Why did I Write "A Janitor's Simple Wish"?

I hope my first short story is not a lullaby. If it is, do come back often when you are suffering from insomnia.

***** Spoiler Warning! ***** Do not proceed unless you’ve read the short story! *****

In A Janitor’s Simple Wish, I wanted to share with you about how things are after a movie ends – viewers would just leave (unless it’s a Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) movie where there are post credit scenes one after another *grin*) and left the cleaners to pick up the trash. While I don’t see old people working, I wanted to explore the questions “what if they were old? Would there be any difference?”

I might never have added the social media portion had I not been reading The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell while writing the short story. The early chapters about how something interesting could tip and becomes viral inspired the part where a couple went back to their hometown – possibly being away in their youthful years to chase riches – to discover the bad habits of cinema patrons. It was further compounded when they noticed elderly people were doing the cleaning.

I wish to showcase both positive and negative effects of social media but at the same time did not want a bad ending for the main characters. My initial plan was to have the janitors fired because the boss felt they were no longer productive but that didn’t materialise because it’d be sad. I don’t like sad.

Just for the fun of it, I took this opportunity to add in an exploitative boss and illustrate what I think how such greedy people live in their own self-righteous, selfish world...

Well, it’s supposed to be a simple story about a janitor but I tried to add some complications to spice up the story... such is life. Hope you enjoyed it! Thanks for reading!