The Part After the Shift

September first. The shift report was three pages, which felt like a lot for a Tuesday, and the coffee from the break room was that particular brand of bad that you stop remarking on after a while because it's just the weather. I was walking out at the same time as Simone, which happens often enough that it doesn't feel like coincidence anymore, it just feels like the shape of the day.

The parking lot looked good. I want to be honest about that, because I don't say it often: late afternoon in early September does something specific to a parking lot, turns the asphalt briefly amber, makes the whole thing look like it belongs in a photograph someone meant to take. Simone set her phone against her bag on the hood of someone's car as a kind of joke, or half a joke, because I said something like 'this is the best light all day' and she heard it as an invitation. The timer went off three times. I don't know which frame she thought was the one.

reconstructing the shift, parking lot edition

We stood there longer than we needed to. That's the parking lot debrief, it's not a formal thing, there's no agenda, it's just the last ten minutes of a shift happening outdoors with better air than the break room. She said something about next Tuesday's schedule. I said something about the shift report. Neither of us moved toward our respective directions.

the goodbye that takes another ten minutes

The 5K was two days ago. The prints are still leaning against the kitchen wall. None of that had anything to do with September first, which was just a long shift and a parking lot and that specific angle of end-of-summer light. I'm writing about it anyway because the draft folder has been full of larger things lately, and sometimes the smaller one is the one that fits.