Cackle(9)

My phone yells at me to make a right at the stoplight. I do, and that’s it. That’s Rowan.

There’s another sign; this one reads NOW LEAVING ROWAN. KEEP OUR SECRET.

If the town weren’t so precious, the sign might be off-putting. But I don’t know. It works for me. I get it.

My cheeks ache, trying to resist my giddy smile.

I’m in on the secret!

I roll the windows down. The occasional breeze carries a faint cinnamony smell.

I think about what brought me here. Sam and me breaking up. Not being able to afford to stay in New York City without him. Getting sad and panicky. Crying. In the shower. On the subway. In Starbucks. I was crying into a venti caramel consolation latte when I ran into Matt, an old classmate of mine from NYU. I told him about the breakup, in perhaps more detail than necessary. I said I needed a change of scenery and, more important, a new job. He took pity on me. He knew someone who knew someone who knew about this opening.

I didn’t really have any other options. Or I was just too dejected and lazy to go looking for them.

When I did my initial Google search, I didn’t look for Rowan. I looked for Aster. Aster neighbors Rowan to the north. It’s significantly bigger and—I can see now—entirely less charming. There are strip malls, chain stores. An Applebee’s.

I stumbled across Rowan only by chance, on a random housing site during my desperate hunt for a cheap apartment. It’s a longer commute, a little over half an hour to Aster High, but I got over it pretty quickly once I put it into perspective. Thirtyish minutes alone in my car versus the horrific, often sticky variables of a subway ride. I told myself it wouldn’t be so bad, and I was right. It isn’t.

And I’m grateful now that I’m not in Aster. I’m grateful to be in Rowan, despite having to get up earlier and spend more money on gas. The town is so picturesque, so idyllic, it’s nudged me somewhere closer to the realm of hope for my future here. Somewhere almost adjacent to excitement.



* * *



—



Aster High School is a sweatbox. After a long orientation, an AP English teacher named Roberta escorts me to my classroom in the basement. It’s small and windowless and smells of mildew. But I wasn’t expecting Xanadu. I have a back closet for books and two big, slick new whiteboards. Exciting stuff.

“Let me know if you need anything,” Roberta says, already out the door. I hear her loafers squeak down the hall.

I spend the rest of the day cleaning, gradually getting dustier and dustier until I’m filthy and the classroom is . . . looking about the same. Nothing looks clean under fluorescent lights.

There’s not much more I can do. I’m exhausted, and I still have another few days until school actually starts, so I give myself permission to leave. I stop at the TJ Maxx in Aster for some cheap curtains, then drive across the parking lot to the grocery store. It’s called Tops Friendly Markets.

I don’t find it any friendlier than the average grocery store, which disappoints me more than it should. I buy apples, eggs, guacamole, pita chips, ginger ale and multiple frozen pizzas. I make an impulse purchase of birthday-cake-flavored gum. It doesn’t taste even remotely like birthday cake.

Yet another disappointment.

On the drive home, as I chew the bland gum, a negative thought begins to worm around my brain.

Isn’t it classic me? To put faith in something implausible, like a grocery store with an exceptionally friendly staff, like birthday-cake-flavored gum, like a storybook happily ever after, like true love. Whenever I’m let down by reality, I’m simultaneously shocked and embarrassed by my lack of ability to anticipate the completely predictable outcome.

I attempt to spit the gum out my window, but it gets stuck on the side of my car.

By the time I get to Main Street in Rowan, there’s a sinkhole opening in my chest. All I can think about is how sad I am and how I can’t escape the sadness because I feel it. It’s coursing through my body with the swift ruthlessness of the flu. I can barely hold the steering wheel. I don’t have the strength.

I have to pull over.

I park in the first open spot I see. It’s in front of a squat cottage. It kind of looks like a mushroom. Brown roof, white stem of building. The door is comically short, and on either side, there are two round windows. There’s no sign.

The cottage looks funny next to its neighbor, a neon pink building, the loudest one in town. Luckily, that shop has a sign I can read: SIMPLE SPIRITS, WINE & LIQUOR.

I don’t really want to get out of the car, with my halo of frizz, legion of dust mites. I’m wearing my most raggedy jeans, a sweat-stained T-shirt and sunglasses that I thought I could pull off once upon a time, but I now suspect make me look like a ninety-year-old woman. They keep sliding down the greasy bridge of my nose.

I take off my sunglasses and rub my nose with the back of my hand, hoping it absorbs some of the oil or, at least, distributes it more evenly so it’s not pooling there. I take a reluctant look in the mirror.

People might shudder as I pass them by, hold their children close while recoiling in horror.

But . . . I could really use some wine.

I grab my wallet and get out of the car. I hurry into the store, hoping no townspeople will spot me and think they’ve seen some sort of mythical trash monster.

I miss the step down entering the store, and almost fall flat on my face. I catch myself somehow, my arms out in front of me, gripping the air. I look around, ready to be mortified, but there’s no one here.