by Rob Sheely
Rob entered this story in the February/26 writing contest “333/33” (prose, fewer than 333 words).
“No one ever said on their deathbed, ‘I wish I’d spent more time at the office.’”
Bob Green had heard the saying before, but somehow when his wife texted it to him on this particular Saturday, it sank in.
Enough, he said to himself. He closed his laptop on the big proposal he was preparing and stood up from his desk. He grabbed his jacket, hustled out the office door, and made it to the soccer field in time to see his daughter Elaine score the winning goal.
On Monday, when his boss said, “Where’s that proposal?” Bob said, “I decided to put my family first. And because I did, I got to see my daughter kick the winning goal.”
“That’s admirable,” said his boss. “But you just cost us a 25 million-dollar contract. You’re fired.”
Bob had the bad fortune to experience his spiritual awakening during a tight labor market, so he had no luck finding a new job. His wife was understanding—until his unemployment ran out.
“I can’t be with a man who doesn’t pull his weight,” she said, handing him divorce papers.
Because he’d exhausted his savings, Bob didn’t have the money for a decent lawyer, and she took him to the cleaners. After the dust settled, all he could afford was a shabby studio apartment in a bad part of town. His kids hated visiting him there, and when he went to his daughter’s soccer games, she pretended she didn’t know him.
The only job he could find was stocking shelves at Walmart. It beat his body, and within six months, he was buying Percocets off his coworkers. Unfortunately, one of them turned out to be a counterfeit pill made with Chinese fentanyl.
That night, on the sagging sofa that would serve as his deathbed, as the life drained from his body, with only the angels to hear his dying words, Bob looked up to heaven and said, “Goddamnit, I wish I’d spent more time at the office!”