Please Hold...

"Thank you for calling. Your estimated wait time is… fifteen minutes. Please stay on the line. Your call is important to us."

It was the familiar sound of customer support. Today had started out as a normal day for Avery. She was excited to be doing her big presentation. This was the first account she was lead for and she wanted to make a great impression.

Avery booted up her laptop to go over everything. The power had gone out the night before, forcing her to restart everything. Normally, she kept her laptop on with thirteen tabs open—organized chaos, but efficient.

Avery was horrified when the computer booted and a message popped up: File corrupted. She wasn’t sure what caused it—maybe the power outage, maybe fate—but of course it had to happen on a Monday, right before her biggest presentation. At least she had emailed it to herself. Somehow the email had been logged out and the remembered password didn’t seem to be working.

Avery remembered that she had recently changed her password, so she typed in what she thought it was.

Incorrect password.

Again.

Same red banner.

She blinked, stared at the screen, and muttered, “No. Come on.”

This was not happening. Not today.

She clicked “Forgot Password” and a prompt appeared.

A verification code has been sent to your backup email.

Her stomach sank.

She hadn’t thought about that backup email in years—an old Hotmail account from college. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d logged into it. Still, she gave it a shot.

Incorrect password. Try again.

Of course.

She tried a few combos—her college dorm number, the name of her ex’s cat, the obscure anime character she swore she’d never forget. Nothing worked. A red box popped up:

Too many failed attempts. Try again later.

Avery leaned back in her chair and exhaled through her nose.

“This is fine. Totally fine.”

She clicked the second option:

Send a verification code to your phone ending in 2-9.

She stared at the number like it had personally betrayed her.

That was her old number. She had just changed carriers last month. When she switched carriers, she finally got that upgraded phone she needed badly. She changed her number so that her ex was unable to contact her any longer.

She had an epiphany when she realized the phone had not been picked up yet. She had just set it out that morning for pickup. She shot out of her chair and ran to the front door. No package. No phone. Just an empty porch and the silence of missed opportunity.

“I didn’t even hear them come!” she shouted, as if the universe owed her a do-over. “They always slam the screen door. What, are we being polite now?”

The one time she needed that notification sound like a gong in a cathedral; the delivery guy had floated in like a ghost and taken her last hope with him.

Back at her desk, the email login screen waited patiently.

She knew what she had to do. She tapped the number for customer support.

"Welcome to TechLink Customer Care. We are currently experiencing higher than normal call volume. Please stay on the line... Current wait time is 15 minutes."

Avery narrowed her eyes.

The hold music began—soft jazz, cheery, and deeply offensive.

She wasn’t panicking. Not yet. It was just an email account. A very important email account. The one that held her presentation for today’s meeting—slides, notes, everything. The one tied to her work account, her cloud drive, and basically her entire professional existence.

She had ninety minutes before the call. Just enough time. Probably.

By minute eight, she had:

Checked her cloud account. It auto-logged out when the computer shutdown.

Found a three-week-old version in her downloads folder that ended with “...v6_FINAL_FOR_REAL_THIS_TIME.pptx.”

Opened it and discovered it was not the final.

Cursed her past self thoroughly.

The music paused for a beat—she sat up straighter—then it shifted to a pan flute remix of “Greensleeves.”

Avery closed her eyes. “You did this to yourself.”

She tried recovering the Hotmail account again. Same lockout warning. Tried to reset her password on the main account again. Same dead-end loop.

“A verification code has been sent to your backup email.”

Every road led back to a locked door—and she didn’t have the key anymore.

"Please stay on the line. Your call is very important to us."

Another pause. She held her breath.

Then came the sound of synth-heavy jazz layered over a flute solo that sounded like it had been recorded inside a haunted aquarium.

She didn’t even flinch.

By minute eighteen, she’d created a new email address just in case.

The system prompted her to input a backup email.

She entered the original one.

This account has been flagged for suspicious activity. Please try again later.

She laughed out loud. One short, unhinged bark.

Her wife poked her head into the room, eyebrows raised.

“Everything okay?”

Avery gestured at the phone. “I’m locked out of my account. The backup is dead. The phone I needed is in a mail truck somewhere. And the presentation I need for this morning is in my inbox.”

Her wife winced. “Oof. Want me to bring you anything?”

“Just my will to live. Pretty sure it rolled under the couch.”

Minute twenty-two.

She refreshed the help page for the fifth time. Nothing had changed.

A chat window popped up for support. For a moment, Avery felt something close to hope. She clicked it. Typed:

"Locked out of my account. Need access urgently. Backup email and phone number are unavailable."

The chatbot responded:

"Let’s verify your identity. Please enter the code we just sent to your registered phone number."

Avery stared at the screen. “I just told you I can’t—”

“No response detected. Would you like to start over?”

She clicked the big red X and muttered, “I hope you overheat.”

Minute thirty.

The flute was back. Greensleeves. Again. Of course.

She wandered into the kitchen and began stress-cleaning the counter. Her phone stayed on speaker. She scrubbed at a nonexistent coffee ring like it owed her money.

Back in the office, she opened her notes app and began rewriting parts of the presentation from memory. She got about two bullet points in before her brain short-circuited.

She sat back in her chair and stared at the ceiling.

"All I wanted to do," she said aloud, "was prove I know how to run a clean onboarding process."

The ceiling did not answer.

Minute thirty two.

The phone crackled.

A click.

A real, blessed click.

Then a voice: “Hello, this is Marcus with TechLink Account Recovery. Can I have your name and the email address you’re calling about?”

Avery bolted upright. “Yes! Thank God. It’s Avery Kline, and the email is—"

A click.

Then silence.

Her mouth hung open, halfway through the sentence, while her brain tried to catch up.

The screen flashed: Call Ended.

“No,” she whispered. “No, no, no…”

She redialed. Busy tone. Tried again. Got the automated response:

"Thank you for calling. Your estimated wait time is… thirty minutes. Please stay on the line. Your call is important to us."

Avery let the phone slide out of her hand and hit the couch beside her.

Her wife reappeared in the doorway, holding a mug.

“Did they hang up?”

“I don’t know,” Avery said. “I think the universe did.”

“Want me to cancel the meeting?”

Avery picked the phone back up, pressed it to her ear, and let the flute music wash over her. She was too tired to be angry anymore. Her shoulders slumped.

“No,” she said. “Let’s just see how long I can hold.”

She set the phone on speaker again, lay back, and stared at the ceiling.

Somewhere between the cushions and the flute, she whispered:

“Please hold. Your breakdown is important to us.”