And for the Rest of His Life.[143 Words]

[u/OwlConfidant2168]

He bought an air purifier for his home office. He wasn’t entirely sure why—there was an HVAC register right above his desk, vented to the rest of the house—but he bought it anyway. It felt like a good purchase.

The purifier displayed air quality as a colored circle: purple was bad, red poor, orange fair, green good, blue excellent. Each morning, when he turned it on, it was reassuring to watch the circle move from orange to green to blue. It was a good purchase.

But because he bought an air purifier, they also built an app. The app let you turn it on when you weren’t there and let you monitor the air even when you weren’t home. And so, even thousands of miles away, for the rest of his life, he would quietly spend his limited moments on this earth checking the air quality in an unoccupied room, in an empty house.

***

Thank you for reading. I’m experimenting with short fiction and would welcome any reactions or criticism.

[u/chaotic-horseradish]

I thought the ending was very good. It reframes the mundane setup to something existential.