Please Rate Your Apocalypse

How it begins

The customer said his apocalypse had arrived without instructions.

Nina checked the order.

Premium extinction. Volcanic package. Complimentary meteor.

"Have you tried turning the horizon off and on again?"

"I don't want to troubleshoot the end of the world."

Nina understood. She had been troubleshooting it since Monday and still had not received a staff pass.

Her supervisor pointed at the satisfaction dashboard.

The customer was currently one angry orange face.

"Could you describe the problem?" she asked.

"My mother is still here."

Nina removed one headphone.

"Is that a complaint?"

"No. She was supposed to visit last weekend. The package promised a clean emotional resolution. Instead she's in my kitchen asking whether I've eaten."

Nina opened the policy.

Family complications were covered only under the platinum plan.

She scrolled past two pages of exclusions and a photograph of an attractive couple watching a tasteful mushroom cloud.

"Would you prefer a refund?"

Gus waved both arms from the next desk.

Nina pretended not to see.

"Yes," the customer said.

The refund field offered three units.

Money.

Credit.

Years.

She selected years.

The customer became quiet.

Outside the support-floor window, the building opposite grew a new coat of paint.

Someone in accounting screamed.

"How many?" Nina asked.

"I don't know."

"How many would help?"

A long pause.

"One afternoon."

There was no option for afternoons.

Nina entered a fraction.

The system accepted it.

On the dashboard, the angry face changed into something nobody had designed an icon for.

Gus rolled his chair beside hers.

"What did you do?"

"Gave him his afternoon back."

"That feature isn't for customers."

"Then why is it on the form?"

Gus looked at the refund total.

Then toward the locked management office.

For the first time that week, the support floor fell silent.

In Nina's headphones, the customer began to cry.

He did not sound dissatisfied.