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Julia postponed two weeks of Sunday football with Keegan. She lied and said the board gave her last-minute reports to review as they approached the tail end of the evaluation. Keegan acted like she believed it, acted like she didn’t see the shades of brown beneath her eyes, like she didn’t notice she locked herself in her office all day.
Each day Julia sat at her desk, dozens of papers scattered around her and an open laptop to her left. And yet as the sun set behind her and the school emptied, the same papers surrounded her.
Overwhelmed wasn’t the right word. That was only half of it. It was like sitting in the driver’s seat, your foot planted firmly on the gas. There’s no emergency brake, no airbags. Colors of muted, dilapidated houses flash by in hues of yellow and blue. Trees look like brushstrokes, so purposefully placed. The speedometer ticks up, but you’re not really in control. You’re not really driving. There’s no choice as you pass through every yellow light, no choice as you drive deeper into the lost.
She sat with her face buried in her hands. For what? Minutes? Hours? Her cheeks and forehead turned pink under the pressure. She closed the sleeping screen to her computer and turned towards the window. Rain pitter pattered on the windowsill, almost drowning out the unexpected knock at the door.
“Yeah?” she responded suddenly, dramatically pulled out of her trance.
Erin opened the door and unsurely stood there, a slight glow on her face from the light through the window. The lights in the office were turned off. A migraine beat on the walls inside Julia’s head–the throbbing of a little drummer boy without rhythm–pulsating behind her eyelids.
“Hey,” she said with a smile. “I didn’t see you get lunch. Can I get you anything?”
Julia looked at the clock on the wall. It was 2:05, well after lunchtime. Wasn’t she the one who was supposed to remind Erin to eat?
“I’m actually not hungry today.”
Julia looked back at her. Her eyes were so small, her shoulders slumped. She looked so unlike the Erin she came to know. She continued standing there, nodding slowly, as if weighing her options.
“Can I work here with you,” Erin asked, her voice full of uncertainty, “just for the rest of the day? I could use your help on some of my evaluations.”
Julia froze at the unexpected question. It’d been so long since they shared the same space, so long since they were a breath span apart, so long since she had the luxury of being distracted by those hazelnut waves.
She wanted to say yes; she wanted to blurt it out right there. But her body felt numb, heavy with regret. She couldn’t keep doing this back and forth. She couldn’t keep allowing her in just to push her away. It was too hard, too much work to tiptoe along the thin line they drew in the sand.
“I’m sorry, Erin,” Julia sighed. “I have a lot of things I need to get caught up on.” She patted the piles of papers on her desk and looked up. Erin’s eyes dimmed with the storm brewing outside. “Today just wouldn’t be a good day.”
“Oh, okay,” she said and forced a weary smile. “No worries. We can get caught up later. Have a good rest of your day, Julia.”
And then she was gone, and Julia was left again with her own thoughts, or lack thereof. She sat there–the sound of the rain echoing like a foghorn behind her–the silence wrapping her in binding ribbons.
What am I doing? What did she continually do to herself, to her life? She could visually see that Erin needed her, needed her professional support and the comfort of that office. Maybe needing something more?
No.
She couldn’t, couldn’t be there for her like that when all she could think of was Marin and her being in the same room and not knowing what was up and what was down.
If her life was messy before, nothing made sense now. She sunk deeper into the possibility that nothing would ever make sense again. There’s no bliss in ignorance, no prize for the winner. It turns out you can’t have your cake and eat it too.
But what she could do was check on Erin, because she was continually there for her. Even with the ridiculousness of their whole situation, she still showed up, still helped out, and still did her job.
Julia walked to Erin’s office, her hand hovering over the door just like before. She might not even be inside. She could’ve been out and about, and her nervousness for nothing. Erin could be fine, and she didn’t even need to be standing there at all.
She knocked anyway.
“Come in,” sounded Erin’s voice, muffled through layers of wood and concrete.
“Hey,” she said, smiling weakly, her hands holding open the door.
Erin sat up straighter, her eyebrows arched and eyes wide. There was almost an imperceptible redness around her eyes, like she’d been crying.
Inside sat a desk facing the door, only enough space for one round wooden table in the middle. On the walls were motivational posters spewing cliché quotes about determination and perseverance, pictures of mountains to climb or calming oceans to subdue to.
“Would you mind if I closed the door?” Julia asked, three fingers still holding the edge in anticipation.
“Not at all.” She finished writing something down and then set a paper to her left.
The window faced the woods behind the school, no children in sight. Overgrown, snow covered shrubs rustled against the glass, accosted by the wind in the distance. The pressure of wind-beaten drifts tapped on the brick outside between the aggressive pounding of rain.
