| |
Time waits for no one. And by time, I meant Erika who knew I was moving into my new office that day but couldn’t be bothered to care too much about the details, like the meetings I might have had or the sheer time involved in getting settled in. She couldn’t think about those things with her mind so singularly focused on her work and the selling of manuscripts that went along with it.
The paperwork for my partnership with Cecilia had been sent to me, signed, and sent back, so technically, I could have just worked with her on that middle grade project still otherwise unnamed. But no, Erika knew I was awkward with new people and that–maybe, kind of, sort of–I wasn’t in the best headspace to step out of my comfort zone. So she took on a role she knew all too well and inserted herself back into my life.
Shortly after Professor Evory left my office, my cell phone rang, and though the sight of Erika’s name on the screen turned my stomach, I knew I had to answer it. Now that her queue was full of my work, there was no way around it anymore.
Once I did, Erika immediately started with the agenda she had drafted in her mind. “So Cecilia’s edits on the first book in the Gilded Phantoms series will be coming your way this afternoon.”
The thought made me wince. I still couldn’t really fathom the idea of releasing that series into the world, but it was clearly going to happen. That ship had long since left its port, and there was no calling it back.
I twisted my lips and tried to pull the conversation back. “Hello to you too Erika. I’m doing well. The office is great. It’s well refurbished and furnished. Can’t complain in the slightest! Everything is just so great!”
My voice sounded like a caricature of itself as I spoke. That was all I could muster. And in response to it, there was an uncharacteristic pause on the other end of the line.
“Mia, that’s the most upfront you’ve been about anything in your life.”
There was a moment of panic as I realized that once again my attempt to be witty and clever did not land where I wanted them to. In fact, the target was missed so wildly that I was in a completely different county, crashing a moment I was not meant to be a part of.
“And that’s...” I trailed off, only to quickly add. “Not suspicious at all?”
My voice cracked during that last bit. Once again, something of mine was failing to hold together and creating an uncomfortable situation for me.
Despite the clear bait I seemed to be laying out, Erika merely sighed. “Moving on. Cecilia asked me to look over her notes before she sent them, just to make sure everything was clear, and that she hadn’t stepped on any landmines.”
I scoffed. “As if you know where all my emotional baggage is.”
“I know plenty, Mia.”
As she spoke, I could hear Erika reach up and pinch the bridge of her nose in frustration, something she must have done more often as of late. I was wearing on her nerves. I couldn’t really deny that. Even avoiding the thought was becoming increasingly difficult.
Papers shuffled on the other end of the line as Erika gathered up her notes. It also worked as some sort of punctuation to mark the transition from one part of this conversation to the other. The sound pulled the train back onto the right tracks before this derailment got any worse.
“There are some minor edits she wants you to do,” Erika explained. “Of course, more edits will come once the series is acquired. But for us, a couple of scenes need to be added, a few sentences need to be deleted or reworded, and an explanation could be inserted here and there. Also one of the characters needs to be renamed.”
I sighed and instinctively put my feet up on the desk. I had wanted to be more comfortable as I listened to this litany of my literary faults, but then I remembered where I was and what the space represented. I remembered the other desk that once sat in this room. This desk wasn’t actually Professor Evory’s, but the resemblance was so uncanny that it still felt sacrilegious to rest my feet on it. So I lowered them again and shifted forward in my seat.
“I think I know exactly which one you're talking about,” I replied.
“The anagram one that also looks like you hit the keyboard in frustration?”
“Yep.”
Erika hummed. “At least we’re on the same page. For curiosity’s sake, which was it?”
“It was the keyboard one that I just twisted around to make it look like an anagram,” I explained. “Erika, you know I’m bad at naming things.”
She knew all too well, and the reminder just pulled a low groan from her throat. “I’m not going to tell you what to do with your body, but if you decide to have kids, run their names by me before you commit. For the kid’s sake.”
Rolling my eyes, I lifted my shoulder to press the phone against my head, freeing my hands up from the responsibility. “I told you my dad named me after one of his cats, right?”
“Some things run in families,” she mused absentmindedly.
At that point, Erika clearly wanted a stiff drink but knew it was still far too early for something like that. A bold assumption for me to make, perhaps, but we understood each other. That was another reason Erika made such a good agent for me. She let me understand her well enough to know exactly when I was pressing a nerve or two, so I wasn’t left guessing and then panicking as a result.
“Also...” she said to mark the next transition. “I found a short story I want to pitch to an anthology one of our other authors is putting together.”
