The Test

“Dammit!” Charlotte hissed as she stared at the blinking square on the computer screen. She’d correctly answered every one of the test questions the program had asked and yet here she was back at the same prompt: “You have not achieved a passing score. Would you like to retake the test or reset your password?” She gripped her forehead in between her palms and growled in frustration. She glanced around at all the other people intent on their screens. The library was filled with small desks just like hers; nickel framed with a smoky glass top in which was embedded a pop-up computer monitor and mouse. The keyboard was embedded in the tabletop itself. At every one sat a person doing the same thing. Now and then, one would become as frustrated as she was and yell or snarl. Some banged the desktop and others cursed like sailors. They drew stern rebukes from the Proctors in their sector. But occasionally someone would press either the “Restart” button in the lower left corner or the “Reset” button on the lower right. Occasionally, the applicant would be successful. When the test ended either via success or by choice, the rim of the desktop would light up either red or blue. When that happened, the Proctor came over to quietly speak to them and escort them from the library. They always returned with someone new to take the place of the previous occupant and the process would start all over again.

Charlotte reached for the glass of water and drained it.

“More?” a quiet voice asked startling her.

“Yes, please,” she answered and the woman poured fresh ice water from a pitcher. Charlotte had no idea where the pitcher had materialized from. Only moments ago, the woman had walked past with an iPad in hand. The same type that all the Proctors carried. There were also no sideboards or kitchen exits in the library so there had to be some sort of hidden cabinet where the water pitchers were kept.

“Thank you,” Charlotte muttered as the Proctor nodded moving away as silently as she’d crept up.

They all moved that way. You never heard their footsteps on the wood floor nor the swish of their clothing. They just seemed to glide over everything, which was odd because Charlotte distinctly remembered hearing the squeak of her own shoes when she’d entered the silent room and those of the subsequent arrivals and departures. She picked up the newly filled glass and observed her surroundings again. People of all ages occupied the library from every walk of life. Some wore street clothes like her, while the rest were dressed in hospital gowns and robes. Was it impossible to reschedule a test for a more convenient time if you were hospitalized? A few were even wearing pajamas. Who takes a test in pajamas? The most important question of course was what was this test for? She didn’t remember why she was here or what she was doing. She only knew that she’d been at it for at least three hours. She’d also gone through three full glasses of water and oddly didn’t have to pee.

Charlotte set the glass down and stared back at the phrase on the screen. She could easily end this entire ordeal by simply pressing the “Reset” button, the desk would glow, and she could get the hell out of here. But every time she guided the mouse to it, her hand began to tremble. It felt wrong. It felt like a failure, and she wasn’t ready to give up, at least not yet.

The young man at the desk next to her jumped up pushing his chair over in anger. “Enough of this bullshit!” he hollered. He’d obviously reached his breaking point in repeating the test. The Proctor rushed over to him silently and urged him to get a hold of himself, but he wasn’t having any of it.

“I’ve answered every question on this damned thing ten times!” he screamed as he pointed to the monitor.

The Proctor gave him a stern look and said “Perhaps you haven’t been as honest with your answers as you think. Honesty is a prerequisite for completion of this program.”

“I’ve given the same answers over and over and now I want out of here!” he demanded.

“Well then, you know what you have to do, don’t you,” the Proctor instructed. She pointed to the screen and silently waited.

The young man stared back at her with angry tears in his eyes. She said nothing, returning his gaze with obvious disappointment.

“Fuck it,” he muttered and grabbed the mouse. He clicked it and the desk rim turned red. He stood up staring defiantly at the Proctor, tears now actively falling from his eyes.

She gazed down at him with pity and said “Follow me please.” They left together, the Proctor silently leading the way as the young man stomped behind her with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his dirty jeans. Charlotte could hear his sneakers squeaking as they left. The Proctor’s stylish heels made no noise whatsoever.

She turned back to her own screen. She had no idea what button the young man had pressed but she had a pretty good idea. She moved the cursor to the left side button and clicked it. The screen went momentarily blank and then the program restarted. A landing page with a waterfall leading to a clear blue lake appeared with a caption in the water that read:

‘Welcome to The Test. This test will determine if you have chosen the correct path for advancement in your future endeavors. Please answer the questions as asked. There are no hidden meanings or tricks embedded in them. They are straightforward and your answers should be as such. Truthfulness is a requirement. There is no prohibition on profanity if you find it necessary for proper expression however, honesty is an absolute necessity for you to pass. This test is not time-limited so consider your answers carefully before proceeding to the next as there is no back-button option. You may take this test as many times as necessary until you pass. You will be given an opportunity to retake the test immediately should you fail, however, if you choose not to retake the test, your decision will be considered final, your exam completed, and your grade irrevocable. Good luck.’

