by Nino Cipri
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To anyone who has struggled to find their voice and speak out
Welcome aboard!
We are so pleased that you have joined us on this journey.
As a Special Exempt Employee, you are on the forefront of an exciting new era at LitenVärld. We are living in an exciting time of big changes. We couldn’t do this without you. We are grateful to you, and expect that the feeling is mutual.
At LitenVärld, there is a place for everyone, and we want to help you find your place—then make it good enough that you’ll never want to leave. This handbook is both a map and a compass. It’s meant to orient you and help you find your way. It contains all of the information and resources you’ll ever need to succeed, but you are allowed to talk to your Resource Management representative in the unlikely event that you want anything else.
Table of Contents
The LitenVärld Universe™ and Your Place Within It: How it all began, and how this is going to go.
Orienting Our Own Moral Compass: We’d be lost without it!
Known and Unknown Risks: Acting fast is always better than acting slow, but it’s not without its risks. Luckily, our employees are adept, adaptable, and quick to learn how to mitigate them.
Shortsight and Farsight: Do we know where we’ll be in five years? Thirty years? Do we know what we’ll be facing tomorrow? Next month? Is there any point at all in thinking about future consequences? Or should we treat every moment like it’s something to be conquered?
Expecting the Unexpected: A boring chapter about personnel policy. No real surprises here. ;)
There Is No Escape . . . From Fun! Are you ready to get this party started? Well, this party was going for a long time before you got here, and will continue long after you leave. Here’s how to enjoy yourself in the time you have.
When “Don’t Be Evil” Fails, Try “Don’t Be Boring”: It’s worked for us since 1958.
Changing the World, One Room at a Time! How to build a revolution in thirty-two easy-to-follow steps. Complete with diagrams!
The Journey Never Ends: It’s not the destination that matters! Time and distance are illusions!
Chapter 1: The LitenVärld Universe™ and Your Place Within It
After everything, it’s hard not to think in lasts, the same way other people—normal people, real people—might think of firsts. Derek saw his share of other people’s firsts as a sales associate at LitenVärld: fiancés wandering through the store with a scanning gun, marking out items for their first home as newlyweds. Visibly pregnant customers picking out changing tables and toys for a first child.
LitenVärld had a whole section dedicated to firsts in its online catalog: the Milestone Collection, a soft-focus, dreamlike collage of normal firsts for normal lives. The catalog was empty of people yet full of life, strangely voyeuristic. It made Derek feel like an intruder, gazing at the well-furnished spaces whose occupants always seemed to be just in the other room, on the verge of returning and discovering Derek’s unwelcome presence.
Derek’s own quarters were furnished mostly from the damaged-and-returned pile at the store, and while he tried to re-create the feelings that the catalog portrayed—warmth, comfort, welcome, family, belonging, home—in the end, there was only so much he could do with a repurposed shipping container on the edge of the back parking lot.
Not that Derek wasn’t thankful! It was wonderful that LitenVärld provided housing for him, as well as his uniform, off-duty clothes, and nutritious meals. Practicing gratitude was a healthy habit of self-care, and his employee guide emphasized the need for self-care. He exercised before and after every shift, jogging around the expansive parking lot and picking up litter as he went. He stretched and did thirty minutes of yoga before bed, following along with an old DVD that had formerly been a decoration in one of the showrooms. He practiced speaking in the mirror, practiced his smile, practiced keeping his shoulders relaxed and his hands in a neutral position.
But he would look through the Milestones that he was missing, the many events that seemed to define everyone’s life but his, and feel heavy, as if he were casting a second shadow, thicker and darker than his normal one, that stretched out behind him and dragged down his steps.
So: Derek’s lasts, since he couldn’t quite remember his firsts. He ate his last plate of LitenVärld meatballs on a Tuesday in February, accompanied by a Greek salad and a small container of ginger ice cream with lingonberry jam. He ordered his last half-caf skim latte that afternoon, and it was likewise the last time the barista—who knew his order, but only deigned to make it correctly about a third of the time—gave him a full-caf, leaving Derek slightly ill and jittery during his last evening break in his last double shift. After eating his last box of frozen lasagna in his converted container apartment, he went for a walk in the frozen fields behind LitenVärld to watch the sun set. For the last time, he walked up to an invisible line that he didn’t realize demarcated the property and, for the last time, he turned around without bothering to think about what lay beyond the line of stunted spruce trees, returning to his shipping container to get ready for his shift.
The store had been preparing for LitenVärld’s new VIP membership program. Disappointing sales numbers over Christmas had led to corporate pulling the trigger on the program months early, rolling out the initiative with a grand opening in March at select stores, including theirs. There was a sneak preview in a week for select customers that were part of the LitenVärld Universe loyalty program. Derek and a couple of other employees had been pulling doubles to build the new VIP lounge, converting a series of rooms at the center of the store into a closed-off section filled with high-end luxury furnishings, according to secret specs sent from corporate.
