurber’s cartoons in a nationally distributed religious tract. Pay no attention to the grumbling in your stomach, or the sharply pitched peals of laughter that feel like sandpaper in your ears. You are not writing to Megan Maxey, boyfriend thief, possible anorexic, she of the banshee laugh. You are writing to George F. Humbucker, Jr. a self-described “inspirational speaker” whose affinity for an all lower case writing style, woefully misused contractions and the serial comma you find oxymoronic. Remember to check all of the contractions, commas and capitals in your own email as a silent rebuke to George F. Humbucker, Jr. Make sure the line “In the future, please be sure to double check the copyright pages of all texts for information regarding proper rightsholders” is in boldface type, as per your own personal precedent. Hit send.
Stop wondering about the nutritional content of chocolate mousse cake. Remind yourself that mousses are made with egg yolks and that egg yolks are high in cholesterol and that your cholesterol is already high. Silence any argument to the contrary, including the one insisting that the only reason you’re depriving yourself of chocolate mousse cake is because you wish, someday, to be as skinny as Megan Maxey, and to have a bevy of suitors, one of which might include a certain former boyfriend who had been known, in the last days of your brief courtship, to refer to you as a “lard ass” when you refused to get him another Brooklyn Lager as he was watching the Knicks fail just like they did last week, and the week before, and the week before that. Take a moment to upbraid yourself: thoughts like that are not only dumb but self-defeating, since there is no way that you could ever be as skinny as Megan Maxey anyway.
Check the time to see how many minutes have passed. Neatly close the windows on your desktop. Allow yourself to apply a small dab of lipgloss before rising from your desk. Practice a quick smile in the compact mirror. Don’t allow yourself to think about your hair, or your face, or the fact that you should have powdered your inner thighs the last time you visited the restroom. Stand up. Square your shoulders. Don’t think about the cake.
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