Catherine greeted me at the door with a smile and a compliment and I headed down the hallway to put my lunch in the refrigerator. By the time I got back to the intern office, Catherine was standing patiently waiting right at the doorway. “Hey, we need this tape for our meeting this afternoon,” she said handing me a sticky note with the title written on it. I felt sweat begin to bubble up on my forehead as I walked towards the tape library to look for tape #774. I think I may have said a short prayer before opening the door. My eyes scrolled from left to right among thousands of tapes that stacked all the way up to the ceiling where I saw the 750’s number range. Great.
I began to perform a balancing act on top of the stack of boxes in front of me. I stretched my arm as far as I could, then I stretched my fingers in a desperate attempt to reach those tapes hovering over my head. Finally! I could see the row of 770’s! 771… 772… 773…774? No. I had just risked my life for this one tape, and it wasn’t even in its place!
I broke out in a cold sweat… “This has to be a joke,” I said with a giggle.
I jumped down off of the boxes and began to meander around the office hoping to see tape 774 lying around. I asked Paul had he seen it, and he led me to a whole stack of tapes to look through. “Well surely it’s in here,” I thought to myself. Wrong! I looked around in Michael’s office. It wasn’t there. I went back to Paul’s office to look again, it still wasn’t there! I looked under chairs, behind desks, and on top of shelves. Still no 774! “Well ok, I guess it grew legs and walked away!” I said angrily.
I mumbled a feisty “forget it” under my breath as I walked to the tape closet to close it back up. Just as I closed the door, my heart dropped as my eyes came in contact with the numbers 774 on the binding of a tape case. It was right at the edge, just a small reach away from the doorway.
“Yep. That’s 774,” I spat out and slammed the door. I ran to Catherine to show her what I had found. She grabbed me for a huge, victory hug. I knew it was in there somewhere!
— Brianna Glenn