Small amounts of stress were good for you; they made you grow. He went into the bathroom to brush his teeth and get ready. On the advice of Tricia, his manager, he practiced his facial expressions in the mirror, repeating phrases from the LitenVärld handbook to himself until they sounded instinctive and natural.
“Nobody likes a sales robot, Derek,” she had said during one of their check-ins, scolding him for his stilted delivery. “Customers want a human touch in their time of need.”
A human touch in their time of need. The phrase had felt so powerful that it had become a mantra for him.
“What can I help you with today?” Derek asked his reflection. Eyebrows raised and tilted slightly to signal a polite inquiry, hands loose near his hips, shoulders set back at an unthreatening angle. “What can I help you with today? What can I help you with today?”
That was when he noticed the tenderness, the croak in his voice. He tried to clear his throat and winced in pain. Derek leaned toward the mirror and stretched his mouth open wide; nothing looked strange in the harsh, fluorescent light.
He’d heard Tricia complaining about workers getting sick—either coming to the store when they should have stayed home, or staying home when they were obviously faking being ill. He’d never felt the need. There was a phone number he could call if he experienced any physical issues; it was posted on the first page of his Lite
nVärld employee manual, the numbers large and stark. He felt an inexplicable sense of disquiet about calling it. It seemed like a waste of time to report just a sore throat. He pressed his fingers flat against his throat, prodding at the soreness.
He’d hold off on calling them. He didn’t want to want Tricia to complain about him the way she complained about his coworkers.
* * *
Derek arrived at the empty store just as the last closing-shift workers were leaving the store. One or two nodded to Derek out of compulsory Midwestern politeness, and he smiled back (mouth closed, corners raised in a closed-off smile, respectful of their disinterest in conversation). The rest ignored him, which was normal. He wished there were an easy way to bridge the gulf between them, a team-building exercise or icebreaker that would unlock actual friendship with his teammates. But they seemed universally put off by Derek’s friendly overtures, and it upset him that he didn’t know what he was doing wrong. He’d asked Tricia, his manager, for advice, but she’d told him to keep his eyes on his own work.
Tricia was waiting just inside the front doors, tapping her foot impatiently.
“I don’t suppose you saw Jules on your way in?” she asked.
“No, but I’m early,” Derek said. He always arrived a minimum of ten minutes before his shift started. Sometimes earlier, if the boredom and silence in his container overwhelmed him.
Tricia huffed. “God damn it. Jules is on thin ice, I swear.”
Derek wanted to think that speaking to him like this signaled that Tricia considered him a peer, capable of discretion. He didn’t like to think that she knew nobody would bother to listen to him.
“Well, I’ll be downstairs!” he said. “Have a good night, Tricia!”
She grunted at him, and Derek cut through the children’s section, swung left past a cluster of open-concept living rooms and kitchens, and descended down the stairs to the cavernous basement, where they did all the assembly and stocking for the store. When Jules came down about fifteen minutes later, Derek had already made a dent in their assembly quota for the night. It was a relatively easy load-in/load-out: three showrooms, two of them under 150 square feet, including a children’s playroom with no heavy furniture.
“Hey, Derek,” Jules said.
Jules had been a seasonal temp who’d been upgraded to permanent, though they weren’t a great fit, in Derek’s opinion. He’d learned to spot the ones who would never belong—who, astoundingly, didn’t want to belong. Jules remained as seasonal as a fad for blush tones or oxidized oak. They didn’t have the staying power of an Arc lamp or Eames chair. At least they were friendly, more than Derek could say for some of his coworkers.
“Mind if I turn on some music?” they asked.
“Not at all,” Derek replied cheerfully.
The daytime stocking team had a radio that switched between Mexican pop music, hip-hop, and classic rock, depending on the shift lead at the time. Jules didn’t use the radio, but instead plugged in their phone to its auxiliary port. They put on something angry, soulful in a guttural way, which made Derek frown; punk was his least favorite musical genre. It was so alienating, purposely distasteful. Still, if he tuned out the lyrics and the underlying antipathy, the beat made a good rhythm to assemble the furniture to.
Or, it did for him. Jules seemed distracted, slow, and had a hard time navigating the instructions, flipping back and forth between pages in the manual. Their poor efficiency made Derek anxious. He had assembled three-quarters of a room by the time Jules put together a single child’s toy chest. Derek could read the name SVINLÅDA across the empty box. The SVINLÅDA were a recent addition to the children’s section, a small toy chest shaped like a pig. It was upholstered in soft pink faux leather, with a soft snout, ears, and a curly tail. The back was hinged, pulling up to reveal a space to store knickknacks or toys. It was cute, but not overly complicated.
“Would you like some help?” Derek asked. It came out more strained than his normal tone. He could easily imagine Tricia’s frown. A human touch in their time of need, Derek. This wasn’t a scenario he had practiced for.
“I’m fine,” Jules said sharply.
Derek nodded and went back to his modular shelving unit. Message received, loud and clear.
“Actually,” Jules said a moment later, tossing down their hex wrench. “I’m not fine. Actually, everything is shit, I hate this job, I hate my life, and I really just want to get high and listen to Purple Rain on repeat while sleeping until May.”
