Thursday

It's Thursday. Thank god it's just one day away from Friday, then the weekend. But what would happen if Thursday just stopped and we were all stuck in it? Its 1pm and the time stops, but things are still going. We're all moving. We're all doing work, then we look at the time hours later and say, "Wait, its just 1 o'clock?? Damn, this day is dragging!" But little do we know, 1 o'clock hasn't changed in the past 8 hours.

We're all tired. We're cursing at each other. One girl throws a stapler at the window, only to find the window doesn't break. "WE'RE TRAPPED! WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!" she screams. "It's not the case people. Time has just stopped. We can still go on." Says a man in a dark navy blue suit. He's the boss. And what he's about to say is quite shocking.

"I suggest we all get back to work....till it's time to leave.” He walks out. "What?" Says a man in the back. Everyone stares as he walks out. There's silence. The stapler girl speaks out. "I know I'm not crazy. Time has stopped and he just said to work till it's time to go home? I've been up since 5am for this damn Japan conference call!" While everyone stands there in silence, she lets out a scream.

Down the hall, the boss picks up his phone and begins to dial in for a conference call. His secretary comes in. "Umm, sir. I got an email from Howard and Ronald. They're going to be late for this call. They said 10 after 1." He slowly puts down the phone and sighs. "10 after 1 it is then....thank you." He knew 10 minutes after 1 o'clock was not going to come. Time had stopped at 1 and 26 seconds. But everyone was still moving. So why couldn't they just have the call? The boss waited by the phone for 2 hours.

A knock at the door. "Umm, sir? May I go home now?" Furious, he turns around and shouts, "NO! THERE'S STILL WORK TO DO. IT'S ONLY 1 O'CLOCK!" "But sir..." "OUT!" He shouts.

Back down the other side of the hall...

"Okay. Why don't we just leave and go home. We'll go to sleep and maybe it'll be Friday." Says the stapler girl. "Yeah, yeah maybe that'll work. Maybe this is just one bad nightmare." Says the man in the back. "We can't leave till 5pm." Says John. "Says who? The boss? That asshole..." "No, the security people downstairs. Seems like our "boss" has ordered none of us to leave work till its 5pm." "What?" says the man in the back. The stapler girl says, "Wait, you mean our boss has trapped us here? We can't leave at all? Time has stopped people!! This isn't normal. Something is terribly wrong! The world is coming to an end as we stand here!"

The halls were quiet. Paper tumble weeded across the table of a conference room. Bodies on the floor lying in sleep on the west side of the floor. The boss walks in. "So you, stapler girl. Let's talk about the conference call you had with Japan." "What? You mean the call I had yesterday? And my name is Jennifer!!" "No, the call you had several hours earlier today...Jennifer." She screams. "Its 1 o'clock and its 24 hours later! My breath is bad and my arm pits are sweating!"

"Am I the only one that can keep it together here? You should learn from me. I have a lot of things to worry about. If I don't get things done here, you're out of a job. See me in 5 minutes." "I can't see you in five minutes. TIME HAS STOPPED!" "Well you've manage to say it's been 24 hours later, haven't you? See me in FIVE!" The boss walks out. John stands up and says to Jennifer, "Please...don't scream."

His secretary, slumped over her desk, is abruptly awakened as the boss slams his door shut. "Fuck this, I'm leaving." She says to herself.

"Just go over there and discuss the call with Dan, Jen. We're all here till 5pm...whenever that happens." Says John. "Scream till you can't talk anymore. That way you don't have to talk to the boss man." Says the man in the back. "Okay, okay. Shut up, guys. I'm thinking...maybe we should go down to the supply room and find something to tie Dan up. Then we'll escape out the back door through the mail room and go home. If time stands still, we can stay home forever."

Meanwhile in the lobby....

Maggie, the secretary is screaming and using her umbrella as a weapon to fight off the security guards who are not allowing her to leave the building.

Back upstairs...

"...when your heart's in someone else's hands, monkey see and monkey do, their wish is your command. You're not to blame, everyone's the same..." "SHUT UP RICHARD! THIS ISN'T A BEST OF WHAM CONCERT." Shouts Jennifer. "...No it isn't. It's the best of George Michaels." Says Richard, the man in the back. "GUYS! STOP! We have to tie Dan up. We have to think of a way to do this." Says John.

