My coworker’s mouth hung open in shock and dismay.
“What’s this?” he demanded, waving at the sheet of paper I’d slid onto his desk.
I halted my flight out of his office.
“It’s uh – it’s a comp check.” It says it right on the top.
He grabbed it and held it up, shaking his head wildly.
“Nope – I just did one of these. You need to give this to someone else.”
He held it out until I reluctantly took it back. Then he motioned for me to shut his door and I trudged back into the hallway.
Now what?
It was part of my job to assign these things, our office was sent requests for them multiple times a day, and everyone hated doing them. I initially made a list of all my coworker’s names, so I could keep things fair and make sure they all got equal turns.
At first I was met with sighs, groans, and bitter acceptance. Now it was refusal almost constantly, so I’d abandoned my list and resorted to begging or sneak-attacks. I’d just darted this one into every office and got sent out.
I stood in the hallway fiddling with it. I wondered what would happen if I started making comp check requests into paper airplanes and flying them at people’s heads when they left their shelters to use the copier.
Too bad I wasn’t licensed, so I could do the work on them myself.
I hated this part of my job, and when my employer was finally fed up beyond repair and showed me the door, my inability to pass out these papers effectively was one of the (many) reasons he listed.
I wish I could go back in time and do this position over. It’d feel so fun and satisfying now, to go about it with everything I’ve learned since then.
And since time-travel isn’t an option, I opted for something even better: