So Much
There was just so much of it. Page after page, all filled. In SINGLE-spaced lines. Some of her writing submissions were in freehand. And they had no idea what to do with all of it. They would have to chuck it, they had no ROOM for all of it.
If Mandy had wanted it back, she should have asked for it right away. The secretary had rushed out Mandy's rejection letter after her second interview. The night before, they had received a third box of submissions. They feared a fourth.
Five months passed since she'd delivered the boxes. Mandy hadn't the courage to ask for them back.
It was, all agreed, a charming first interview. Mandy Rodin had interviewed very well. It was all they had to go on at first — that and her two initial writing samples, pieces showing real promise. ("Were they hers?" was a question asked ad nauseam since.)
Mandy seemed affable, laid-back. A little bit slow in speaking, but maybe she was just tired. She was working two jobs, and washing dishes on a graveyard shift must dull one's energy level. The day after her first interview, she appeared at the office with some muffins and cupcakes. She was savvy enough to know a magazine staff will rarely turn down food. A zebra dropped into a pen of starving lions is treated more gently than a box of donuts around that place. Mandy stayed for about ten minutes, and was given a casual tour. Her second interview, at this point, was assured.
But it turns out she was just… dull. If she were in a movie, she would be lambasted by critics as a stereotype.
Each sentence seemed to have an unspoken "heeeeeyyyy" preceding it. She was never ruffled, and no one could even consider her that way. Unless maybe someone broke her bong.
But that wasn't what caught the interviewers off-guard as much the second time around. It was the two boxes of submissions she brought along.
She actually became this sort of inside joke around the magazine. This person who produced SOOOO MUCH CRAP. Reams of it. It was obvious after reading five pieces that it was all trash. It was sad how much manpower must have gone into just writing it all down. It contained no evidence of editing. (Oh GOD, hopefully this wasn't a piece she'd re-read and improved upon, was it?)
They were going to just throw it all out. After Stacy read something unintentionally funny, it was decided that one box would survive for occasional Friday afternoon amusement. The staff would pull out piece after dismal piece, making pathetically hilarious discoveries, the box transformed from nuisance into children's party grab bag. Two months after Mandy was impersonally thanked and notified her information was on file, the staff invented a game. On slow days, they would take out her submissions. One person would flip through its pages until someone else yelled "stop;" the open page would be read aloud. This piece would finally be read by someone, sixty or more days after it had found its way to them. And without fail, it was horrible. Dreadful. Staggeringly bad. They called the game "Monkeys With Typewriters." It would eventually be adjusted to "Brain-Damaged Monkeys With Typewriters." They would wipe tears of laughter away as they'd read her sincere attempts at poetry, prose, et cetera for the very first time.
So the day she showed up, the mere mention of the name Mandy Rodin broke everyone out in hysterics. Their receptionist Peggy had joked about the very scenario only a week before.
Peggy can't tell you now what possessed her to put Mark on speakerphone when she announced Mandy. But Mark should have known better than to call her bluff with a smartass comment and a deadpan hang-up. (It would be the last time both would make such mistakes.)
Mandy heard Mark's comment. She paused a moment, filing it emotionally, then suddenly pushed her way past Peggy, past the reception area. She wandered around the office, sniffing out Mark's cubicle. She was cutting her way through lines of her own work. They were lobbed around her from laughing writers. The heat-seeking laughter shot out from cubicle rows, ricocheting off of her and setting her skin on fire.
Mark turned white when she discovered his desk. His mouth actually fell open.
Peggy was frozen, stunned by all of this. She had tried to call Mark again to convince him she wasn't joking, but the writers' comments and laughter must have drowned out his phone.
Stacy leaned over Mark's cube wall, quoting one particularly bad poem. It became a gasp when she saw Mandy. She couldn't help but laugh again. She always laughed when she was extremely nervous. She held the laugh tightly in her face, running to the bathroom.
There was a long pause.
Mandy asked Mark for her submissions back, please.
He made an almost imperceptible move towards the Box of Shame, instinctively. Half-full now, the rest thrown out, or used as scratch paper, the more priceless works stolen. One poem was tucked in a staff writer's birthday card. Thank goodness she didn't see the pages on the wall near the cooler.
To her credit, Mandy stayed calm. She asked for it back. All of it.
Mark swallowed, and he swore he could taste sand in his throat. He finally squeaked out:
"There was just so much of it."
"I know. I want it back."
He briefly considered handing whatever was left back to her, but then remembered some scribbled editorials. Was the "Most Brain-Damaged Monkey Submission" winner still in there?
"We had no idea what to do with all of it. I'm sorry, we had to chuck it, we had no ROOM."
She looked at him, her bloodshot eyes narrowing.
"Look, man. Those pages were my only copy."
He was stunned. The burning in his stomach dropped down to his knees. He could no longer distract himself with the one question that had been running through his mind over and over: Why is security taking so long why is security taking so long why is security taking so long
He felt badly about that moment for years. He would jump when someone even resembling Mandy got onto the train. While the others continued (fueled by her brazen trespassing), Mark never ridiculed her again.
Years later, after he'd finally forgotten all about it, he came across a remnant of Mandy's writing. He was retired now, sifting through a forgotten box while packing up his house.
He read the piece, with empathy and consideration this time.
The hurt, sincere shock she displayed at the edge of his desk now colored every word he read.
And, to his surprise, it still sucked.
Otium
