Brennan hadn’t felt like going to work today.
Not that she felt like going to work any day. Her last summer before college was speeding by, the days blurring together, too slippery for her to grasp hold of the time and hold on.
Brennan would have spent the entire summer holed up in her room, writing. Instead, she was spending the summer working, trying to save money for college expenses. She glanced at the pennant she’d pinned to the wall above her desk in hopes of rousing some excitement—some sort of spark—for school. For college. SIUE. Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. Brennan felt a little sick thinking about making it her new home. It was a nice school—really nice; on visits, she’d almost felt like she could belong. Back at home, though, the feelings faded in the wake of anxiety.
Brennan pulled her hair up into its usual knot on top of her head. She could almost hear her mother. I wish you’d actually put some effort into your hair, for work at the very least. Brennan, the disappointment. If she saw herself that way, would her parents see her that way too? Sometimes she wondered. She stared at the stubborn flyaways around her ears that refused to be tamed. It wasn’t that she didn’t care at all about the way she looked. She did care, somewhat. It was just that she had come to the conclusion, at the start of high school, that people weren’t worth her putting extra effort into dressing herself up and hiding who she really was. Her black leggings and T-shirts were easy to grab even on an anxious morning; they didn’t take thought. Thoughts were something that tended to cause trouble for Brennan. What if I look silly in this shirt? Is this skirt too short? Will people notice that my sweater has creases where it was folded?
Letting the thoughts lead her around by a leash hadn’t helped when she’d been a freshman, after all. After her family moved when she was in middle school, Brennan had left behind her school and the friends she had made. Instead, she was homeschooled. It was sort of a relief—Brennan had always found it hard to make friends, and after having all the effort she’d put into it at her old school wiped away, she was perfectly fine with being at home.
That was when her love of writing had started. She’d had so much time to write what she wanted and how she wanted. Her mind was filled with stories—with fantasy worlds, half-formed. Without a laptop, she wrote by hand, her handwriting growing more sloppy and slanted the faster she wrote, as she tried to keep up with her racing mind.
Then she’d been a freshman, they’d moved back, and her parents wanted her to go to “actual school,” as her then-best friend had called it. She was reenrolled at her previous school.
Brennan had been excited. She’d gotten new clothes, new binders, and new notebooks. She’d daydreamed for days about being able to see all her old friends. Then she’d shown up on the first day of class only to find that everything was different. Her friends had gone on with their lives without her, because of course they had. What had she expected? It wasn’t as if they’d just stop time in their sixth-grade year and everything would be the same now that Brennan was back.
Her best friend from the homeschool group her mom was a part of had enrolled in school as well. Brennan took comfort in this; at least she’d have a person. But when they showed up on the first day of school, her friend met someone new and they hit it off, immediately leaving Brennan the awkward plus one. You know, the one who had to walk ahead or behind when the sidewalk wasn’t wide enough for three people.
That year had been when the anxiety had started. The first time Brennan had had what she later discovered through some Googling must have been an anxiety attack, she had thought she was having a heart attack. She’d stood in the bathroom stall, back against the cold metal door, her breath coming quick and shallow, her hand on her chest in an effort to press away the deep ache and keep from falling apart. Can fourteen-year-olds have heart attacks? she wondered. And then I can’t get a breath. I can’t breathe. Eventually, it had settled in long term as a knot in her stomach, where it liked to make her feel like she was about to throw up. It gnawed at her stomach every day, for seemingly no reason. She was sick, she told her mom. You’re fine, her mom would say, after pitying Brennan initially. Brennan didn’t blame her; she had to be tough; had to force Brennan out of her comfort zone lest she become a total recluse. And so Brennan was grateful to her mom, at least somewhat—even when her mom forced her out of the house and into a job the last summer before her first year at college.
So Brennan scraped together all her anxiety, tied it into an ever-present knot of sick in her stomach, and went to work behind the deli counter of her local grocery store. Needless to say, she wasn’t one of those people who left for work excited, loving her job. By the end of the day, she’d be dirty and food splattered, feet aching from standing for hours with only one break. On top of that, she was usually starving, because the anxious demon in her stomach wouldn’t allow her to eat in public. What if you get food poisoning? She would counter with I can bring my own food, to which it would reply But you feel SICK. If you eat, you’ll THROW UP and everyone will think you’re D-I-S-G-U-S-T-I-N-G.
For now, Brennan tried not to focus on how she’d feel at the end of the day. She was too busy gathering strength for the beginning of it. And it took a lot of strength, carefully gathered, to push down the nausea at the back of her throat and get out of the car, slam the door, and speed walk into the store before she changed her mind and turned to run.
