My phone buzzed against the conference room table at 1:17 p.m.
I remember the time because the budget slide on the wall had frozen, and the little digital clock in the corner of my laptop looked sharper than anything else in that room.
The table smelled like burnt coffee, dry-erase markers, and the old carpet smell every office gets when the air conditioning has been running too long.
My manager was talking about quarterly cuts.
Someone from accounting was tapping a pen against a folder.
I saw my son’s name on the screen and let it ring once because that is what responsible employees do in meetings where everyone pretends their lives do not exist outside the glass walls.
Then the phone buzzed again three seconds later.
Noah was four.
