In my last few weeks in Bogota, I was informed a girl named Scarlett would be moving into the apartment. I have always wanted to know someone named Scarlett - it is, for some reason, one of my favorite names. Despite my immediate hope that Scarlett would be some sort of elegant Southern bell, I was even more excited to learn that she was, in fact, Hungarian. Or possibly Romanian. To be honest, I never really could keep track of where she was from. She generally introduced herself as being from "Europe. All of it." which only added to her mystique. It is a decided shame that we only had a few weeks (not even, now that I think about it) to get to know each other. She was an interesting, outrageously intelligent person with a worldliness to her that made her decidedly wise beyond her years. You could imagine that she secretly knew everything, and as far as I'm concerned, she probably did.
Despite her Time Lord-like intelligence, she continually claimed that she was utterly uncreative. When I went around asking for story ideas, she assured me she would have nothing, which I assumed was a lie. Most people who claim to lack creativity are far more creative than they think they are. Sure enough, after I had moved out of the apartment and was living in a hostel in central Bogota, she Facebooked me with the following prompt: "an ironic story of a structured, control-freak woman who falls in love with a men while being in a happy relationship with another man who she also loves". Apparently inspired by a movie she saw, and given to me in a moment of pure impulse, when I saw her later that day she told me she didn't actually expect me to write it, and in fact, was hoping I wouldn't. Which of course, meant that I had to.
The vast majority of this was written during my last week in Bogota, during which a series of violent political protests were going on basically right outside my hostel. For the most part, I just heard lots of shouting and occasionally saw people banging on pots. There was one day, however, where I had been warned that things were going to get particularly dangerous, and I should probably stay inside. Sure enough, that afternoon I was accidentally tear gassed from a terrace window. It hurt. A lot. As much as I disliked violence before, I really don't like it now.
Because the prompt was specifically about a "control-freak woman" I had originally planned to write about a cult leader. I think it became what it is now largely due to what was happening outside my window while I was writing it. After the tear gas incident, I didn't really leave my room much, which is a shame, because I really loved Bogota and would have liked to have spent my last week being a tad more active. But, that's life.
Josephina Saves
Josephina Rush realized she was the messiah one quiet Sunday afternoon in August. She and her husband were sitting on the porch, overlooking the green backyard. Each held a cup of tea, and a different section of their local paper. It was a typical, highly ritualized afternoon that both of them tended to look forward to during the chaos of their regular week.
“Look, Noel,” she said, tilting the article so her husband could see it, “they’re doing a special on the Chrysler Building tonight.”
“Seven o'clock,” he said, glancing over, “We should be finished with dinner by then.”
They smiled in unspoken agreement, and returned to their individual reading. It was then that a bright light suddenly appeared next to the chestnut tree to the right of the porch and a loud, ethereal voice echoed through the trees.
“WHO AMONG YOU IS THE ONE THEY CALL JOSEPHINA RUSH?”
Josephina raised an eyebrow, and put her paper down. Her husband followed suit.
“I am,” she said, not entirely sure how to properly address a disembodied voice, “Can I, er, help you?”
“I AM FROM ANOTHER PLANE OF EXISTENCE - A REALM SEPARATE BUT INSIDE YOUR OWN. YOUR WORLD WILL BE ENDING SOON, JOSEPHINA RUSH.”
Josephina looked to Noel, who shrugged his shoulders.
“I didn’t read anything about this in the paper.” she said.
“YOUR WORLD WILL END IN ONE YEAR. YOU MUST TELL THE PEOPLE TO FOLLOW YOU, FOR ONLY THROUGH YOU CAN THEY BE SAVED.”
“Why only me?”
“FOR YOU CAN HEAR ME.”
“That’s not really much of a reason.”
“DO YOU UNDERSTAND YOUR SACRED MISSION?”
“Yes,” said Josephina, slightly frustrated, “The world will end in a year, I have to save everyone by telling them, yes?”
“INDEED. STRAY NOT FROM YOUR PATH, JOSEPHINA. YOU ARE THE PEOPLE’S SAVIOR.”
The light vanished in a cosmic explosion of blinding, otherworldly spectacle. Josephina and Noel were left alone.
“Well,” said Josephina, “I guess we’ll have to get started.”
