MARRIED TO MY ENEMY’S SON

PUNISHED

I walked out of HR holding a box that suddenly felt too light to contain the weight of everything going on within me right now. Nobody had to explain anything to me because I already knew why. The silence in the room was all the answer I needed, I tried my best to breathe normally but my body was already betraying me, the way my fingers were grabbing the edges of the box was as if it was the only thing stopping me from collapsing right now.

People were still moving through the corridor the way they always did, speaking softly, laughing in low tones, pretending not to notice anything out of place, but I could feel it anyway, the shift in attention that followed me like a stain I couldn’t wash off. It wasn’t loud, it wasn’t obvious, but it was there in the way conversations paused slightly as I passed and resumed only after I had gone a few steps further.

I told myself I didn’t care even tho I did but that was the only way i couldn’t give him the satisfaction of a break down cause I knew that was what he wanted, I was almost at the exit leaving the place that had heard one of the best and worst memories of my life as I was lost in thought a voice suddenly rang in my head not loudly but urgently it was my colleague from earlier Ellie, she ran over with her face a mix of confusion and disbelief like she was deciding whether to believe what she was seeing or trust what she already knows.

She looked at the box in my hand then my face.

“What’s happening?” she asked and I could hear the disbelief in her voice, like she already suspected the answer but wanted me to deny it properly so she could keep her reality intact.

I opened my mouth but nothing came out. My heart was filled with hurt and my head filled with words but whenever I opened my mouth to explain what just happened I couldn’t seem to find the words I was breaking down inside but didn’t want anyone to see me break. She asked again, I still stared because the truth felt soo heavy so I lied,

“I quit” immediately the words left my mouth. I felt how wrong they were, how they didn’t belong to me, how they felt like I had stolen them from someone’s life.

Ellie stared at me longer than necessary like she was waiting for the truth to come out. Her stare sent a chill down my spine, she noodles slowly after what felt like an eternity, she didn’t press further and for some reason that made me feel more at ease.

Ellie said she would walk me out so we could talk a little bit before I left. I took the first box and loaded it into the truck of my car. I told her that I needed to pick up other things and she said she would help. I nodded without saying a word again cause I was scared my voice would give me away.

When we returned to my desk, it no longer felt like mine, even if it was still the same small space with my things still scattered on it but it still didn’t feel like mine cause it wasn’t anymore. It felt so distant like I was already it was already a memory instead of the present

I opened the drawer first because it was the first place that I could think of to pretend that I had everything under control. The first thing I picked up was the coffee mug I had bought on my first day here when I still believed I would be here for long, long enough for things to matter long enough for my work to matter, I remembered choosing it carefully convincing myself that small routines were how people built stability now I was wrapping it in paper like it belong somewhere I used to know.

My favorite notebook was the next thing I picked up, half of it was filled with thought I would probably never return to ideas that now felt like they belonged to a version of me that was still allowed to stay. I placed it in the box without reading any of it because I knew if I did, I might start undoing more than just my job.

The plant Ellie had given me was still alive, stubbornly so, and I hesitated longer than necessary before putting it in because it felt wrong to abandon something that was still trying. I told myself someone else would take care of it, even though I didn’t believe that for a second.

The ID card was the last thing I picked up, and I held it longer than anything else because it was the one object that made everything real in a way I couldn’t soften. My face stared back at me in a way that felt almost naive now, like I had been proud of something I didn’t yet understand the fragility of.

I placed everything into the box slowly, and that was when it fully settled on me that I was not just losing my job but I was being pulled out from a structure that I thought I belonged in. I didn't even know when the decision had been made and why I had no right to resist.