The job (written back in 2009)

The job

It was the darkest of the dark night. Like every night, he had woken up in cold perspiration. He had to do it.

Every night like clockwork, he would wake up past midnight. Tell himself that its just a job. Its not his fault. And nevertheless do it!! The boss had told him that he could get someone else to do it. But he had refused. He wanted to do it. He wanted to watch. A sadistic pleasure in torturing himself watching people getting terminated. He had special accesses. Special authorities. Special responsibilities. Sometimes he would manage two, sometimes ten and sometimes hundred. One by one he would cross the names from the list. Then there would be nights when there would be no names on the list. He would feel lost. He could never go back to sleep on those nights. He would keep on feeling that something will come up.

He sat there thinking about how he had ended getting sucked into this. Its an addiction. You first tell yourself that you don’t want to do it. Then some hand forces you to do it once. And then its too late to stop. You tell yourself that you wont do it tomorrow. But the tomorrow never comes. You just have to do it again and again and again.

Today yet again his reluctant body and heavy heart were refusing while his brains pushed him on. He wanted to say that he did not want to do it. Who were these people? Why were they in jail? What had they done? Were they murderers? Thieves? Why were they being terminated? Many times, like today, he knew the answer to the last question. Whenever he did not, his boss never refused to give him the reason, but made it obvious that it was not his place to ask; it was his place to know.

After thinking in dark for some time, he got up. He had to do what he had to do. He saw the list. It was a list of seven condemned names. He took the list with him and started on his job.

Click. One gone. Click. Second gone. Click. Click. Click. Click. Six gone. One last left. Click. Gone. All seven terminated. Job was completed. He was feeling a half-hearted satisfaction at doing his job well. He had to call his boss.

"Hello, Sir. The job has run. The customer service for the federal jail healthcare had given seven subscriber IDs with lapsed coverage. All the contracts have been successfully terminated."

He went back to sleep.