And so the otherwise average couple quit their jobs and became religious leaders. They began small - they started a website, published a podcast, and opened a Facebook page. Eventually, Josephina assembled a small, but vocal group of followers that became gradually more devoted the more Josephina adjusted to her role as messiah. One of them, a former advertising executive, suggested the movement adopt a slogan. “Josephina Saves” was soon graffitied on street corners and trending on Twitter.
The internet as a whole, in fact, proved to be a particularly lucrative place for her message to spread. Disenfranchised Tumblr users and Redditors alike seemed to resonate with the idea that the world was about to end. Cries of “I don’t want to live on this planet anymore” and “It’s about fucking time” were everywhere. “Josephina Saves” was reblogged and shared more than any other topic. The hashtag trended longer than the most pervasive celebrity inside joke. Josephina soon found herself one of the most talked about people in modern culture.
“There are three books being published on you,” said Noel, excitedly at their new headquarters one afternoon, “and CNN is going to do a special on you.”
“That’s fabulous, dear,” said Josephina, considering something, “but should we really be allowing this much, you know, discussion?”
Noel was, as he frequently was, confused.
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve been thinking,” she said, slowly, standing up and pacing across the room, “the most important part of this whole mission is to spread word, right?”
“Right,” said Noel, “all this publicity will allow you to do that.”
“It will,” she agreed, “but left unchecked, it will lead to public discussion, which will, inevitably, lead to doubt in our cause.”
“But was we’re saying is the truth,” Noel pointed out, “There’s no reason for anyone to doubt anything.”
“You’ve been on the internet,” said Josephina, “People will doubt anything. Half the world still thinks the president was born in Kenya, and that’s because everyone is allowed to throw their ridiculous ideas wherever they want. If we really want to succeed in our cause, we have to take control of what people are saying about it. It’s for the world’s own good. I have to save everyone.”
“For the world’s own good,” Noel repeated, nodding solemnly. He sighed, “It must be a huge burden on you, being the only one who can save us.”
Josephina stopped pacing and looked up at her husband. He was unsurprised to see the dark circles under her eyes, and the weariness with which she carried herself. When speaking to the public, spreading her message, she buried her anxiety and appeared strong - like a leader. It was only with him, in their rare, quiet hours, that she betrayed her true fear.
Noel stepped forward, as he always had, and took her in his arms. He kissed the top of her head, and she looked up.
“At least I have you.” she said.
“Always.”
The next day, Josephina began her campaign to control their message. She had adherents scouring the internet at all hours of the day, deleting and censoring any inappropriate discussion. She made sure any books or specials on her were filtered through her eyes first. Through very careful micromanaging she hadn’t realized she was capable of, her popularity continued to soar despite the controlling atmosphere at her headquarters. It all came to a head when a violent South American protest broke out, and “Josephina Saves” was written on the murdered body of a president. Josephina had to rush to denounce the protesters, which consisted of almost an entire nation.
“I will never condone the death of others,” she said into about a thousand microphones at a crowded international press conference, “My mission is to save, not to kill. I want no association with any of the people responsible for this atrocity.”
A million hands went up. Noel picked one at random.
“New York Times,” said a thin, skeptical looking man, “Ms. Rush, if your purpose is to save all people, and yet you want no association with the protestors, will they be saved?”
“Well, um,” Josephina had honestly not considered this, “They probably will be.”
“Do you still consider them to be followers of your faith?”
“Of course not,” she responded, “If they really believed in what I’ve been preaching, they wouldn’t have murdered someone in my name.”
“But, you’ve stated before,” the man continued, consulting a notepad, “that only those who follow you will be saved at the end of the year. If they are no longer considered your followers, how can they be saved?”
Josephina hesitated.
“Uh, well, then, sadly, I suppose they won’t be saved. I’ll have to deny them.”
“So you do condone the death of others?”
“What?”
“You’ve said,” the man continued again, “that the world will end at the end of the year. The Earth will, effectively die and the only way to be saved from this death is to follow you. If you no longer allow these people to follow you, then by your own pronouncement, you are allowing their destruction, thereby condemning them to death.”
“Then, you know what,” said Josephina, frustrated, “I will save them. They can come back to the faith anytime they want.”
“Then it’s alright for your followers to murder in your name?”
“No!” Josephina could barely think. This was not at all how she had expected this conference to go, “That’s not what I meant at all...just, stop talking. Next question!”
The reporter smiled. He had gotten exactly what he wanted out of her. Noel stepped quietly up to the podium and whispered in her ear.
“Don’t worry,” he said, “that part wasn’t aired. I had it interrupted.”
