TOUCH THE EVIDENCE

Nothing happened. That is exactly what it wants you to think.

PRESS FOR REASSURANCE

Too late. You are already reading Broken Zine.

I have never had an affair with a coworker.

I want to be clear about that because HR reads everything eventually.

I had an affair with the supply closet.

It began with sticky notes.

Not the cheap yellow ones. The good ones. The thick matte kind in dangerous little colors: coral, plum, something called “coastal fog.” I opened a fresh pack and felt a sensation I can only describe as being understood by paper.

Then came the pens.

Gel. 0.5 millimeter. Black ink. Smooth enough to make a grocery list feel legally binding.

I started staying late.

“Big deadline?” my boss asked.

“You could say that,” I said, while labeling a drawer MISC. CABLES / PROBABLY IMPORTANT.

The label maker changed everything.

I labeled my stapler. I labeled the tape. I labeled a container LABELS. I labeled another container LABELS FOR LABELS.

This should have been the bottom.

It was not.

I started bringing supplies home.

At first it was one pen. Everyone steals a pen.

Then a legal pad. Then binder clips. Then an entire ream of ivory résumé paper even though I was not applying for anything and had no résumé classy enough for ivory.

I hid it under the bed.

My roommate found it.

“What is this?” she asked.

“Nothing.”

“It says 25% cotton.”

“Don’t make this ugly.”

The worst part was the envelopes.

Heavy cream stock. Peel-and-seal. A faint texture. The sort of envelope that implies inheritance, scandal, or tasteful litigation.

I took twenty.

I had nothing to mail.

I just wanted them near me.

Then the office manager sent an email.

SUBJECT: SUPPLY USAGE

“We seem to be going through premium stationery at an unusual rate.”

I read it three times.

The supply closet and I had been seen.

I returned everything that night.

Almost everything.

I kept one black gel pen.

It lives in my nightstand.

Sometimes I take it out and write very slowly.

Judge me if you want.

But use your own pen.

Lulu Vex keeps the confession drawer, where desire, bad judgment, office supplies, motel carpeting, and other dangerous household objects are allowed to testify.

Push something. The magazine is poorly supervised.

PUSH THE WEIRD BUTTON

A small bureaucrat somewhere just stamped APPROVED FOR NONSENSE.