X Post It Notes

 

I am seven days into the New Year and the calendar on my cubical wall still shows December. I just am not motivated to change it.  My resolution for this year is not to update it.  What difference would it make? At the end of the day, it is just another “x” in a square. The x’s form a chain and the chain of x’s in all the calendars that have graced this beige eighties wall goes back nine years.  Post-it notes with names and extensions of co-workers who are no longer here adorn this fossil of a fabric. I have not moved most of them because they give the area much needed color, but Emily’s has not moved because it is all I have left of her.

There was a feeling of newness when she would drop off her breakdown at my desk the start of every week. My heart would jump in celebration when she would walk into the breakroom when I was there.  I would pray that God would bless me with the confidence to let her know how I felt. He never did and my lack of self-esteem would renew every Tuesday.

I could not bring myself to do it when she was here, but I sometimes call her old extension and Carlos answers. I have no idea who he is or what his role is in this trench of depression, but I can feel he is beginning to get annoyed with me. Honestly, I do not care. Carlos is just another Post-it.

I wonder if Emily felt the same way about me.

the above was part of a writing prompt from Creative Copy Challenge.