Josephina nodded, and continued on. Despite having total control of the situation, she couldn’t take her eyes off the reporter’s smug expression in the crowd. Somehow, she couldn’t shake the feeling that, despite everything, he still had the upper hand.
A week later, Josephina was drafting a cease and desist letter to a blasphemous YouTube channel when the door to her office unceremoniously burst open.
“Is that you, Noel?” she asked, not raising her eyes from her work. They hadn’t seen much of each other since the conference - Josephina had been completely focused on making sure her message hadn’t been lost in the flurry of publicity, and Noel had been busy inducting new followers.
"If you’d bother to look up,” a terrifyingly familiar voice barked, “You’d fucking know.”
She looked up. The reporter from the New York Times was standing at her desk - his young, angry face inches away from her own.
“Nothing I said was aired,” he spat, “Everything after ‘I won’t condone death’ was interrupted by an accidental broadcast of fucking
Rosa de Guadalupe.”
“You know how it all changed when everything went digital,” she said, calmly, “No one can figure out how it works. Mistakes happen.”
“I know you tampered with that signal,” he shouted, “You censored me, when I was raising important points.”
Josephina tried to be reasonable, but it was difficult with his eyes staring into hers.
“What we discussed could have severely damaged my message.”
“What, you mean the truth?” he demanded, “A political leader was brutally murdered in your name, and as far as the world knows, your only stance on it is that you’re not a fan of death. If you’re really intent on creating a new religion, your adherents have a right to know the exact nature of your doctrine, including what happens when you kill.”
“I’m sorry,” said Josephina, frustrated, “but I don’t have time to go into every tiny detail of unimportant dogma.”
“How is death unimportant?”
“Because I’m trying to save us all from it!” Josephina stood up from her desk, and met his gaze. They were close enough to feel each other's breath. “I’m not trying to be a religious leader. I’m not trying to start a new faith, or get millions of Twitter followers. I’m just trying to warn everyone what’s coming. The only reason I need people to follow me at all, is that I was specifically told that I was the only one that could save them.”
He stared at her. There was an intensity in his face, she wasn’t sure she liked. Worse, she was afraid she actually did.
“You really believe that.” he said, slowly.
“Of course,” she said, with conviction, “it happened in my backyard.”
The man nodded, and then, without warning, leaned forward and kissed her. She was so shocked, that for a moment she caught herself enjoying it before she pulled back.
“What are you doing?” she demanded.
“Offering you a deal,” he said, with a small grin, “you can interrupt as many signals as you want, but I still recorded our whole exchange. I can release it anytime I want, and if you try to deny me, I can sue you for obstructing my freedom of speech. Want to save the world? Fuck me.”
“What?”
He took a step back, and took his shirt off. He was young and toned. His chest was perfectly muscled in a way she had only thought possible in rock stars and romance novels. She had to stop herself from reaching over her desk to touch it. His expression, which she had initially written off as smug and arrogant, had suddenly become dangerously alluring.
“How many times would we have to do this?” she asked, hoping her breathlessness wasn’t as noticeable as she thought.
“Once to make sure I don’t release the interview,” he said, “and as many times as you’d like, after that.”
She sighed, frustratingly unable to take her eyes of his body. She couldn’t believe she had managed to let this happen. She had been so careful. She was in complete control of her media exposure, and to a certain degree, the whole of the modern media. How had this one, uncontrollable element slipped through her grasp?
At least there was one way to control him. And, she allowed herself to think, it could have been a lot worse.
She turned on her intercom.
“Please cancel any appointments I have for the next few hours,” she said, “something very important has come up. I can’t be disturbed.”
“Josephina saves,” the secretary said, mechanically, back to her. She turned off the intercom.
“Indeed, I do.” she muttered. She looked back up at the reporter. “Take your pants off.”
He smiled, and began to undress.
And so, a distinct pattern began - almost as ritualistic as Sunday afternoons with Noel. The reporter, who she eventually discovered was named Gabe, would come to her with damaging information that had somehow managed to evade her reach, and she would tumble onto the floor with him to make sure he didn’t release it. Though originally, the act was purely out of necessity and done with utmost shame, eventually, like Sunday afternoons, she began to look forward to it. After endless days of devout, loyal followers and unyielding media obsession, the release she experienced giving in to primal desires with a man who was sure she was a fraud was refreshing, and eventually, needed.
