The Refresh Button

Pavel sat in his office staring at the monitor screen. The screen displayed: "Refresh page?" Below the text, a blue "OK" button was blinking.

"Strange," Pavel thought. "I didn't do anything."

He looked at his colleagues. They were all staring at their monitors too, and they all had the same expression on their faces—something between bewilderment and resignation.

"Do you have this button too?" he asked Oleg from the neighboring desk.

"What button?" Oleg replied without taking his eyes off the screen.

"Well, this one—'Refresh page?'"

"Oh, that. I've had it for three days now. My wife says I should just click it already. But I'm thinking—what if it's a virus?"

Pavel pondered this. Indeed, what if it was a virus? On the other hand—what if he didn't click? Maybe the system would just freeze completely?

At that moment, the department head Sergey Viktorovich walked into the office. He was pale and seemed agitated.

"Colleagues," he said, "we have a problem. The IT department reports that our entire corporate network is infected with some new virus. It's showing everyone identical windows with buttons. The main thing is—nobody should click these buttons until the specialists figure it out."

"What happens if you click?" asked Marina from accounting.

"I don't know," Sergey Viktorovich admitted honestly. "The IT guys say there's some philosophical nonsense in the virus code about reality simulation. Probably another hacker prank."

Pavel looked at the button. It kept blinking. There was something hypnotic about it. As if it wasn't just offering to refresh the page, but something bigger. Refresh... what? Life? Consciousness? The universe?

"Maybe," he suddenly said aloud, "this isn't a virus at all?"

Everyone turned to him.

"Meaning?" asked Sergey Viktorovich.

"Well, think about it. We sit here every day, do the same work, live with the same thoughts. And then this 'Refresh page' button appears. Maybe someone's trying to give us a hint?"

"A hint about what?" Oleg didn't understand.

"That it's time to change something. To refresh ourselves."

Marina laughed:

"Pavel, you're talking like some kind of philosopher. It's just a computer glitch."

But Pavel wasn't listening anymore. He was looking at the button and thinking about his life. About how every morning he rode the same bus, bought the same coffee, sat at the same desk. About how every evening he watched the same shows and fell asleep with the same thoughts.

What if he actually clicked? What if this wasn't a virus, but... an opportunity?

He reached for the mouse.

"Pavel, don't!" screamed Sergey Viktorovich.

But it was too late. His finger clicked the button.

The screen flashed. For a second everything disappeared. Then a message appeared: "Page refreshed. Welcome to new reality version 2.1. Main changes: improved graphics, fixed motivation bugs, added new personal development features. Enjoy!"

Pavel looked around. The office was the same. The colleagues were the same. But something had changed. The air seemed fresher, the colors brighter. And most importantly—he suddenly had a strange feeling that he could do anything he wanted in this life.

"So?" asked Oleg. "What's on your screen?"

"Nothing special," Pavel smiled, getting up from his desk. "The system just updated."

And he walked toward the exit, thinking that it was finally time to learn to play guitar, meet that girl from the neighboring building, and maybe take a trip to Tibet.

Meanwhile, blue "OK" buttons continued blinking on his colleagues' monitors.