Manifest.

[Cruel Irony]

My name was Jeff Carson. I was a high-powered law intern running on sheer energy. I was young. I was idealistic. And to be honest I mostly just picked up dry cleaning and delivered coffee.

But it was great, I'm not saying I didn't like my job. I loved it. I really loved it. Looking back it was almost unusual how attached to it I really was. I did what I could to help these people with whatever they wanted.

See, I was "the Kid"
I wasn't Jeff to these people. Which was okay in my book, I hadn't earned their respect yet and I wasn't really all that fond of my name anyway. So I was "the kid."

"Have the kid get it"

"The kid was just sitting on his ass."

"Don't blame the kid he's new here."

Being "the kid" in a law firm was kind of like being the one that everyone copies off of in 9th grade Biology. You feel like you've done a good job and at the end of the day you've helped your fellow man. But you don't come home with any less globs of chewed gum in your hair for it.

The attitude of the "real lawyers" (as they liked to call themselves) toward me was, at best, slight amusement. And at worst they saw me as their personal punching bag for whenever their attractive secretary wasn't around to yell at.

I'd like to take this opportunity to talk about sexism in the law commnity. Lawyers think women are good for three things. Coffee, Filing, and answering phones. And though there was one woman working in the office that didn't answer phones for a living. No one ever looked her in the eye much less thought of her as a woman.

The atmosphere was tense. People ran from one end of the building to the other holding steaming foam cups at arms length. You'd be surprised how many hospital visits interns get a year from burns alone.

You learn to be light on your feet. To follow orders directly, exactly, and quickly. It was like the army but in the end you didn't go to bed feeling you had done your country a service.

[Anonymous]

I like it, but I believe this should be in the original creations section =D

Seriously though, your writing feels very natural and it goes along quite smoothly. I'd love to more of this!

(my only problem is with the quotations... they seemed out of place somehow, but that was minor in my opinion =D)

[Cruel Irony]

(Yeah, it's original sorry. . . .about the misplacement I mean)


But I wasn't just a lawyer. I had a small amount of life outside the office. I had been playing the dating scene unsuccessfully for a couple of years and I had begun to lose faith in my ability to converse with women. I was what you would call a hopeless romantic. Elaine, my sister, always told me that I would never settle for anything less than full-blown, slay the dragon, rescue the damsel, fairytale love. While that may have been a bit of an exaggeration I did find myself wondering if I was desperately searching for something that doesn't exist. I was unable to find a woman that I saw myself spending my while life with. I could tell on every date that the girl was not my soul mate, and that was what I was looking for.

Aside from my "love life" I did play a little pool. Well to be honest it was a lot of pool. I played enough pool that it would have been unhealthy if I wasn't so damned good at it. I beat everyone. It was a big deal for a while until everyone got tired of losing and seeing me win. So, after a lot of coaxing from what passed for my friends, I covered my pool table and I didn't get many chances to whip out the ol' cue sense joining the offices of Watson and Holmes.

Unfortunately it wasn't only my love life that was suffering. I had no real friends, I hung out with some of the guys around the apartments, there were parties (games of pool) and there were double dates, but in the end we all went our separate ways, knowing that we would never see one another again. While most people would find the lack of a meaningful relationship depressing. I'm happy to admit that I'm one of those morbid people with a perverted love of silence, and that I handle solitude fairly well.

Thinking back to my childhood I never was all that different. I fit in well enough with the children. We all ate things that should never have entered our mouths at one point or another. The point being that my childhood was more boring and standard than anyone else I can name. It really had never occurred to me how little happened to me before I had joined the lawfirm.

But, as I said, my life before wasn't really important. Who I was when I was the newest kid in the firm is the important bit. So, to break it down to a very basic level, I was a tall, independent intern with intentionally messy black hair and a tendency to leave a five o' clock shadow on my face because I thought it looked cool.

[Takushi Rena]

Moving this to the Original section for you!

And this sounds quite intriguing. I seriously love the fact that you're using first person for this. It makes it interesting! D:

Great job! I can't wait to read more!

[Snow Candy]

Makes me wonder what will happen next. Nice work by the way. Can't wait to see more! :D

[Enemy]

Pretty nice. I enjoy this sort of insight into the character. You don't even need anything exciting to happen.

[Cruel Irony]

Now, on a normal day in the office I would walk in ten minutes early and have more things on my plate from the second I walk in the door to the second I get in the elevator than most people had the ability to deal with. And while others turned to things like obscene amounts of coffee, alcoholism, speed, or sexual harassment I turned to what I liked to call. "The Void" I think I probably stole the term from some novel I had read not long ago, but the process was fairly simple and completely my own. I would just let everything roll off of me like water. Every harsh comment from the lawyers I passed in the halls, the daily glare I got from Victoria, the summer intern/high school prom queen who I had touch inappropriately I assure you (just as I assured her and everyone else) quite by accident. Now she's positive that I'm going to follow her home and steal bits of her clothes so that I can makes some sort of sick alter that I can use to fuel my sick fantasies. . . her words not mine.

The point being I only allowed the important things to affect me. When I was told to get the case files from the archives and that I was an idiot who would never get ahead in this business if I didn't pick up the slack I thought Okay, Johnson file, case 118, basement. It made things more bearable. And while bottling up emotions is a bad habit, that wasn't really what I was doing. For some reason I had the ability to choose what I allowed to get through my "void." And that was largely the method I used to stop myself from going insane.

This morning, however, there didn't seem to be anyone in the building at all when I stepped through the loving arms of the firm. No one to spill hot coffee on me, no one to hand me a large stack of papers that reminded me of my unfortunate time on the high school football team, no one glared, stared, or forcibly moved me at all. I nearly let out a sigh of relief. Then I realized that it wasn't a good thing. If a law office isn't moving then it means one of two things. The firm is dead, or everyone in the building is. I silently hoped it was the ladder because this internship was really the only thing going on in my life at the time and to be honest I never liked the people there much anyway.

But my hopes sank as a sullen secretary walked across the startlingly silent lobby, her high heals making that clicking noise that they do. She was beautiful. And, though she didn't yet know it. She would be the death of me.

[revarai20]

Wow, this is a story worth-reading! Very intriguing, I would say! Keep it up! =]