Days passed, the end came closer, and yet despite that, nothing in the world seemed to be changing. She had assumed that she would start to see signs of the demise of life as they knew it as the date came closer, but in fact, the only thing that seemed to be diminishing was her ability to take part in it all. The social phenomenon she had spawned had left her unable to leave her headquarters without being mobbed by followers and paparazzi. She couldn’t even go on the internet without being stalked by private messages and @replies. Her weekly sermons had gone from heartfelt speeches to carefully constructed showpieces. She felt detached from the whole of society, artificial when she should have been real. She wondered how she was supposed to be savior to a populous she could no longer connect with, and realized, her only real link to any of them was Gabe.
“How exactly is the world supposed to end?” he asked, one afternoon as they lay entwined on the floor of her office.
“I’m not sure,” she admitted, sighing, “The light just told me that it was all going to end and I had to save it. I thought it would come to me again, but it hasn’t. I’ve been on my own.”
“How can you be sure it contacted you in the first place?”
“I saw it,” she said, “it was right in my backyard. It spoke while I was reading the arts and entertainment section.”
“But there’s a thousand things it could have been,” Gabe pointed out, “people have bizarre visual and auditory hallucinations all the time. It could easily have been something you ate, or the sun affecting you, or you could have dozed off and dreamt it.”
“But Noel saw it too.”
“Did he?”
She thought back. It was so long ago, by this point, and her memory had never been the best. Had he seen it? Or had she simply told him about it?
“He says he saw it.” she said.
“Anybody could say that,” Gabe said, cynically, “I could say I saw it. Doesn’t mean I did. You can’t believe anyone on their words alone, especially these days. You need actual proof.”
“But why would he lie to me about it?” she asked, “he’s never lied to me about anything.”
“Neither had you,” he said, “until recently. Who knows? Maybe he was just humoring you for a while, waiting for you to come to your sense, and then everything became huge, and he decided he wanted a part of it.”
“That would explain why he’s always so involved in publicity and finances,” she said, thoughtfully, “but...no, that’s completely insane. It’s Noel. He’s not that kind of person, he never has been.”
“Would you have even thought of yourself as the messiah type?” Gabe asked, “You can never really know.”
The next few weeks went by in the blur. She spent most of her time in her office, leaving only when it was absolutely necessary. She found it easier to give sermons online, taping them in her office and then pasting them on every piece of social media the world had to offer. Her words reached more people this way, as they didn’t have to travel long distances to hear her speak, and within a few weeks of switching to digital sermons, her message had become a worldwide phenomenon. She was informed that she had devout acolytes in countries she’s never even heard of, and thus, her new found following meant little to her. With Noel so frequently flying out to oversee the spread of their movement overseas, her only real interaction with other people on a day to day basis was essentially just her secretary and Gabe. Her role as a savior of the people suddenly seemed to be a bit far fetched as she gradually shielded herself away from any interaction with people to save.
One late Sunday afternoon, without warning, she heard the doors of her office open. She half expected it to be Gabe, his visits were often a surprise, but was shocked to find that it was Noel. He strode in, tan from his trip to India, and kissed her on the forehead.
“Everything’s almost ready,” he said, proudly, “everyone’s talking about the salvation next week. You should see it, Josephina, it’s like you’ve united the world.”
“Yeah, I guess I have,” she said, bitterly. Noel frowned.
“Are you ok?” he asked, gently, “I know I haven’t been around much. I’ve missed you like crazy, but as soon as this all finally happens, we’ll have all the time in the world to spend together.”
“Will we?” she asked, “I’m not so sure. Do you know how I’m supposed to save the world? Or what, exactly, is going to happen when I do?”
“I don’t know,” said Noel, “hasn’t the light told you anything more?”
“No,” said Josephina, standing up and pacing once again, “it hasn’t. In fact, it actually hasn’t spoken to me since it showed up in our backyard, when we both allegedly saw it.”
“
Allegedly saw it?”
“Allegedly.” Josephina sighed, “I
think I saw a light, and I think it told me I was the messiah. But there are a million other things it could have been. I could have hallucinated it. Maybe I fell asleep on the deck and dreamt it. Maybe I’m an untreated schizophrenic and I haven’t actually been speaking to anyone. There’s no way to prove that any of this is real, let alone that I’m really capable of saving the world from a destruction that I haven’t seen any proof of actually being about to happen.”
“But I know you saw it,” said Noel, “I was there. I saw it too.”
“Did you? I have no way of really knowing that for sure. All I have are your words, and you could easily be giving me incorrect ones.”