Derek twisted his hex wrench nervously between his fingers. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
He cringed a little at how hollow and practiced it sounded. His throat twinged again, and he cleared his throat. “If you want to take a break, I can keep working.”
“No, you don’t have to—”
“It’s fine, really,” Derek said, trying to project reassurance, overly aware of how trite he sounded. “I can finish this room myself.”
“I don’t need a break, Derek,” Jules said. “I need these stupid instructions to make sense, and for feelings not to exist, and I need Tricia not to fire me before my health insurance kicks in so I can get a new pair of glasses. And none of those are things you can help me with,” Jules finished. “So let me be miserable in peace, alright?”
They continued working in silence, aside from the caterwauling and power chords. Derek’s hands moved automatically; he didn’t even have to look at the instructions, really. Putting together the flatpacks was intuitive for him.
“What if you unpacked, and I assembled?” Derek suggested gently. “I’ve always found breaking down cardboard to be very relaxing.”
Jules sighed. “I hear I’m good at breaking things.” They abandoned the SVINLÅDA and started stomping on cardboard. Derek, showing what he thought was a lot of restraint, did not tell them that there were more efficient ways to flatten the boxes.
Their work progressed much more smoothly after that. This was the part of his job that Derek loved the most. He was made for sales, he knew. He excelled at it. Working with customers was a rewarding challenge. But he felt most at ease when future pieces of someone’s home were coming together beneath his hands. And whatever Jules had meant by their earlier comment, they were good at breaking down the boxes, stacking the cardboard that could be recycled by the cargo doors. Derek let himself fall into the pleasant rhythm of putting together pieces of someone’s future home.
“What the fuck?!” Jules cried. Derek turned to see them scrabbling away from the flatpack they’d been breaking down, orange box cutter abandoned on the ground. A thick, opaque white fluid leaked from where they’d scored a line in the cardboard.
“Is everything okay?” Derek asked.
“I don’t know, is it okay for a box to start oozing like that?” Jules said.
Sometimes LitenVärld shipped items in strange packaging, and they arrived in the store wrapped in dried kelp or boxes made of some brittle clay that smelled like baker’s yeast or sulfur. One of corporate’s “green” initiatives, Tricia had assured him.
She apparently hadn’t given Jules the same heads-up.
“Yeah, they do that sometimes,” Derek said. He wasn’t sure what the big deal was. “You didn’t get any on you, did you? Sometimes it can cause a rash.”
Jules stared at him, and Derek felt a small flutter of panic. Had he said something weird? He’d just been trying to reassure Jules. Maybe this was why Tricia had told him not to try to make friends with his coworkers.
“There are work gloves, if you want,” he tried. “You’re supposed to bring your own, but I keep a pair stashed—”
“Are we really going to gloss over the fact that the box was leaking sap? Is that not creeping you out at all?”
Derek toyed nervously with his wrench. “What’s so bad about that? It’s eco-friendly. And if you wear gloves like the handbook suggests—”
“I should have known not to expect you to get it,” Jules said sourly. “You’re the creepiest thing in
this stupid store.”
In the echoing silence that ensued, Derek noted that Jules looked about as shocked as he felt. Did they feel it too? Like something had just reached down their throat and grabbed their guts with a tight, unrelenting grip?
“I’m— Shit, Derek, I’m so—”
“It’s fine,” he said. “Don’t worry about it. I, I always appreciate feedback, and will—”
The odd ache in his throat suddenly cracked into sharp pain, like he’d just swallowed a mouthful of broken glass.
Jules looked over as Derek dropped his hex wrench, which hit the floor with a jangling crash. “Derek?” they asked. “You okay?”
“Ow,” he said—or tried to say. Something had blocked his throat—not so he couldn’t breathe, but too big to swallow around or speak comfortably through. He coughed into his elbow, and whatever was in his throat seemed to move, uncoiling in the hollow of his throat. His mouth flooded with the taste of salt and copper, and he felt vileness pass his lips.
“Derek?” Jules said urgently. “Are you choking? Do you need help?”
Derek cautiously lifted his mouth away from his sleeve. Something red, wet, and gristly had splattered against his uniform. He wiped his mouth and clapped a hand over his sleeve so Jules wouldn’t see.
“Fine,” he said, edging toward the bathroom in the back of the assembly room.
“Is that blood?” Jules asked.
“I just need . . .” He wasn’t sure what he needed, so he fled without finishing his sentence.
* * *
The basement bathroom was for staff only, and starkly different from the customer restrooms. The customer restrooms were another venue to display LitenVärld’s varied aesthetics, with each stall designed in a different style. The new VIP lounge would feature cutting-edge designer luxury toilets, with bidets, heated seats, air dryers, white noise machines, and self-raising and -closing lids. The premiere model was inspired by Arne Jacobsen’s iconic Egg chair, and its wide back and arms offered pressure point massage meant to stimulate the digestive system. It was designed to sync to the user’s phone to play music, but corporate had instructed that all the showroom versions play only Debussy.