Charlotte grasped her hands together and closed her eyes. She had to pass it this time. She must have done something wrong. She was positive she’d answered every question honestly, although at times when she’d wanted to curse, she’d chosen more circumspect language. Was that why she failed? Did they want her to just regurgitate her most heinous feelings onto the screen, ranting like some unhinged mental patient? Had she somehow misinterpreted the information or the question? She had no idea. What she did know was that she’d been here for hours and had taken this test four times already. This would be her fifth time. If she failed, would she explode like the young man had and just give up in disgust? Would she have to endure a walk of shame in front of everyone? What would happen to her once she was released? A thousand questions paralyzed her as she sat trembling in front of the computer screen.

“Problem dear?” the Proctor’s voice floated down to her.

Charlotte looked up into the stealthy woman’s face with its narrow features. The Proctor towered over her in her silent heels. A tall woman of at least six feet with graying, blonde hair and blue eyes beneath horned-rim glasses. She wore a cream business suit with a silk blue blouse that matched her eyes. Her concern seemed genuine even if it was the complete opposite of the sternness she’d shown the young man only minutes before.

“I’m just tired,” Charlotte began. “I keep taking the test and failing for some reason and I don’t understand why. Hell, I don’t even know how I ended up in this library or why I’m even taking this weird test in the first place.”

“Excuse me, did you say library?” the Proctor asked.

“Um, yeah …” Charlotte responded as she pointed towards the stacks along the walls. “What else would you call a place like this?”

The Proctor glanced around the room as if noticing the books on the shelves for the first time. “Yes,” she mused. “I suppose it does resemble a library.”

Her lighthearted tone only made Charlotte more nervous.

“As for ‘why you’re here’ dear, you’re here because you chose to be. We’re here to assist you with finalizing that decision. The Test is the tool that helps us decide what direction your next steps will take.”

“What? You mean like a career path?” Charlotte asked.

The Proctor let out a light giggle. “More like a life path, dear. But a new career is definitely a possibility. One more suited to your aptitudes than your previous occupation.”

Charlotte felt even more confused than before she’d asked the question.

“So all these people here made a choice to be here and take this test?” she asked.

“Not all of them,” the Proctor answered. “The ones who arrived here like you certainly did. The rest are only now discovering that they have opportunities and choices to make. It’s very uplifting for them.”

Charlotte glanced over at the desk that had just been vacated. It was still empty but it had already been polished clean and had a glass of ice water waiting for the next occupant.

“He didn’t seem very uplifted when you hauled him out of here,” she remarked nodding to the empty desk.

“Not everyone who arrives here intentionally has the fortitude to make new choices. They would prefer to follow their original path for better or worse than try for something better. We don’t judge them for their lack of vision. We merely respect their conviction and send them on their way.”

“On their way where?” Charlotte asked, but the Proctor only removed her glasses and stared down at her.

“You seem to be struggling far more than I expected.”

The remark caught Charlotte off guard.

“You expected me to pass this test?” Charlotte asked. “A test that I have no idea why I’m taking, in a place I’ve never been, and that seems to have no purpose other than to make me re-experience the most horrific moments of my life?”

“Oh now you’re just being dramatic, dear,” the Proctor chided her. “The test is a psychological assessment. We simply want to know how those moments influenced your decision-making. How they drove you to make the choices you made. And, more to the point, we want to make sure YOU understand how those moments affected you. That’s why it is crucial that you be completely honest in your answers, not for us, but for yourself. You need to consider each situation and the choice you made to deal with it carefully and completely. Then give us the most honest answer possible.”

“Even if it’s pretty ugly and horrendous?”

“Especially then,” the Proctor told her. She perched her glasses back atop her nose and adopted a more professional tone. “Don’t be concerned about offending anyone, dear. We’ve been grading these exams for decades. Trust me, there is nothing you could possibly say that would offend us.” The Proctor suddenly grinned an incredibly fake smile and said “Back to work,” then wandered off in her oddly muted heels.

Charlotte felt more confused than before she’d asked for help. The Proctor had managed to answer her every question without providing any real answers whatsoever. The whole thing was absurd. She wondered what would happen if she simply got up and walked out without taking the silly test. Again, that odd trembling sensation took hold. The one that told her it would be an incredibly bad move. She reached for her water glass and took a healthy drink then clicked the ‘BEGIN’ button on the screen.