Dan, the boss man, is in his room waiting for Jennifer, when the phone rings. He jumps up to get it, hoping its Howard and Ronald calling. But when he looks at the caller ID, he sees that it's the security department calling him. "Hello?" "Mr. Davis!" Shouts the security guard. "We have your secretary here and she's out of control. She's fighting us here to get out. She's already hurt one of our guards." In the background Dan hears a man shout, "Second man down! Second Man Down!" "Sir?" Dan sighs and then says, "Tell her she's fired if she leaves."

There's a knock on his door. "Come in." In enters Jennifer. Then enters John. Then enters Richard, the man from the back. "What is this?" Asks Dan. "Dan, we're here to talk to you." Says Jennifer. “I don't understand why John and Richard are here. They have nothing to do with Japan." John steps forward and says, "Oh we know we have nothing to do with Japan, but we have everything to do with what's going to happen now." Dan's face stressing a puzzled look. "We just want out, Dan. And if you will just cooperate with us, no one will get hurt." Jennifer states. Before Jennifer can continue, in walks Maggie. "Don't bother; no one is getting out of this building." Dan looks pleased and manages to smile. "Welcome back, Maggie!" Says Dan in a sarcastic tone. "Up yours..." Maggie walks back to her desk.

"Now John and Richard, if you don't mind I'd like to have this meeting with Jennifer. Please close the door behind you." John and Richard both look at Jennifer. She nods at them both for them to go. They leave and close the door behind them. "So what was it that I needed to cooperate about, Jenny? Oh never mind, let's get to work." Please Dan, please. I can't go on. I need to go home."

Dan stands up and walks over to his window. The world keeps moving, but stuck at the same time. "What's going on, Dan? Why is this happening?" Dan looks at Jennifer. They both stare into each other's eyes. "Jennifer, you know how I feel about you. No one here knows but us." Jennifer, sitting in one of Dan's leather chairs, says, "Dan YOU know how I feel. We can't keep doing this. You're married." Dan was married and cheating on his wife with Jennifer. But Jennifer didn't like it. She kept telling him it had to end. But he never listened. She was almost his prisoner. "Maybe you should call your wife and ask her how she's doing. Go home to her to make sure she didn't freeze along with time and has burnt your house down." Dan walks over to her. "Oh don't be funny, Jennifer. She probably doesn't even realize what time it is. All she does is sit on her fat ass all day. I come home and the place is a mess. She does nothing." "Well I’m sorry, Dan. But I'm not your woman, so it's time to let go. You should probably stop calling me too." Jennifer stands up and walks towards the door. She grabs the door knob and before she opens the door, she says, "...Dan, call off the guards. I'm going home." She leaves.

On the way down to the first floor, the elevator ride seems to take a long time. It kept stopping at every floor and soon enough, the elevator was packed. John says to Richard and Jennifer, "Everyone goes home at the same time. It's funny." A woman standing in the corner says to John. "You leave at 5pm too? ha ha ha. It's been a long day. It seemed like my day wouldn't end." Everyone in the elevator agreed. Another woman says, "I'm off tomorrow, so today is my Friday. 5pm today could not come any faster for me." She laughs. Jennifer, John and the man in the back, Richard stare at each other in silence. Jennifer looks at her watch and it says 5:04pm. "Five? When did we hit 5pm?" John looks at Jennifer and says, "I guess you and Dan were really busy, huh?" "What?" Jennifer looks at John, not understanding what he just said.

"What's wrong? You seem a little stressed, Jen." "Was I in some dream today or did we not just go through some time warping crap and I'm a mess?" Richard says, "Well you do look a little messy, but we'll keep this to ourselves." And winks at Jennifer. Everyone gets out of the elevator and proceeds to exit the building. John and Richard walk up and notice Jennifer standing in the back, not walking with them. "Come on, Jennifer. What's wrong?" Asks Richard. "What happened today? Where did the time go?" John walks over to Jennifer. "Jennifer, whatever you're doing, you need to lay off it. You're starting to look a little crazy. You got the crazy eyes look. Stop working so hard and take tomorrow off. Maybe take next week off." He gives her a pat on her shoulder and says, "See ya next week. I'm off tomorrow."