“Approved, but for my sake, tell me which story it is.”
“The one about the bisexual scientist and the asexual sculptor.”
“The weird, buddy-cop-esque one?” I asked, stammering over my own description.
It was a hard story to describe, written in the midst of a fever dream. Or that’s what I would say if I was asked. In reality, it was the sort of thing I thought Ellie would find profound based on a misunderstanding. She loved this podcast with queer creatives, so I wanted to make a story about them. However, the characters were so unruly that I was left with just a mess to show for their visit to my laptop.
“Yes.”
I sighed. I was worried she would say that. As I saw it, that story didn’t have any potential other than as a reminder of my youthful missteps. But I had promised to give Erika anything in that pile that she wanted.
“It’s yours,” I said, ever dutiful. “Do whatever you want with it.”
“Great!”
I could hear the smile on her face. And for a moment, I felt a flicker of something stirring in my chest. It wasn’t joy, per say, but it was close.
She went on. “Cecilia will send over her notes later today, as I said. After you get those revisions done, we’ll sell it, and the editor will hash out any substantive changes. That will guide the edits on the rest of the series. Normally, writing out the whole thing before an editor has a chance to look at the first volume is a dangerous game. Actually, it still is. Don’t do it again. But it somewhat worked out for you. Or if I had to guess it will. As for this short story, I’m willing to send it in as is.”
“Super!”
I was trying to sound cheerful or optimistic about this whole thing. Excitement wasn’t really expected given how difficult editing one’s work can be. But given that I didn’t have those notes yet, it was reasonable to think that I could still keep that dread and despair at bay, at least for the moment. But despite how simple that performance should have been, something else seeped into those two syllables and transformed them from an earnest attempt at connection or a sign of agreement and into a biting, sarcastic remark.
But it wasn’t sarcasm. It was panic, dread and anxiety. It was a lot of things. Once again, the figurative train was moving. Work was being sent to publishers. Expectations were being raised. Erika and Cecilia might have liked those projects, but that didn’t mean they were actually any good. And oh goodness, this would actually or technically be my sophomore book or return project or something along those lines. The specific title eluded me. Regardless, those sorts of releases didn’t always go well. Or so I read in a review of someone else’s book once. I didn’t even know why I read that review. I didn’t know the author or care about the book. It was just something that an internet algorithm put in front of me when I was bored. From that, a real anxiety grew, and I was stuck with it. It just had the decency to lie dormant when it was not entirely relevant. But it was becoming relevant as the train inched along.
I looked around the office, trying to find something to hold my gaze or to pull my mind away from the lingering dread of what had to come next. But the room was too empty for that. The university logo plastered about had become little more than visual static and couldn’t hold my attention. And even the ghosts of all that had once been in this room had retreated when their presence might have offered me some comfort.
I was left with nothing but my own thoughts. That was a dangerous game.
“Final thing,” Erika said.
Something about her tone struck me. Specifically, it struck a well of dread buried deep within me. “Do I need to sit down for this?” I asked.
“Why would you need to sit down?”
“Really, Erika? After everything, you’re going to tell me that?”
Erika mulled the question over for a second, but she clearly couldn’t see what was left to talk about. I would have to spell it out for her.
“Look, Erika, I...” I paused and took a deep breath as my mind raced. When my lungs stopped inflating halfway through their range, I quickly returned to what I was saying. “I think you were right to tell me about my sister. Just so I can prepare myself, yes, but I’m going to be anxious until she actually calls me, and she hasn’t yet. Who knows when she will? But now I have to wait, and I’m really bad at waiting.”
“You had no problems with waiting to send me all this,” Erika deadpanned.
“Waiting at the wrong times, you could call it.”
“Clever. But this is somewhat related to that. No big news just trying to deal with this new reality of yours.”
I groaned, but because that wasn’t a coherent objection, Erika pushed on anyway. “For your fellowship. Now as you know I don’t like lying.”
“Kind of wish you did,” I muttered.
Erika did not react. “I looked over all the paperwork again. And while it’s somewhat implied that you should spend the year writing the first draft of something new, there’s no real reason why you can’t workshop something while you’re there if you need to take the easier route for.... Personal reasons that are obvious to the both of us. We just have to be on the same page about what needs to be workshopped.”
It was a fair concern. I just admitted that I was going through a lot, and the deliverable for a fellowship that I took for entirely personal reasons didn’t need to be another burden on my shoulders. If there was a corner to cut in order to save my will to live, that seemed like a great one to aim for.
