Page 16 of The Girl with No Name

“Roger that,” Mason says into his earpiece, then takes a hit of his weed pen.

“Some days doesn’t this whole staring-at-a-computer-from-eight-to-five thing get to you?”

He doesn’t respond, and I realize he was talking to his online friends, not me.

Mason games most days during work hours, and he rarely leaves his perch by the window, overlooking our humble street in Old Town.

I put my headphones on and start cranking out the work Lennie forwarded me, clicking and typing out an email and getting into the flow.

My phone buzzes.

I look down and see a message from Mason.

I open it, confused.

Mason: Hey man, you’re typing really fucking loud. Do you realize that? I can’t concentrate with that. I have ADHD, you know. I’ve been meaning to bring this up with you for a while, but the deal when we moved in here was that you weren’t going to be working from home. So you’ve got to stop. Sorry. I messaged like four people about this to get their point of view and I’m not crazy. You’re really distracting me.

“You can’t concentrate?” I ask, spinning around in my chair, wondering why he didn’t just tell me this verbally.

“Yeah. It’s really bad when you’re doing all that typing.”

Something inside my stomach flares.Anger. “You’re kidding.”

“I’m not. You type so loud. Like I said, I messaged like four of my friends to make sure they agreed and that I’m right. You can’t type like that.”

“Yeah, I read your text.” The anger stays with me. “So what do you suggest I do?”

“When we moved in here, the deal was that I get the workspace to set up my office for work from home. This isn’t an MP. It’s a YP.”

“A what? A YP?” I echo, confused by this new acronym. “Come again?”

“It’s YP. A you problem. Where you work is not my problem; it’s a you problem. You’re disturbing my workspace.”

“It’s…a me problem?” I stand.

“It’s not a debate, dude.”

I’ve never been great at confrontation. Plus, I’m stunned. Wasn’t he just playing video games anyway? Not to mention,we split the rent fifty-fifty, and he monopolizes the living space almost one-hundred percent of the time.

“All right then.”

I go into my room, shut the door, and put my computer on the desk there.

Outside, it’s a sunny day. But the only strip of natural light I have is a two by two window with a view of the bricks of the apartment building three feet away from ours.

I think about messaging Samantha and asking her what she thinks about the situation, but I decide I won’t bug her with drama. She’s been busy lately, and I don’t want to bog her down with some silly debate. Besides, she has her European friends coming in this weekend, and I know she’s excited about that.

My phone buzzes again with a text from Dunn.

Dunn: I’m thirty minutes out from my parents’ place in the suburbs. When do we start pregaming for Railfest?

Reed: lol. I can’t go, man. Sorry.

Dunn: We’ll see about that. When can you get here tonight?

I look at my emails stacking up. My boss has forwarded an email reminder, specifically to me:

FW: Monday thru Friday In-Office:Now Mandatory for All Overlay Team. Remote Era is Over