Writing Prompts

Writing Prompt #8

"Stop petting the test subjects"

I started working for OPLL.inc when I was fifteen and still looked like a potato with legs and a puffy ponytail. At first I was just a volunteer, someone to photocopy memos or run downstairs to pick up deliveries when everyone else was busy. Usually I'd just follow my supervisor around and do whatever meaningless task I was asked. Never said no, always had a peppy attitude and greet everyone by name. It didn't take a genius to do it. People liked me since I wasn't a nuisance. It also helped that I did all the boring tasks they were too lazy to do without complaint. In a few months, even the higher-ups knew me by name.

When I was seventeen, I have given me the opportunity to become an intern. I assumed they'd give me more responsibilities since I showed initiative and actively wanted to be apart of the company but my jobs were still the same. Fetch the morning coffee, restock the printer paper, entertain the guest before a conference. Nothing I couldn't handle.

My supervisor never got tired of me and little by little I began to learn the ropes. I was offered a chance to prove myself as a true member of OPLL close to my eighteenth birthday. My schedule in school was cut in half since I was at the top of the accelerated program. Monday to Wednesday was dedicated to class work and studying while the rest of the week I interned. Fridays were usually the most hectic.

My hair still very puffy in what seemed to be a permanent ponytail. The newbies that hadn't met me knew me by this.

It was a busy day at the office, the phones were ringing off the hook when I arrived. Nobody texted me to bring coffee but I did anyway.

"Oh good, you're here." My supervisor greeted.

I put down the big box of freshly made coffee. Anyone who wanted any was free to take some. "Need any help? Or you just want me to do the usual?"

Violently shaking his head, my supervisor said, "No, help us, please. We're gonna need it."

Seems like someone messed up an important order. OPLL. was a very secretive company so discretion was key. Truth is that there is a whole laboratory downstairs dedicated to research and advanced development. That is where I want to be working.

My supervisor sent me on about a thousand small errands, constantly running me in and out of the building. The last tiny thing needed from me before my lunch break was to restock the loose leaf on the third floor. Entering the building, greeting Oscar the doorman and today's receptionist Lila, I tried to run after the familiar ding of the elevator yet right before I entered, I was knocked to the floor.

It didn't hurt since I was naturally a clumsy person and had a very intimate relationship with gravity but still, ow.

"Are you okay?" The person above me asked.

"Who me? Yeah, fit as a fiddle." I answered, bending forward to pick up some blank sheets of loose leaf I had dropped.

"Really? After crashing at top speed?"

"Just call me Sonic the Hedgehog." I paused for a second, confused. "Wow, why did I say that?"

Looking up I finally noticed who I bumped into considering that I had bumped into him before a few years back. Only last time I was covered in syrup.

He was walking around with a stack of textbooks, causing his arms to shake. My guess is that he didn't hear me running with six plates of pancakes. And just like today, we crashed. I don't remember hearing his apology over mine but I saw his mouth move so he said something. I don't know what it was since my attention was mostly on picking up the pancakes before they stained the carpet.