Except I didn’t need that. Because I did have a plan. I had a plan and a purpose for that plan. All I needed was the commitment. I needed to sign my soul away somehow, and for that, there was Erika and her more abrasive nature.
“I actually have an idea for what I want to work on,” I confessed as nonchalantly as I could despite the pounding in my chest.
Erika’s interest was piqued. “Are you going to tell me what it is?”
“Are you going to tell me that it’s a bad idea?” I asked with a hint of sarcasm.
“I can’t answer that if I don’t know what it is.”
And she was right. I didn’t like that she was, but my opinions on the matter changed nothing.
I took another deep breath. This one didn’t feel so stunted.
“Look, I need to figure out my dad’s life story. For this new sister. I know I’ve made peace with how he was, but she’s going to have a harder time of it. So... Fictionalized Daddy Issues? How’s that for a title?”
There was a thud on the other end of the line. That could have been Erika slamming her head against the desk in frustration or it could have been a very strong and matter-of-fact palm to the face also in frustration. Either way, she was not thrilled.
“As a working title? Halfway to acceptable.”
“As a published title...” I dared.
“Over my dead body.”
I was about to interject with a joke but was swiftly denied when she beat me to it. “And yes, we’re slowly getting there,” she snapped.
Erika took a deep breath, likely to steady herself, but it could only do so much. “Look, Mia, Darling, you aren’t my only client. So realistically, I don’t need to go through... this... right away. If you need to repurpose something here for your fellowship, we can do that.”
“It’s not going to be necessary...?” I tried to say.
“Mia, why did that sound like a question?”
I did not know why that sounded like a question, so I did not answer.
She asked again. “Mia, do I need to be concerned about that being a question?”
“I mean,” I started, subconsciously swinging my legs in my chair like a child would when they needed to look super innocent because Mommy was about to decide on their punishment. “Is there ever any real reason to be concerned?”
“Mia–”
I hung up right then. And blessedly, Erika didn’t call back. So I had technically won. My word had been the final word. Or that’s what I told myself.
But the artificial peace I could manufacture for myself was short lived. It had to be. Revisions were coming. While most writers hate making revisions, I had a special hatred for them because I already felt like I was an incompetent fake writer, and revisions just seemed to drill the point home. The naming issue in particular stung. Naming a character via a keyboard slam wasn’t my best idea, but I had hoped no one would notice. And yet, it was immediately noticed, setting the precedent for so many more immediate discoveries of all the other things I was insecure about.
I laid my head back against the chair and fled into the many distractions my phone offered. Most of it was junk. In fact, all of it was junk with the exception of a few messages from Ellie that I knew I needed to answer but wasn’t. I even opened up my messaging app, but Ellie’s bids for my attention were ignored in favor of a message to Chris.
ETA on our next date night?
It was a quick text, not overly thought out or incorporated into some grand plan. I had just wanted to ask it, but once I did, I was overcome with fear and half-baked pseudo-regrets. It might have been too soon to ask, considering our last conversation. And maybe I should have followed through with some sort of power play, maintaining the advantage he had first handed me when he showed his interest. There’s certainly an argument to be made on that front, but despite the wisdom therein, I wasn’t inclined to be smart about this act of flirtation, if that’s what it was. I didn’t care about winning or anything that vaguely seemed like it. I just wanted him, but I wasn’t sure how to say that.
I miss you, I added in a second message.
As I sent that one, he replied to the first. Wasn’t going to ask because I know it’s late notice. But one of my guys today asked for more shifts. He’s saving for a car. So he can work tonight, and I can go see you. If you’re down.
Some people might have seen a bouquet of red flags in his message. How convenient that an employee just so happened to ask him for shifts. They were thin patches in the tapestry of his story. I could have poked holes if I was so inclined. But I didn’t find anything wrong with what he said. Money needs do come up, and Chris was a good boss. Maybe he’d be a better boss to the Happy Flour staff than he would be a boyfriend to me, but I didn’t think that was too much of a character deficit. It was something I could deal with, anyway. Why would I resent my partner for being a good person?
Instead of being angry or suspicious or anything of the sort, I just replied, So everyone wins?
At first, he sent me a lone smiley emoji, a mirror of the expression I couldn’t see. Then he messaged me again with an actual. We’re getting a little too old for pizza all the time. So some other place? What are you hungry for?