Noel stopped her, and wrapped his arm around her. He looked down at her, but she didn’t meet his eyes.
“Josephina,” he said, in a tone she knew he only used with her, “Why would I lie to you? Why would I support you and follow you like this? You know we were both there, and you know that we both saw it.”
She looked up at him. His eyes were bright, and earnest. Despite the years on his face, she could almost believe he was still the young man she’d met at her college orientation. It was as if he hadn’t aged a day.
But of course, he had. She still loved him with the same passion she had when they first spoke, but times had changed since then.
They had changed since then.
“You have no idea,” she said, slowly, “how much I want to believe you. But, these days, there’s no way to tell if anyone’s honest or not. I’m sorry.”
“Josephina - “
“Please leave,” she said, hoping she wouldn’t cry, “and don’t come back.”
He might have wanted to protest. He might have tried to say something. She wasn’t sure. She was firmly looking away from him as she heard footsteps slowly moving towards the door. When she finally looked back, he was gone.
“What is meaning?” she asked Gabe two days later as they were sprawled, once again, on her office floor. He raised an eyebrow.
“You’re the messiah,” he said, “that’s probably one of those questions you should have the answer to.”
“But I don’t,” said Josephina, sighing. Her eyes were fixed on the ceiling, rather than on him. “I was a consultant before the light appeared, you know. I thought there was meaning in it. I was helping people, I thought, helping businesses to be successful - to achieve their goals. I suppose, in a way, I sort of thought I was already a savior. And then I married Noel, and everything seemed to fit. I had really thought I found it. A life, a love, and a purpose - all of it meaningful. And then the light came, and I was called to a higher purpose, and I thought ‘alright, clearly that wasn’t it. Clearly meaning is more complicated and bizarre than I thought’ but lately, I’ve been wondering if it really is that complicated.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m wondering if, maybe, my life had more meaning when I was a random consultant with a life no one had heard of, than it does now that I’m the savior of the damn world.”
Gabe shrugged.
“To you it probably did,” he said, almost flippantly, “but, that’s what happens when you step up to the plate like you did.”
She turned and looked at him. He was lighting a cigarette, something she had originally told him he couldn’t do in her office, but had eventually consented to as their relationship had grown. He was considerate about it - or at least, she had always thought of him as being considerate. As she watched him and thought back, she realized he almost always lit up right in front of her while they were still on the floor. He had never made it a point to smoke out the window, or blow the smoke in another direction. He simply did what he wanted.
“Noel left me,” she said, pointedly, “or rather, I threw him out.”
This got Gabe’s attention. For the first time since they had begun their afternoon activities, he looked at her - his face, as always, frustratingly difficult to read.
“You threw Noel out?” he asked, in a tone that could very well have betrayed excitement. Josephina nodded.
“It was like you said,” she said, “I couldn’t trust him. I have to believe what I’m doing, and with him there, all I could focus on was the doubt.”
“And, are you still doubting?”
“Well, yes,” she admitted, “I thought that, maybe, if I let go of Noel, I could finally stop questioning everything and realize what it all means. I thought he was the thing holding me back. But he’s gone, and I still have no idea what I’m supposed to do.”
Still balancing his cigarette between his fingers, Gabe abruptly got himself up and walked towards his briefcase at the other end of the room. She sat up and watched him, but he wouldn’t look at her.
“Maybe you’re not supposed to do anything,” he said, “except fall.”
“What?”
He still wouldn’t turn. He was almost eerily motionless compared to how she generally saw him.
“This has happened so many times,” he said, slowly, “Someone rises to the top and then falls to the bottom. People create outrageous expectations. We feel like the world is going to end, and then it doesn’t. Maybe that’s all this is. Maybe we need it.”
He finished his cigarette, and buried it in the ashtray on her desk. He sighed, picked up his briefcase, and finally turned.
“You might not know your purpose,” he said, “but I think I do.”
She watched him leave, unmoving from her place on the floor. Maybe it was her knowledge as the messiah, or maybe it was just instinct, but somehow she was very much aware that she would never see him again.
The news of Josephina’s dumping of her husband and subsequent affair with an apparently “unnamed” member of the press suddenly spread like wildfire. Everyone had an opinion on it, so many people, in fact, that Josephina’s formerly devoted team of media watchdogs simply gave up trying to control it. Whether in support of, or against Josephina, it was all anyone could talk about. No mission, no world ending panic, simply discussion of her personal life. As soon as it became common knowledge that Josephina was doubting the reality of her mission, she went straight from object of admiration and worship, to object of international ridicule.
