The PTL dashboard had become a wall — not of tasks, but of reflection. Each blank entry stared back at Liam like a mirror, showing him everything he was trying not to admit.
He told himself the task was beneath him.
He told himself it was temporary.
He told himself he was leaving soon.
But as the weeks passed, nothing changed — except the way people looked at him.
Even Mateo, polite as ever, had started to ask less and observe more.
"You holding up okay with the logs?" he asked one morning, gently rubbing his shoulder brace.
"Yeah," Liam replied quickly, too quickly. "All good."
But it wasn't all good.
The test interface lagged. The server bounced errors mid-session.
The repetition numbed his brain, then ignited bursts of irritation that flared over nothing — a crooked table leg, a faulty login, the sound of someone chewing too loudly.
By Friday, he'd developed a dull ache at the base of his neck. Probably from sitting hunched too long. Probably from the tension. Probably from everything.
He glanced around the office — everyone else had something to look forward to.
Anika was preparing to present at the quarterly regional call.
Mateo was slowly being shifted to a new documentation role that suited his condition.
The junior analysts were being trained into upward mobility.
And Liam?
Liam was stuck — still pretending to be on his way out... while the company just let him rot quietly in the middle.
During the end-of-week team sync, Emilia smiled kindly but asked, "Liam, just a quick check — any updates on your transition timing? We're looking to finalize the new hire's onboarding window."
He swallowed. "Nothing concrete yet. Still in motion."
She nodded. "Alright. Just let us know when you're ready to lock it in."
The phrase stung.
Ready to lock it in.
Like a verdict waiting to be handed down.
He walked home that night, choosing not to take the tram. Amsterdam's cobbled sidewalks clicked beneath his shoes as he moved in silence, past shops closing their shutters and cyclists whizzing by in every direction.
He thought about how far this had gone.
He'd lied to avoid doing a task.
Now he was doing only that task, while slowly being nudged out of the only thing that had ever made him feel important: his job.
At 2:17 a.m., Liam woke up to the dull throb in his neck again. He sat up, stared at his ceiling, and whispered:
"It would've been easier just to do the damn work."
But it was too late.
Because now, the work was the punishment.
And the act of pretending to leave had become a cage he'd locked from the inside.