Oh the dreaded question! I never knew what I wanted, and the context of the question did not matter. It was a general inability to form desires that plagued me. True to form, I wasn’t hungry for anything specific. Pizza would be great, ironically enough. There was always a certain joy that came from eating pizza, even if I wasn’t craving it, but man cannot live on pizza alone, to inappropriately paraphrase a Bible verse.
I mulled over the decision for a second, searching my mind for scraps or clues as to what to say, but nothing came to me. Or rather, I didn’t know what I wanted, only what I didn’t.
So I told him as much. Can I start with what I don’t want? None of those stupidly fancy, lights down low sorts of places. My mom used to work at one. Do you know why they keep the lights low?
No, he replied.
According to my mom, it’s so people can’t tell if a guy’s with his wife or mistress. Or at least that’s what she always told me.
I repeated that anecdote with the sort of confidence one uses for facts, for things they know directly or have verified. I had done neither in this case. But it still felt true, just the sort of truth that one could take for granted.
Chris didn’t challenge that truth. LOL. Got it. Bright lights, then?
Call it asserting dominance over any other women who might want you, I joked.
Small crowd, but yes, you can assert dominance, he said in one message. Then there was a second text. There’s a new pasta place in town that has very bright lighting.
The idea itself wasn’t repulsive, but I didn’t understand what he meant. Pasta place?
Like a build your own dish, custom place. The neighborhood down the street from the stadium has a bunch of them. Some fad, but the place I’m thinking of is called Pasta Pizzazz if you want to look it up.
So one business guy just ran with a concept then?
Chris didn’t answer right away. And for a flash of a moment, I worried I offended him, but after another moment, he finally replied, Going to go with no... I co-own the pasta place and only the pasta place.
He really was a good businessman, I thought to myself, as if I were practicing for the speech I would one day have to give my mother. To Chris, I said, Fair enough. And that sounds like a date.
I sent that last message with a bit of a smirk. By some standards, this wouldn’t have been a victory, but I was ready to call it as much. I’d get to see him again, soon, and that was enough for me.
My phone buzzed again. And although the conversation with Chris had seemingly come to its natural end, I was still inclined to think it was him. There were still a few details to work out for this date, like time and if he was picking me up. So I reached for my phone, but it wasn’t Chris who sent me that message. It was my mother.
How’s the new office? she asked.
Initially, I was surprised she asked, only to then remember that I had told her about the office move in. She hadn’t sent the laptop yet, and so there was at least one reason for us to continue a back and forth. Had it not been for that reason, I wouldn’t have answered all of her questions as she poured over every detail of the year I’d be spending at Stella Maris. It quickly felt like an interrogation, and maybe that was her point. But even if it wasn’t, I was never in a mood to deal with her questions. Out of some sense of necessity, I did answer them, but my answers were short and cold.
I wasn’t proud of that. I didn’t like being that way with her, but I couldn’t turn it off. There was just a bitterness that I couldn’t shake. She was tied to a memory that I wanted to avoid. She was there when Dad died, after all. That moment was laced with her voice and her face. I couldn’t think of that moment without hearing her voice or seeing her face and what little help she had been all the while.
But she wasn’t at fault, no. I would try to remind myself of that over and over again. Mom was just there, and I needed to get over the association. But I didn’t know how. I only knew how to be defensive and how to shut down. I was stuck both in life and in my office staring at her text with a rising anger and burning frustration in my chest. There was a tightening that my gut told me could be alleviated by screaming, and there was a way for me to do as much. There was a couch with cushions just outside my office where the students used to wait back when this was Professor Evory’s office. It had also been replaced, so it was probably safe to grab one of those pillows and scream into it. Less germs and all that. But it wasn’t actually to make me feel better.
All I could do was answer Mom’s questions and send a few pictures of the room.
It’s so nice! she replied. What are you going to put on the desk?
I read that message in her voice, and it struck a nerve that it had no right to touch. I closed my eyes and tried to calm myself despite the bile creeping up the back of my throat.
I don’t know yet, I said, my tone softened by the medium.
Does Professor Evory know you’re there? she asked.
Yeah he came by earlier.
He must be so proud of you.
The thought tamed the beast in me that had been tearing through my innards just moments before. I wanted him to be proud of me, but it was not a thought I dare come to on my own. Someone else had to start that conversation, but even then, it didn’t feel entirely right to walk down that path. After all, I hadn’t really earned this fellowship, had I? I was pulled in to save face and to resolve the mistakes other people had made. It had nothing to do with me. And if it did, if my talents had to speak for themselves, then there would only be silence.
But I still had to answer my mom. He said he was.
Not that I believed it.