The first series of questions were pretty basic, things like Name, Address, Birthdate, Gender, Sexual Orientation, Faith, Occupation, etc. It certainly felt like a job application. Then the test began in earnest with all of the questions again reordered to throw off the applicant.

Question 1) What was the most horrific aspect of your first sexual experience?

Her first sexual experience? Calling it an experience was pretty horrific. Gang rape is what it had been. She didn’t want to go to that stupid frat party in the first place. She only went because her roommate, Stacy, and her other friends insisted. It was some sort of honor for freshmen to be invited to a seniors’ party and they were all excited about their social currency going up exponentially. She met Mitchell at the party. They hit it off. He was fun and polite and had exceptional dance skills. At some point, her drink had been spiked, and she found herself dizzy, barely able to stand. She recalled Mitchell leading her upstairs and thinking how sweet and attentive he was. She knew they’d had sex because it only came back to her in flashes. But it was the other faces that had terrified her. The ones that came after. The sweaty ones, the giggling ones, the beer-slobbering, grunting ones that ignored her pleas to stop, and her cries of “NO”. She woke up in her own bed to Stacy shaking her. They were going to be late for class. She sobbed and told Stacy everything she could remember but Stacy seemed unimpressed.

“Don’t you even care?” Charlotte yelled at her through shameful tears.

Stacy stood up and grabbed her sweater. “I’ll tell the professor you’re sick and let the school nurse know to give you a COVID test or something.” She stared down at a stunned Charlotte. “Look, we’ve got three more years at this place, and I don’t want to spend it being blackballed and laughed at by everyone on campus. So, you screwed up and slept with the wrong guy. It happens. You got your college cherry popped. At least he was great looking and not a troll.”

Charlotte didn’t know what to say. She’d expected sympathy, anger, or solidarity, but never indifference from her best friend.

“Just suck it up, try not to make waves, and maybe we’ll be able to enjoy the rest of our term okay?” Stacy offered as she left for class. And that is precisely what Charlotte had done. She’d sucked it up and stayed quiet so that Stacy and the gang could maintain their social equity.

Question 2) Describe the moment you lost faith in your parents’ love for you.

Another easy one. She typed the answer with the same certainty and haste as the previous one. On and on they went with her answering each one as she had done before. Why did your first love end in tragedy?; What was the most humiliating moment you ever experienced in school?; What made you question your faith in God?; Why did your greatest achievement bring you no joy?; Why didn’t your life turn out the way you thought it would? They just kept coming one after the other and she breezed through them rapidly until she got to the last question. This was the one that made her freeze. She’d never seen it on any other iteration of the test, she was sure of it.

20) What made you finally give up and stop trying to live?

The Proctor cleared her throat behind Charlotte startling her. She looked up to see the woman staring down with concern through the harsh horn rims perched on edge of her knifelike nose.

“I’d like to offer you some advice before you answer that last question,” the Proctor told her.

Charlotte wasn’t about to refuse any help so she shook her head quickly.

The Proctor glanced at a stopwatch in her hand. “I noted that you’ve completed all the other questions in record time. That means you most likely answered them the same way you did before, and that you’ve undoubtedly made the same mistakes as well.”

A wave of futility crashed over Charlotte as she realized the woman was right.

“You know that if you finish the test incorrectly you’ll either have to retake it or relinquish your seat to the next candidate. I’d advise you to consider your other responses carefully before answering this last question.”

The woman walked away silently leaving Charlotte staring at the screen with its ominous inquiry. The Proctor was right. She’d answered every question the same way. She began to tear up with frustration as she felt herself unraveling. She remembered how the young man next to her kept screaming that he’d been honest about every answer, and she began to silently cry. Then she remembered the Proctor word’s to him: ‘Perhaps you haven’t been as honest with your answers as you think.’

She took a deep breath and went over the answers she’d given starting with her first sexual encounter. The entire experience had been horrific. She’d been completely honest about that. It was also her first encounter and by far the most humiliating moment of her school career. Charlotte breathed through the memory trying to keep the horror at bay. And then she realized the truth she hadn’t yet admitted. It wasn’t the attack that was the most horrific thing. It wasn’t the fact that none of her friends had believed her. It was that she accepted it. Charlotte had never said a word to anyone about it. She never fought back. Just lived with it willingly as if the fault had been hers.

