Bill.

Bill.



It was Tuesday, November 23rd, 2025. A mild day, at about 17 degrees. A light grey overcast blocked out any hope of sunlight, and made for a freestanding dampness within the air. Bill awoke at precisely 6:53, 7 minutes before his alarm would commence it's familiar, yet annoying blast of "Today's Modern Country", interrupting a last ditch attempt at 5 extra minutes of sleep from Bill. Bill then proceeded downstairs and poured himself a medium sized bowl of Rasin Bran, and a small glass of 2% milk. This process was repeated Monday to Saturday.

After his usual morning routine, Bill walked 2 blocks up, 1 block left to the bus stop. While he waited, a small plastic bag tumbled throughout the street. This grabbed Bill's attention for several seconds, which turned out to be long enough that he missed the bus to work, and would now have to wait 33 minutes until the next bus arrived. In a mild despair, Bill sat down, took a cigarette out of his pack, lit it, and waited for the underage kid behind him to ask for a smoke. Of course, Bill would comply politely, however the immense number of underage smokers living within Bills' small, suburban neighborhood gave him a negative attitude towards the next generation.

After 17 minutes, the kid quietly shuffled away from Bill, eager to catch the coming bus, which Bill was hoping would take him to school. Bill felt the need to inquire, but in the end decided against it. Avoiding social situations was one of Bills specialties, along with mathematics. The bus driver looked at Bill for several seconds, then slowly pulled away, proceeding downtown, where the kid would most likely end up skipping all of his classes. As Bills' bus finally arrived, he felt a small head-rush immediately after he stood, forcing him to stay still and let the universe catch up with him.

Bill sat 2 rows from the back of the bus, staring out into a particularly dull, shadowy grey that currently occupied the sky. About 5 minutes from his stop, Bill noticed that someone had scratched " HFW '15". Bill laughed to himself as he realized the scratch had been made by someone in his graduating class.  Bill then thought back, to all the other times he'd taken this same bus route to the same building at the same time, then took an elevator to the same floor, walked 3 cubicles down, two over, to the same 48 square foot area he occupied everyday, from 8:05 to 4:35. Bill then began to think of all the tasks, activities, things that he repeated day in, day out, thinking how much of his life he's wasted doing the same things. Bill then realized, that these seemingly meaningless, medial, tedious tasks and activities were his life.

As Bill walked into his building, he picked a flower from a concrete planter outside the door, gave it a long, satisfying sniff, causing him to arrive at work at 8:06, precisely one minute late, throwing off his morning routine by one minute, thus throwing off his daily routine by one minute. This one minute would continue to affect Bill for the majority of his life.

Bill had worked at GLB for 24 years. Every so often he wondered how he'd slipped through the cracks of life. Bill was a very smart individual, and had taken an IB program in high school. He had excelled, but every major university had managed to overlook him, each of them taking much more interest in Sacramento High's State championship football team. Bill had ended up settling for a 1000 dollar scholarship to Compuvista Business institute, despite his 3.9 GPA.

Bill went through the motions, as he did every day. Same keyboard, same computer monitor, same reports, same mile high stack of paperwork he would have to make his way through for the remainder of his life. The day seemed to drag on and on, seconds like minutes, minutes like hours, hours like days. This wasn't unusual for a Tuesday, but what was unusual was the speed of which Bill was finishing reports. His fingers moved lethargically throughout the keyboard, his left hand coming up once every 86 seconds, to scratch the lower left side of his head, his eyes constantly making their way over to the new receptionist. She was cute, wore a short-but-not-too-short red summer dress, minimal makeup, just the usual eyelash stuff and some lipstick. She sat atop an older office stool, her arms hanging over a desk that was most likely older than Bill himself, and Bill wasn't young. She didn't seem young either, or at least her body didn't. She carried herself like she was still a young woman, flashy, sexy, whatever you want to call it. He caught himself staring sporadically throughout the day, yet he could never muster the courage to go talk to her. He occasionally daydreamed of doing something for her, like sending flowers, or leaving a box of chocolates, but, once again, he could never muster the courage to do so.

Bill smiled at her weakly as he made his way to the elevator, before watching it close in his face. This was the first time in 35 years he had missed the first elevator down. He stood for a moment, staring awkwardly at his shoes, trying to think of something to say to the receptionist, who, according to her desk, was Gina. Her nameplate made Bill think she held some sort of authority over the rest of the staff. He began to speak, but words caught in his throat. He simply stared at her for a moment, his mouth lying slightly agape.  He decided to contine staring at his shoes, social situations were not Bills strong suit. The whistle the elevator made on its way up would've been absolutely inaudible if either of them had made a noise, but they didn't.

The doors opened swifly, and Bill stepped in equally as swift. There it was, the old generic elevator music, that hadn't been updated since Bill had began as an intern. It was a relatively short ride down, although from Bills perspective, it felt like a century. He looked over and smiled at Gina exactly 12 times before stepping out into the lobby. But before walking away from her, something in his mind spoke to him. "Do it. What's the worst that could happen?"
So, Bill turned, and spoke, finally. "Have a good night."

It wasn't much, but it was enough. Bill didn't understand. Something about him had changed since this morning, but he couldn't figure out what. His routine had been executed perfectly. Little did he know, that one simple minute would change everything.

Bills bus ride home was spent making three phone calls each day, his mother, his cousin in Mexico, and his brother, who, stupidly enough, moved to Eastern Canada. His mothers conversations mainly revolved around why Bill wasn't married, when she was going to have more grand kids, and her latest weekend bingo nightcap, lasting an average of 12 minutes and 32 seconds. His cousins' conversations usually revolved around him trying to get back over the border, or the latest hooker he had conned into sleeping with him. They never talked long, lasting anywhere from 3 minutes and 12 seconds to 4 minutes and 37 seconds. His brother was his favorite to call. He had moved to Nova Scotia 9 years ago, and despite immediately regretting it, he decided to stay. He became a mechanic, had a wife, a boy (who was now a young man) , and twin daughters.

Bill had great admiration for his brother, based purely on his daring personality, which, in reality, was exceedingly average. they would sometimes end up talking for hours,  about whatever was on their minds, from work to the kids to Bills extraordinarily lackluster love life. However, his brother never answered the phone. It wasnt the first time, so Bill didn't think anything of it.

His nightly routine went as it always did. Delivery from Hongs, despite it was only a 2 minute and 7 second walk from his small townhouse. Once he ordered, he'd watch old Star Trek re-runs on the local sci-fi network. Once he ate his meal, which, on Tuesdays consisted of 2 egg rolls, 1 spring roll, 6 pieces of spicy chicked, and 1.7 scoops of brown rice drowned in soya sauce. After that, Bill would nurse 2 beers, and drink a 3rd down to the top of the label before refrigerating it for Friday.

There was a comically large bottle of Scotch sitting on top of his fridge, a gift from his brother. It was a Canadian Scotch, brewed in some Small town called "Glenora". It had been there for almost 8 years. He'd never found the time or had any real desire to drink it, but, for some reason, he always kept it there.