Still Life with Tornado(29)

I wish I had a piece of sidewalk chalk in my pocket so I could draw a chicken on the corner of 17th and Spruce.

I catch a bus. I catch another bus.

I walk into my new school and I go to my seventh-period class, which I’m failing because I haven’t been here in two weeks. As I sit in a broken three-legged chair and listen to my teacher talk about American politics, I can’t help but see how unoriginal she is. She’s taught the class for at least ten years. She needlepoints while we fill in worksheets or tests. Behind her is graffiti in six-foot-high multicolored letters. HEED. That’s what it says. HEED. A cockroach skitters across the dusty floor and into a pile of broken plasterboard.

When the teacher gives us a pop quiz on the week’s work, I realize that I could be back in the café talking to Alleged Earl. I could be finding out if his name is really Earl. I could be discovering what college his son goes to. I could be hearing stories about art or form or color or what makes an original idea.

I take the quiz paper and I write this on it:

I have to stop following Alleged Earl. He’s original, but following him isn’t original. Tomorrow I will try something new. I don’t know what yet. I hate this class. I’m going to get up and leave now.

I fold the paper and put it in my pocket. The teacher says, “Oh, hey, Sarah. I . . .”

That’s all I hear. I’m down the hall before anyone can stop me. More graffiti. More piles of rotting plasterboard. The stairwell door windows are smashed into a million tiny pieces of safety glass, no longer safe. They glow green and blue and look like gems. I scoop up a handful of them and put them in my pocket. I don’t notice that my hand is bleeding until I’m outside. On the street, some kids yell something at me but I don’t hear them. I just see their mouths moving and their hands pointing. They’re laughing at me.

I wish I had my umbrella. There is so much bullshit.





HELEN TAKES SHIT SHE DOESN’T DESERVE



Three times a month I have to go to meetings. Floor meetings, ER meetings, and charge nurse meetings. Because most people don’t work the night shift, these meetings are scheduled at the stupidest times. Usually ten in the morning. So I work a seven-to-seven and then have to stay awake another three hours before the meeting starts and then I have to sit there while the day nurses in Snoopy scrubs eat doughnuts and talk about their kids and shit. Sometimes I put my head on the table and slowly bang it. Sometimes I say, “Has anyone else here been up since four yesterday afternoon?” Sometimes I fall asleep. Sometimes I just walk out.

Luckily, I’m liked. I do my job. My boss has asked me why I behave like this in meetings and I tell her that maybe next time the meeting should be scheduled for three a.m. I mean, at least once a month that would make it fair.

She always says, “Three in the morning? I sleep at night!”

I’ve been doing this for too long not to know that nobody appreciates the night shift. Unless you personally have some shit go down at night, people could care less about the fact that some of us have to do this.

? ? ?

Chet and I have monthly meetings. We schedule them. We tried marriage counseling once. He lasted three appointments. Two and a half, really. He walked out in the middle of appointment number three because the therapist said he had anger issues, had to face those anger issues, and had to stop giving me shit I didn’t deserve.

His solution to “shyster therapy” was monthly meetings.

We never solve anything at the monthly meetings. Every conversation with him is like talking to a person with no short-term memory. He forgets that ten seconds before, he was sorry. He forgets that ten seconds before that, he admitted to being wrong about something.

He makes excuses, manipulates, gaslights, and we end up yelling at each other every single time. In fact, I have no idea why I even show up anymore. If I can walk out at work, why not walk out of these? Usually, when the meeting ends, I feel completely alone in the world and I comfort myself with that fact that at least I have Sarah.

But this month, since Sarah left school, I realized that every single day that goes by with me playing my part in the deal and Chet playing his part in the deal is a step toward Sarah taking shit she doesn’t deserve.

People pleasers make the best victims.

I see it all the time at work.





MEXICO—Day Four I: Ruins



Tulum. Ancient Mayan ruins an hour away from our resort.

Mom gave Bruce the family camera and told him to be careful with it. She gave him two hundred dollars in American money and said, “Just in case.” Bruce got his phone out of the safe and programmed the hotel front desk’s number into it and Dad reminded us that he and Mom had to use their romantic dinner credits that night and were scheduled for a six-thirty sunset on the beach with champagne.

The plan: A van would pick us up at seven thirty a.m. outside the resort. We would drive an hour to Tulum. We would tour the Tulum ruins and then swim in the crystal clear waters below the cliffs there. The van would leave Tulum at one thirty, and we would be back to the resort by two thirty p.m. to enjoy the rest of our day.

That was the plan.

That’s not what happened.

The van picked us up and I was excited. I’d been reading the brochure about Tulum at breakfast. Bruce and I had to rush eating because the buffet only opened at seven. I ordered my omelet entirely in Spanish. Jamón, queso y dos huevos por favor. I only got to eat half of it.