Currently, Brennan was trying to write a summary for a novel. There was only one problem: How could you write a summary for something when you didn’t know exactly where it was going? When you didn’t know the ending?
She was stuck. She’d written the beginning of Ing’s story about ten different times (in first person, third person, present, and past tenses) and she still couldn’t tell exactly what was going to happen. When are you going to just pick something and soldier on? asked Brennan’s friend, Emma, via Facebook Messenger. They’d met sophomore year. Emma liked what Brennan liked. Emma had her life on track—she wanted to be a chemist someday. Sometimes, Brennan wondered if she’d maybe thought some of Emma’s on-track-ness might rub off on her. Brennan hadn’t had any idea what she wanted to do until the last week of her senior year, and she still wasn’t entirely sure.
You should shadow your aunt, her mom had said. Brennan’s aunt (her mom’s youngest sister) had just recently graduated with a doctorate in physical therapy. It was an idea, and Brennan grabbed hold of it like a lifeline.
Really, Brennan didn’t see how choosing your major before going off and actually experiencing things made any sense. And sure, you could go undeclared, but that just felt like too much pressure for Brennan when everyone else seemed to know. Left and right, everyone at her high school was declaring majors. Brennan had felt like the weird one whenever people asked her what she was going to major in. She’d always tried to avoid the subject. She would have gone for English if she thought she could make a career in fiction writing. There was the problem, however, that Brennan couldn’t bring herself to post anything for people to actually read, other than the carefully culled bits of scenes that she sometimes sent to Emma when she was feeling especially brave. There was also the problem of the luck involved in writing—you might make it or you might not. Brennan didn’t know if she had what it took to make it, and no one else could tell her if she did or didn’t, since she wouldn’t let anyone actually see what she wrote.
Physical therapy was convenient because SIUE had a bachelor’s program to prepare for physical therapy school, and Brennan had a scholarship for SIUE.
Brennan had written to her aunt last night.
Dear Aunt Kim,
Too formal. Aunt Kim was family.
Hi, Aunt Kim!
Better; at least more friendly, like maybe she actually wasn’t nervous at all about shadowing.
I’m interested in pursuing physical therapy when I go off to college. I was wondering if I might be able to shadow you a few times before I go down to school for the fall. I’d love the chance to see what a physical therapist does, and how they interact with their patients.
That had seemed all right.
If you have any time available, please let me know. I’m off Mondays and Wednesdays, so those would be good, but if you need to do other days or times, you can let me know and I can try to work something out with my boss.
“Hit send,” Brennan whispered. “Don’t freak out.”
That had been when she messaged Emma, trying to distract herself by talking about the logistics of her novel. (Or story, because Brennan wasn’t quite ready to call it a novel. Something about that seemed too real.)
When are you going to just pick something and soldier on?
Emma, like Brennan, was an introvert, and so both were content to have occasional in-person meetings supplemented by hours of Facebook chatting.
Not sure,
Brennan had typed back, partially offended by Emma’s blunt questioning, and partially feeling called out because Emma was right.
I feel like I’m almost ready,
she finally responded.
I just want it to feel right, you know?
She couldn’t explain how important it was for Ing to be just right, because she was the antithesis—the opposite—of Brennan in every way. She was what Brennan wanted to be, if she were a character in a young adult novel.
She sent Emma little scenes sometimes, but never anything full—fleshed out. Emma would send them back, editing the little typos that her friend was very prone to making in her all-fire hurry to get the words from her head to her computer (it was so much easier typing than writing by hand, but sometimes Brennan’s hands still couldn’t keep up with her mind).
Today, for no particular reason, Brennan was especially nervous about going to work. Even the drive from her house into town hadn’t managed to calm her down. Your pulse is RACING, her mind said. CHECK IT. Brennan didn’t want to check her pulse. It felt like giving in. So she breathed in and breathed out and clenched the steering wheel so tightly her fingers cramped. Check. Your. Pulse. Her mind was screaming now, and her breathing was speeding up. She imagined that her mind was laughing at her, standing next to a sign proclaiming 34 Days Since Last Incident and preparing to flip it to zero.
Brennan pulled to a stop at the light. She adjusted the air conditioner so it was pointed straight at her face, cooling the heat in her cheeks and calming her a little. The voice was a little less loud, but still there. It can’t hurt, she argued with herself. It isn’t giving in. It’s just proving your mind wrong, because the pulse will be normal, and you’ll know you’re fine. She tried to focus on the color of the light. It was one of the busier intersections in town, and she knew the light would stay red for some time. She sighed, forcing herself to unclench her fingers, stretching her hands before clenching the wheel once more, despite her efforts to relax. Even with the air conditioner, she was sweating. Better put on more deodorant when you get to work, inner Brennan chided her. Wouldn’t want your co-workers or customers smelling how nervous you are. She tried picturing the GIF with the ever-expanding and constricting circle, breathing in time with it. In, out. In. Out.
