Jung Ho Han, Matricide

Matricide

Jung Ho Han

Noah feels like his eyes are blistering. He knows that no matter how much he stares into it, the arc will never change. He had worn his keyboard out checking the math, had long since lost track of the time trying to break the calculus, but the graph would always plunge deeper, the numbers getting angrier. Now his only confidantes were the buzzing office lights and empty chairs sitting silently beside him.

"You should go home, dear." The clatter of a mop startles him awake. A familiar plastic jacket tells him it's Mary, the cleaning lady who would sneak him leftover sandwiches from the executive lounge. Her initial scolding wrinkles dissolve into worried ones. "Is something wrong?"

"Nothing." Noah replies instinctively.

"Don't you give me that, young man. I've been in this company since you were a babe." Mary gives a half-smile that Noah doesn't return.

"Really. Nothing."

"Nothing?"

The words strangle him by the throat. This isn't something she - he - anyone could outrun. Those graphs had heralded a god-wave, ordained by the invisible hand above, and it had already crashed. All that was left for them was to wake up to lungs of seawater.

"Nothing."

The old lady shakes her head and lets the air hang. “Take care of yourself!” She calls back from the elevator, and she is gone. Noah sits staring at the elevator door as the floor number sinks. With a weak flick, Noah turns off the monitor, then sits by the window as the city streetlights turn off one by one.