Gemotions

The fluorescent lights of the office hummed, a monotonous soundtrack to her carefully crafted lesson plan. Sarah, the replacement, was a golden retriever in human form, all eager smiles and earnest questions. Good. Sarah needed to learn how to deal with the archaic software, the infuriating clients, and the passive-aggressive emails. She needed to learn it all, and she needed to struggle.

"So, as you can see," Emily said, her voice smooth as glass, "clicking this button… well, it *should* save the file. But sometimes, it doesn't. You'll need to remember to manually save it every five minutes, or else…" She let the sentence hang, a dramatic pause before gesturing towards a stack of paperwork. "You start all over."

A slight tremor in her hand as she pointed. She was so close to retirement, so close to freedom, and this... this was what she had to do.