The Last Slice

Happy Thanksgiving, all.

🍂

A crowded office break room. A pumpkin pie sits, leftover.

Untouched and waiting, under pale fluorescent light.

The light formed a violet aura- it crowned the pumpkin with violet thorns.

It waited, as patient as a cat waiting for a little mouse to scamper from one hole to another.

No one noticed it, except for me.

One person.

That was all it needed. For now.

🍂

I reached for the pumpkin slice, lifted it to my mouth, then stopped.

A note.

"May this last piece of pie sweeten your day."

The note outweighed the pie.

A little pie blessing in tiny, but too discernible, writing.

And the office felt full again.

🍂

Then, I remembered.

Saul. The janitor.

"It's not clean until the last corner's swept," was his mantra.

I stopped him and offered him the pie.

It hummed with an invitation.

He paused mid-sweep and grinned.

A small act with a large voice.

And that was enough drumroll.

🍂

I left the office, the plate empty.

But the note remained firmly in my pocket.

Then, a sliver of gratitude-

Unexpected and persistent.

The note remains in my pants pocket, waiting to be reread.

Like gratitude residue that needs no spotlight.

It lingers - in cold, small offices.

🍂

Original story by Michelle Liew Tsui-Lin. AI tags are coincidental.

For Mikeydred's November Challenge