The fluorescent lights hummed a steady, mid-afternoon lull over the service corridor. A worker methodically taped the final seam on a small, empty box, the yellowing shipping label already affixed. The rhythmic rip of the packing tape was the loudest sound, punctuated by the faint, sweet scent of fresh adhesive. The dispenser, anchored to the metal cart, was running the tape spool in reverse, pulling the adhesive strip back onto itself with practiced ease. It was an efficient, almost comforting sound, a steady counterpoint to the silence of the stacked, identical boxes. Yet, as the worker finished the last pull, the tape did not simply spool back; it began to un-adhere from the box, peeling itself back into the dispenser's empty core, leaving the box suddenly, impossibly, clean.
static · uneasy