The board meeting, much to my surprise and slight disappointment, did not end with anyone being fired via a dramatic, monologue-heavy speech. Alexander emerged ninety minutes later looking invigorated, not vanquished. He swept past my desk, his "Titan of Industry" stance firmly back in place.
"A decisive victory, Miss Chen," he declared without stopping. "The 'Visionary Contemplating the Horizon' pose was particularly effective during the Q3 projections. They couldn't argue with a man who seemed to be seeing profits they couldn't even imagine. Now, I require solitude. The creative vortex needs replenishing. Hold all calls."
He disappeared into his office, leaving me to wonder what "holding calls" even meant, since all calls were, by design, filtered through the telepathic ether of Sterling.
I spent the next hour tackling the logistical nightmare of the "melancholic cyclone survivor" desk slab. Emails with Alistair Finch were progressing into the finer points of resin pattern density and the philosophical implications of the wood's "narrative tears." I was using a simple, reliable black ballpoint pen to take notes on a legal pad—a relic from my old life that felt grounding amidst the digital chaos.
Around 11:17 AM, the door to Alexander's office flew open. He stood there, his face pale, his hand trembling slightly. In it, he held a single sheet of paper.
"Miss Chen," he said, his voice a strained whisper. "What is the meaning of this?"
I stood up, my heart doing a nervous tap-dance. Had I messed up the ebony order? Had the Norwegian desk-dismantler come back from his meditation retreat early and caused a problem?
"I... I'm not sure, sir. What is it?"
He strode forward and thrust the paper at me. It was an internal memo from the accounting department, signed by Robert, the pistachio-green-auraed CFO. It was about expense report formatting. It was, in a word, boring. But it was written in a bright, cheerful, utterly offensive shade of blue ink.
"Look at it!" Alexander commanded, pointing a dramatic finger at the page. "The color! The sheer... audacity of that hue!"
"It's... a memo, sir. About expense reports."
"It's an assault on the optic nerve!" he cried, staggering back a step as if the paper were radiating a toxic aura. "That shade of blue! It's the color of cheap ballpoint pens, of bureaucratic indifference, of... of low-cost airline tickets! It has no place in this environment. It disrupts the creative frequency! I felt a sharp pain behind my right eye the moment I saw it."
I stared at him, then at the memo. It was just blue ink. A little garish, perhaps, but hardly a biohazard.
"Sir, perhaps it was just the printer—"
"No!" he interrupted. "This is intentional. This is Robert's doing. A passive-aggressive attack on the very soul of this company! A declaration of war fought with stationery!" He crumpled the memo into a ball and threw it into the air with a flourish, where it arced pathetically and landed on the polished concrete floor. "This will not stand."
He marched back into his office and slammed the door. I stood frozen, the crumpled blue memo at my feet. A declaration of war fought with stationery. Right.
Less than three minutes later, my tablet chimed with an urgent, company-wide alert. The sender was Sterling, but the voice was pure Alexander.
MEMORANDUM
TO: All Wilde Enterprises Personnel
FROM: Office of the CEO
SUBJECT: Immediate Moratorium on Cobalt-Based Writing Instruments
Effective immediately, the use of all blue-colored ink pens (encompassing, but not limited to, shades designated as cobalt, azure, royal, navy, sky, and periwinkle) is strictly forbidden on all company premises.
This moratorium extends to all written and printed materials. The vibrational frequency emitted by blue ink has been deemed incompatible with the company's core innovative and energetic ethos. It creates dissonance, stifles creativity, and is hereby classified as an aesthetic contaminant.
All existing blue pens are to be surrendered to departmental administrators for proper, respectful disposal (incineration is preferred). Black ink is the mandated standard. Exceptions may be granted for the use of green ink by Vice Presidents and above, and red ink solely for the personal annotations of the CEO.
This is not a suggestion. Compliance is mandatory.
I read it twice. Then I read it a third time. It was the most insane thing I had ever read, and I had recently calibrated a coffee thermometer against the fundamental constants of the universe.
A soft ping came from my tablet. A direct message from Brenda in Marketing.
Brenda: OMG. The blue pen memo. Is this for real? My entire team uses blue pens. They say it shows "clarity of thought."
CChen: I'm afraid it's very real. The CEO felt a physical pain.
Brenda: Wow. Okay. So black pens only. Got it. This is going to make the quarterly reports look so much more... sinister. I love it!
Another ping. This one from Leo in R&D.
Leo: does this ban extend to blue whiteboard markers? because if so, we're screwed. also, is he okay? he looked a little tense after the board meeting.
Before I could answer, my intercom buzzed. It was Sterling.
"Miss Chen. A situation. Robert from Accounting is at my desk, waving a blue pen and demanding to speak to the 'author of that frivolous memo.' How would you like to handle this?"
I took a deep breath. I was the "supporting character." The wind, not the hurricane. But the hurricane was locked in his office, probably recovering from his encounter with the aggressive cerulean hue.
"Tell Robert," I said, my voice surprisingly steady, "that the memo is final. And if he values his quarterly bonus, he will put the blue pen down and back away slowly."
There was a pause on Sterling's end. I thought I heard the faintest sound that might have been a suppressed chuckle. "Very good, Miss Chen."
I looked down at the black pen in my hand. It suddenly felt powerful. Authoritative. Sinister, even.
A new message flashed on my screen, this one from Alexander himself.
AWilde: The edict has been issued. The first blow against mediocrity has been struck. I feel the creative vortex already stabilizing. Well done.
I hadn't done anything. But okay. I looked at the crumpled blue memo on the floor. A small, rebellious part of me wanted to smooth it out and keep it as a souvenir. Proof that I had officially reached the point in my career where the color of ink was a strategic corporate priority.
Instead, I picked it up, walked to the shredder, and fed it in. The machine whirred, chewing up the offensive blue words. It was, I realized, my first official act of corporate pen-based warfare.
This was my life now. And against all odds, it was never, ever boring.