As she went over each question once more, the truth she never admitted kept crashing into her. The moment that I lost faith in my parents’ love? It wasn’t the day she’d been enrolled in a Catholic boarding school. Isn’t wasn’t the day they’d sent her off to college, even though she didn’t really want to go. It wasn’t even when her younger brother was born shortly thereafter. She loved her baby brother beyond measure. It was her father’s voice as her parents’ watched the priest pour water over the baby’s head at his christening. He sighed with a smile and said “God willing, this one won’t be such a disappointment.” Again, Charlotte never said a word. Never fought the assessment, simply added it to her flaws.

Her first love had indeed ended in tragedy, but not because Ben had died as she’d previously said. It was because he never would have been driving in that rainstorm if she’d been honest with him from the beginning. Charlotte had never told him about the rape, about why she tightened up with fear every time he made love to her. She’d just pushed him further and further away until he no longer tried. By the time he’d found someone else, it was too late. Her blurted confession that night sounded more like a lie of desperation than a revelation. He hadn’t believed her.

Her first achievement? That had been Amy. She had no idea she was pregnant when Ben died, but without Ben’s income, she had no way to maintain their apartment. She’d alienated her friends when she’d left school, and lost her job when the baby was born. Going home had been her only option. Her parents took her and the baby in, and it seemed that the prospect of her younger brother having a niece practically his age to grow up with would help mend the family rift. Six months later, Charlotte’s parents announced that it would be better for Amy to grow up in a solid, stable two-parent family with siblings, with emphasis on ‘two’ parents. They asked Charlotte to move out to keep from confusing Amy. If however, she managed to pull herself together and create a stable home on her own, they promised they would revisit the situation at a later date. They filed for sole custody of Amy three months later on the grounds that Charlotte was an unfit parent. The court agreed and Charlotte didn’t fight them. The day she said goodbye to her daughter, Charlotte knew she would never see her again. Her parents would see to it that Amy didn’t remember her and she would be erased from her child’s life. Once again, Charlotte never fought back, not even for her own child.

Charlotte sobbed quietly as the cursor blinked. The last thing she remembered before the library was staring into a cloudy, sky and asking God if she was meant to exist. then why was God trying to erase her from the world? Was that what He’d been trying to tell her all her life? That she was a mistake that needed to be erased? Erased was exactly what Charlotte was feeling. How could anyone have faith in a God that made it so painfully clear that the world wasn’t meant for you? No wonder her life didn’t turn out the way she had wanted. She wasn’t meant to have it in the first place.

What made you finally give up and stop trying to live?

Charlotte placed her hands on the keyboard, but before she could type that strange trembling began again. She lifted her hands and stared at them. She knew the true answer to this question. It was the only answer she hadn’t given yet. Charlotte began to type.

“I never fought for my life. When I was raped, I never spoke up for myself. I never fought back or reported anyone to the police. I let them get away with it. I wasn’t honest with Ben. I should have told him in the beginning so we could work through it. Maybe we could have made it work or maybe not, but I was too much of a coward to try. I only confessed when he backed me into a corner, and it was too late. I never fought for my daughter. When my parents said I was a disappointment, I accepted it and never argued. I let the one thing in my life that made it worth living be taken from me because it was easier to believe them than to believe in myself and be the mother she needed.”

A warm hand rested on Charlotte’s shoulder. She didn’t need to look up to see the Proctor standing next to her. She took a deep breath and typed:

“I didn’t lose faith in God. I lost faith in myself. I chose to believe those who told me that I didn’t belong in this world. I let them take from me all the blessings that God sent me because I never felt I belonged here. I became what they said I was, and I stopped trying. I gave up on living.”

Charlotte pressed the “Enter” key fully expecting to see “Reset Your Password?” fill the screen again. Instead, the desk rim glowed a soft blue and the image of a rising sun over the ocean appeared with a banner above it that read:

“You have successfully completed The Test. Thank you for your honesty. Please accompany your Proctor to the next iteration.”

“Come with me, please,” the Proctor’s voice gently told her.

Charlotte rose and followed the woman silently down the row of desks to the door at the far end. Once there, the Proctor removed a key card from her jacket pocket and inserted it into a slot atop the lock. The door clicked open and she led Charlotte through. The room beyond the door was round and white and empty. Soon the walls began to flicker and random images began to appear all around them.

“What happens now?” Charlotte asked.

“It’s your choice, dear,” the Proctor explained. “You may return to your previous life and attempt to, as they say, get your act together. Or you may choose to start over in a new life. You’ll have no knowledge of this one whatsoever. You’ll be free of the burdens and indignities that encumbered you allowing you to make better choices than the last time. It’s entirely up to you.”

