Ever since college, every day has felt the same. I wake up, get to work, type for hours about nothing, eat lunch, go back to typing, go home, fall asleep, and go back to work. Every day is monotonous. When my parents told me to follow my dreams, this is not what I had envisioned. I'm living in New York City, working as an analyst for some bank, doing God knows what for God knows why. I never thought that my life would come to this. I had always been the type to plan out every step of my day, every week, month, year to come. I was on track to being a nurse practitioner. By this point in my life plan, I would have been working overseas, building hospitals and saving lives. I don't know how my life came to this. I wake up, get to work, type for hours about nothing... type for hours. About nothing. What am I doing?
Sure, I have friends. I have plenty of friends that I see on a weekly basis, all with the same boring, monotonous life as mine. We get together after work ends on Friday and forget the week for two nights straight, after which we spend our days nursing hangovers and lounging about our tiny, cramped rooms, watching whatever programs on TV for an indeterminate amount of time. And then we go back, working until the next time we can forget working. I used to find bliss in simplicity, going out and seeing the lights of the bustling city. But after having lived the same week at least 100 times, I grew tired of the city that Never Sleeps. My friends are just faces with names, easy to forget and easily replaced. Sure, I have friends, plenty of friends. I see them on a weekly basis.
I get to work and approach my tiny, gray cubicle. Apparently, I had been working towards some goal, and whatever aspiration I had came to fruition. A banner over my cubicle reads "Congrats on Your Promotion!" My friend Jesse comes up to me, patting me on the back. "Senior analyst! That's great, man!"
I nod and smile. Quotidian. A superficial gesture, a passive aggressive grin. Jesse wanted this position, and I know he did. For all I care, he could take it. After about 30 minutes of people milling around, grabbing coffees and bagels from the break room, congratulating me on my achievement, giving me thumbs up, I am free to sit down front of my computer on the chair that is no doubt older than I am. I start to type, analyzing stocks as I normally do, when out of the corner of my eye I spot a non-descript piece of paper. Odd. I pick up the piece of paper, and on it reads
"Room 101. 1:00."
I look around for someone, seeing if there was anyone who might have dropped the piece of paper accidentally. The office is quiet, save for the sounds of people clicking away on keyboards. I turn back around to sit in my chair and suddenly my computer screen goes blank. There is a flash of green words covering the screen, but they disappear too quickly for me to read. The screen flickers back on and puzzled, I get back to work.
An hour later, as I'm typing, my keyboard gets really, really hot. Like fire. I take my hands off the keyboard and try to see what might be the matter with my computer. As I'm checking the wires, I'm shocked with a spark of electricity. "Whoa!" I jump back from the computer and my head feels like it's spinning. I stumble around my office for a second, trying to find my chair, but fall face-first and everything goes black.
When I finally regain consciousness, I'm in a white room with no windows, tied to a chair.
"Hello?"
I call out, but no one responds. I look around for some door or anything other than the abrasive white I'm being bombarded with, when I hear someone speaking, right next to my ear.
"Rowan Freya."
I jump again, and realize again that I'm tied to the chair.
"Who's there? What do you want?"
I look around and try to see where the voice is coming from, but my movement is very limited.
"Do you know what you're doing here?" The voice asks again, and I groan in frustration.