Desperate to rescue her cause, but unwilling to leave her office and subject herself to a press conference, she held a last minute livestream on her website and opened it up for questions. To the great pleasure of the world of late night comedy, the question with the most “likes” at the end of the night was “r u avoiding the press because ur afraid you’ll fuck them?”
Josephina, having absolutely no idea how to intelligently respond, simply answered that she didn’t appreciate that kind of language being used in relation to herself. The author of the comment became a minor internet celebrity, while Josephina’s response became that week’s most popular meme. As the prophesied end of the world came even closer, Josephina frantically spoke through just about every social media outlet she could find, but was met with nothing but snarky, abusive comments and several people informing her it would be within her best interest to go die. Even her secretary was unable to keep a straight face around her, and after she was fired, she went straight onto Fox News.
In a coffee shop in Times Square, Noel sat - tired and sad - across the table from Gabe. Both were fixed on a large screen outside, in which a comedian was broadcasting a satirical apocalypse special counting down to the end of the world. The countdown reached ten. The comedian put on a crash helmet.
“With only ten seconds to live,” the comedian said, “I want the world to know that I’m sorry I wasn’t the one who fucked Josephina Rush.”
The audience, and the people watching on the street, roared with laughter. Noel and Gabe took simultaneous sips of their drinks. The countdown reached zero. The comedian shouted “Josephina Saves” desperately as the screen went black. There was silence. For one moment, and one moment only, you could hear a pin drop.
The screen flickered back to life. The comedian looked around him in mock awe.
“Wow,” he said, “the end of the world sure looks alot like…
the world.”
There was laughter. Those watching from the street continued walking, realizing that if they really wanted to see the rest, they could probably catch it on YouTube.
Noel looked down at his drink, despondent. Gabe raised an eyebrow.
“Did you really want the world to end?” he asked.
“A bit,” he said, “For her sake.” He sighed. “I just wonder what comes next.”
“Another apocalypse, I expect,” said Gabe, with a frustrating air of ease that Noel suddenly envied, “once the hilarity of having lived through this one dies down, we’ll all get cynical again, and start looking for another one.”
But Noel didn’t want to start looking for another apocalypse. He wanted his sunday afternoon paper on the deck, and a special on the Chrysler Building in the evening. He wanted to hear his wife tell him stories of how surprisingly difficult it was consulting for Dannon yogurt, and ask her where she wanted to go on their next vacation.
“I wonder when we stopped enjoying things.” he mused, quietly, to no one in particular. Gabe finished his drink, and turned towards the window.
“I don’t know,” he said, uncharacteristically contemplative, “maybe we never did. I can’t help thinking that, as crazy as it all is, we might need this kind of thing. Like, without a savior for us to obsess over and tear down, we’d all go insane, and the world really would end.”
He reached into his briefcase and pulled out some cash. He stood up, and threw the money on the table next to his drink.
“Who knows,” he said, “Maybe Josephina really did save us all.”
Noel didn’t look at him as he stepped away from the table. He was contemplating the newspaper, and how much longer it would be available in print. He’d probably have to get an ipad soon, he realized. He wondered if Sundays would be different in digital.
The following morning, Josephina’s secretary woke and realized she hadn’t received her last paycheck before she was fired. Already annoyed at how difficult the job’s appearance on her resume had made acquiring a new job, she stormed into her former employer’s office with every intention of unleashing the full wrath of her caffeine deprived, early morning rage.
Except Josephina wasn’t there.
The office was almost exactly as she had last seen it - essentially the den of a madwoman. There were papers everywhere, with blankets and pillows nearly covering the floor and an old, musty scent that made it clear the room’s occupant had neither washed nor left the room in quite a long time. Despite that, it was eerily empty.
She attempted to cross the room to search the desk for her paycheck, but stopped halfway there. She stared at the floor in the center of the room, somehow mostly untouched by the filth of the rest of the office. She pulled out her iphone and snapped a picture. Within moments, it was on Facebook.
The picture was of a patch of floor which she helpfully tagged “my ex-boss’s office.” Beneath the picture she commented “went 2 J-Rush’s place today. she wasn’t there, but this was. WTF?” On the floor were a large group of perfectly rounded grey stones. They spelled two words.
“Josephina Saves.”