Charlotte looked at the screens around her. Visions of her crying as Stacy watched, indifferent to her pain. The images of the boys she would never forget as they used her for sport. Her laying on the floor curled into a ball as Ben packed up his belongings and dragged them out into the rain. Kissing her daughter’s cheek as she said goodbye outside the courthouse for the last time. Her father’s disapproving stare and her mother’s reluctant obedience. It was almost too much to bear until the screens went blank.

“I won’t remember any of this?” Charlotte asked as she closed her eyes and fought back the tears and pain.

“No,” the Proctor told her. “No more than you would remember any of these.” The screens cycled once more and she heard shouts of joy that she recognized from deep within. She looked up to see herself playing in the park with Bruno, her first puppy. She was five, laughing and rolling in the grass as he licked her cheeks raw. She watched and listened as her mother read her bedtime stories about elves and fairies in hushed tones, the ones her father disapproved of. She watched her brother Christopher lift his tiny hand and grasp hers for the first time. How he glowed wide-eyed as she cooed to him. It made him laugh his baby laugh which always sounded like crystal bells to her. She saw him cry as they said goodbye when she left for college and felt the bear-tight hug of his tiny body. She watched as her mother taught her how to sew clothes for her dolls and then later on smiled with pride as she’d made Amy’s first set of pajamas on that same old sewing machine. She watched the twinkle of tears in her mother’s eyes as she held her granddaughter for the first time. She’d looked at Charlotte with such pride and gratitude. She watched as her mother and brother shared a see-saw with her and Amy. The two children laughed loudly waving their hands as they flew. She saw Ben’s kind eyes as he hung onto her every word when composing her dissertation. The jokes he played on her and the little surprises he would leave for her each day. She heard the rustle of the hair on his chest as they lay in the night talking about a future that would never be.

Charlotte had spent so much of her life focusing on the pain that she’d lost sight of the joy. The darkness had pulled her from the light like a relentless rip tide and drowned her beneath its waves. Even now, she could see the light fading from the room to a pinpoint as she let go of it. The room went black and silent. Charlotte stared at the empty bottle of pills in her right hand. The Proctor stood silently waiting.

“This was my choice,” she muttered. “That’s what you meant when you said I arrive here intentionally.”

“Yes,” the Proctor told her. “And now you have to finalize that choice.” She slipped the iPad into her jacket pocket and approached Charlotte with care. “You still have a chance to set things right. Only you can decide if you’re strong enough.”

“If I choose not to, I won’t only lose the pain, will I?”

The Proctor shook her head silently.

“I’ll lose everything. My mother, my brother, and my daughter. They will have never existed.”

“Not for you,” the Proctor told her. “You will experience a rebirth free from your previous life, its pains, and its pleasures. For them, however, the memory of the choice you make today will remain forever.”

A stab of pain greater than anything Charlotte had ever felt ripped through her chest. The thought of inflicting that amount of pain on her family was even more unbearable than living it herself.

The Proctor pushed a button on the wall and a pedestal extended up from the floor. On it was a laptop and its mundane keyboard. The screen was filled with the same large button she’d been staring at all afternoon. It read “Reset your Password?” But this time, the options below read "Yes" or "No".

Charlotte approached the pillar and froze. “I’m scared,” she whispered. “What if I’m not strong enough to make things right?”

“You were strong enough to face the truth about yourself,” the Proctor told her. “It’s time for you to have faith in yourself.”

Charlotte looked up into the Proctor’s blue eyes which now bore a look of pride.

“I want to go home,” she said.

The Proctor smiled confidently and said “Then you know what you have to do.”

Charlotte clicked "No". A door opened at the far end and as she walked toward it, the Proctor called out. “It won’t be easy,” she cautioned. “You have a lot of work to do and much to make up for. But I have faith in you.”

"Thank you," Charlotte said smiling. Stepping through the door, Charlotte left the library.

The light here was so bright it hurt her eyes and Charlotte flinched in pain as a distant voice said “There she is. Thought we’d lost you there, young lady.”

She didn’t recognize the man’s voice but the next voice was familiar. “Is she going to make it, Doctor?”

“Your daughter is definitely a fighter, Mrs. Corbin. I think she’s going to be just fine.”

Charlotte smiled weakly under the soft touch of her mother’s hand on her forehead and the touch of her brother's small hands gripping hers tightly.