She thought about her summary. In a world of Extros (people with physical or strength powers) and Intros (people with abilities based in the mind), Ing is an Ambivalent. She’s normal, and normal isn’t wanted in Santos. Brennan frowned. Too much explanation? Solve the puzzle. Defeat the queen. Kill the king. Welcome to the Santos Game. The problem was Brennan hadn’t quite decided what exactly the Santos Game entailed. Her mind was filled with vague images of riddles and challenges, intrigue and trickery—but none of it was solidifying into anything concrete. She knew she wanted Ing (Ingrid Wei, hero of the story) to trick the Superioris (Santos’s government—ten houses and a king) and enter the game to win, basically, her freedom to exist in Santos, all while proving that those without powers were just as powerful as those with. Maybe the game contestants were drawn by lottery, and Ing didn’t have a choice? Brennan just couldn’t find a plot where the pieces fit together perfectly. It was frustrating. It had been a year since she’d started working on this idea.
Brennan focused on the stoplight again. Still red. She left the summary behind in favor of thinking about the scene she was currently working on—in which Ing, newly-chosen contestant in the Santos Game, attends the Celebration of Beginnings, which was basically the send-off for the entire Game Season in the story. In the scene, which was a masquerade ball complete with lots of gilded and ornate masks and dresses, Ing meets a mysterious stranger. She is unsure if he is an investor in the game or a contestant, but something about his eyes—somehow nothing and everything, brown, hazel, green—captivates her. “Trust no one,” he said, leaning ever so slightly closer to Ing. “The Game isn’t a game after all . . .”
The car jolted forward, and Brennan’s hands, which had started to relax, immediately clenched around the steering wheel once more. Had her foot come off the brake? What had happened? It took her a moment to make sense of things.
The light was still red but she knew it would be green soon. She glanced in the rearview mirror at the minivan behind her. It was close; abnormally close. Then she got it.
She’d been in a car accident. She, Brennan Davis, was part of a fender bender. A bad one? No, probably not, she guessed. No airbag—she’d only jolted forward a bit.
Brennan figured she could do one of the following things:
1. Drive off. Better to do that than to face the embarrassment of talking to another driver.
2. Get out and yell at the other driver. It was their fault after all, and the tension inside of her was just begging to be let out, unleashed.
3. Sit. Wait. Let the other driver lead.
She tried to remember what they’d said in driver’s ed about what to do in a car accident.
She vaguely recalled something about not moving, in case of neck or spinal injury. Brennan glanced down at herself. It wasn’t that kind of accident. She was all right. No injuries. No intrusions into the driver’s compartment. She undid her seat belt. At worst, a slight case of whiplash that would leave her sore tomorrow morning.
But then the anxiety demon clenched her stomach. What if it’s internal? What if your liver is lacerated and you’re bleeding out into your abdomen? You should CALL AN AMBULANCE. Just in case. Better safe than sorry.
Brennan shook her head. Be logical, she told her demon. Next. What next?
Probably she’d have to talk to the other driver. Inspect the damage. Get his name and insurance information. She glanced in her rearview. The other driver seemed to be staring forward in shock, making no move to get out.
Okay, okay, she thought. She remembered being told not to admit fault in an accident. Leave it to the cops, the insurance company, the lawyers—anyone else. But in this case, she didn’t think that mattered. It wasn’t her fault. He—she?—the other driver, whoever it was, had rear-ended her.
She wondered if they’d been texting. Sleeping. Looking out the window?
She saw the light turn green and people started moving forward without Brennan. In her peripheral vision she could see passersby glancing sideways, watching her with curiosity and concern. Oh, an accident? Interesting. That’s not something you see every day. Her chest tightened. They’re STARING at YOU, her brain yelled. MAYDAY MAYDAY.
Please shut up, Brennan begged her mind. She glanced at the dash clock. It seemed like hours had passed, like everything was happening in slow motion. In reality, it had been mere minutes. Hours or minutes, she was going to be late to work.
So she took out her phone and, people outside forgotten in the wake of a million other things to worry about (like the fact that she could currently be, at this moment, bleeding out), she called her boss.
The phone rang in her ear a few times before her boss picked up.
“Hi,” Brennan said. “I’m going to—I’m going to be a little late.”