i had to call the awful evil witch from tech support at my job today, and it had me thinking about getting the little error message and feeling your heart sink and you lean over to your coworker to whine,
"i have to call and get an override,"
and she snorts because she knows what that means, and despite what she says—there is an evil little gleam in her eye. "maybe midoriya will pick up."
you throw your head back dramatically, letting it hang over the chair until you feel the blood rushing to your ears. "i never get midoriya! what menu options are you choosing to get him, because it's never him for me!"
your coworker shrugs, turning from her computer again to smirk at you. "i don't know, man, it's just whoever picks up."
you stare at the window box in the center of your computer, the red ! at the front of a set of codes you loathe to see. hard as you try to find hope that you'll get lucky and izuku will pick up the phone—you don't think it's likely.
"will you call for me?"
"oh my god, just do it already."
and that's how you end up biting at your thumbnail, staring down at the phone on your desk as the automated voice greets you—happily—and begins to list out the different menu options. you consider choosing something random, to see if that will get you to a different, nicer member of the support team, but you wait too long and the options repeat and you decide to just bite the bullet.
it only rings for a moment before you get,
"task solutions. 's'bakugou."
you roll your eyes up to the ceiling and back and snap to stare at your coworker, mouthing a soundless 'fuck!' as she bursts into a fit of laughter.
"y'got five seconds before i hang up the—"
"sorry, hi, sorry! hi! i'm here!" you muster up all the kindness you can, smiling politely so that it will transfer in your voice. "i just need an override, please."
there's not much he says that he doesn't have to, only grunting in acknowledgement when you give him your name and employee id, read off the error message that brought you into the lion's den.
the support team for your company works off-site, so you've never met him. bakugou. hardly know anything about him outside of the name he barks out when answering the phone, and you don't think you'd like to, really.
it's incredibly frustrating to have to call him for help because he knows the system better than you do, knows your job better than you do—and is quick to call it out when your math is wrong or your input is off. if validation didn't fail every once in a while when the program is overloaded you'd be fine—but here you are.
a tense silence fills between the phone as he works, and you know he can only log in and see your screen but it feels like he's watching you, entirely. to be polite, you ask, "are you, uh, goin' to conference this year?"
the silence becomes a void, all consuming, before he murmurs out a sharp, "no."
"oh, bummer," you chuckle nervously, sweat building on the back of your neck as you watch his mouse click around on your screen. "are midoriya and iida going?"
bakugou sighs, heavy with frustration. "probably," he answers, though, to your surprise. "they like to sit around and do fuck—nothin' all day at the damn booth."
you've been by the task solutions booth every year at conference, mostly because they hand out nice steel cups with metal straws, but the faces you've seen there are never unfamiliar. for a moment, you try to imagine it: walking up to get your free goodie from some sour asshole, only to have him bark at you as you try to reach for it.
the mouse stops in the bottom corner of your screen, hesitating. you hold your breath. this is usually when he chastises you for something he makes sound so simple.
"you goin'?"
"uh," your mouth hangs open for a second, because this is the most you've ever spoken to him that didn't involve scolding of some kind. "yeah, yeah! our team will be there for day 2!" there's a soft hum from the other end, and you see the opportunity for what it is: a chance to get on good terms with this guy, so you can stop being so afraid to call the help desk. "you should go! i don't—i don't think we've ever met before."
it's hard to tell how he takes that, but you only assume not well considering your screen flashes as he logs off, taking the error message with him.
"uh, yeah, whatever," he grumbles, "is there—you need anythin' else?"
"oh, nope! that's it, thanks!"
"alright," the line doesn't disconnect immediately and you curl into yourself, as if you could hear anything else by pressing the phone harder to your ear. then he says, "later." and is gone.
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Edward Hopper, Conference at Night, 1949. Oil on canvas.
Numerous critics and exhibitions have documented the influence of stage sets and popular American cinema upon Hopper’s depictions of the urban scene, often citing this image as a prime example. Film historian Peter Wollen identified Conference at Night as one of many Hopper paintings that look like scenes in movies that one has come in on in mid-screening. The viewer feels that the vignette must have a before and after; it feels like a momentary flash in an on-going mystery. Writer and Hopper’s close friend Brian O’Doherty noted that Conference directly referenced the hallmarks of the era’s popular gangster movies, or film noir, in its lighting, bleak urban setting and hard-faced characters.
This painting is classic Hopper in its theme of voyeuristic glimpses of the city at night and its masterful exposition of such favored compositional devices as an open window, a near-empty room in a utilitarian structure, strongly-directed light from an unseen source, and anonymous figures engaged in some undefined yet intense social exchange to create an arresting psychological drama. Conference at Night furnishes one of the four superb examples of work in the Wichita Art Collection by an artist who is one of the greats of 20th century painting.
Text & photo: Wichita Art Museum
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