1:38 PM

The AI did it in twenty-two seconds.

She stared at the output.

Then ran it again.

Twenty-one seconds.

She had spent years learning how to do that.

Not just learning the software.

Learning judgment.

Learning the little tricks.

Learning what clients actually meant when they asked for something completely different.

Learning enough to become the person younger colleagues came to when they got stuck.

Now she was looking at something that wasn't as good as she was.

Yet.

That word bothered her.

Yet.

Her first thought was about her job.

Her second was about money.

Her third surprised her.

If this thing eventually became better than she was at the thing she had spent fifteen years becoming good at...

what exactly had those fifteen years made her?

She minimized the window.

There was plenty of work waiting.

But the question had already escaped.

Given who I actually am, what makes sense from here?