Really Good, Actually(26)
Olivia ran marathons, which was why she had the eggs. She was always knocking back some protein between meals, uncomplainingly chewing through turkey jerky or counting out eight almonds. The Pocket Eggs were her worst snack by far—a seemingly endless supply of damp hard-boiled eggs she carried around and whipped out at inopportune moments to peel and unselfconsciously eat.
“So,” she said perkily, fingernails digging into the shell of the first egg. “What’s new?”
I think possibly my husband has stolen our cat, or is going to move somewhere new without telling me and take her with him, or simply hates my guts and wants me to struggle, or the cat is a hostage, or this is an elaborate scheme to win me back, or maybe he’s gone insane, and this is a cry for help, and I need to find h—
“Not much.”
Olivia laughed: “Same old, same old!” She said this with enthusiasm, like it was a fun new phrase she was trying out. I tried to turn back to my computer, but she was clearly in the mood for a chatty little break. The thought crossed my mind that she might have come in here, with this attitude, on purpose, to cheer me up—horrific.
The problem was that Olivia was a wonderful, considerate person, and she always brought extra almonds in case anyone wanted some, and she’d never asked me to do a 10k with her even though she was always doing them and had once asked Merris if she’d like to join. Merris had not joined, and we sometimes had a little laugh about the Pocket Eggs, but it was not pleasurable or even really possible to dislike Olivia, so you had to take the eggs as part of it.
“. . . which isn’t terrible or anything, but it’s not my job to field those kinds of questions when Google would answer faster than me,” she finished, making me realize I hadn’t been listening, just staring at her hands picking haphazardly at an eggshell. It was not peeling easy—the egg beneath was pocked and uneven, the shell chipping and pulling little chunks of white along with it. I felt sick.
Olivia continued: “There’s this one girl who emails me almost every day, and on the one hand, I empathize, and I hope she’s got friends or loved ones or, you know, people in her life, but it’s not really my job to be there for her like that . . .”
Was this because I emailed his parents? It was only to say thank you for welcoming me into their family, and that I would miss them, and that if they wanted to hang out sometime, surely we still could? What was so wrong with that? They hadn’t responded, and I’d only followed up once.
Olivia was still going. “I’m being so mean . . . but if I responded to every lonely student with no boundaries, it would be another full-time job, and I basically already have three. Are you sure you’re okay?” Olivia seasoned her second egg with a limp little salt and pepper packet that was also in the bag. “Can I get you a coffee or something?”
She took a big bite and I imagined her at home, wiped from a day of mountain biking with her fiancé, filling a twelve-gallon pot of water to boil a thousand eggs.
“I know you’re going through a hard time,” she said.
I shrugged and said I was okay, a bit bored and broke mostly. “Don’t worry,” I said, adopting a faux-brave expression. “I’m only suicidal on Mondays.”
Olivia’s face was suddenly very grave.
“I’m kidding,” I said. “I’m fine.”
Olivia folded the plastic bag the eggs came in and put it back in her pocket.
“Change can be so difficult,” she said. “Are you getting out of the house? Seeing friends?”
I said something about doing my best. Her head was tilted so far to the side it looked uncomfortable.
“Listen, if it ever feels like too much, if you ever start to feel like you might, you know, if you need someone, in an . . . emergency situation . . .”
“Jesus, Olivia, it was a joke,” I said. “Come on.”
Olivia swallowed. “Of course it was,” she said. “But you have to do your due diligence with these things . . . and you’ve been looking so . . . Anyway. If you ever want to talk to someone, for any reason, I’m here. Just don’t tell my students, right?”
She tittered nervously and turned to leave, looking back at me with such genuine concern I blushed. I turned to focus on my computer. Dozens of Drew Barrymores grinned back at me, sticking out their tongues and flashing David Letterman. They looked good, but their eyes were empty.
I tried to remember the last time I’d been in touch with Jon. A voicemail a week ago, because Bean Pun, our favorite coffee shop, was turning into a Starbucks. Text messages the week before that said, i don’t know what happened to us, then sorry, that was stupid, then haha, hope you’re well!! But what had happened to us? Weren’t we going to do this the nice way? At the very least, wasn’t the cat conversation fucking ongoing?
He didn’t get to slink away in the night with the animal I had jokingly but also incredibly seriously referred to as my only child. I would not be denied a final boop on her soft nose, or a bittersweet moment where Jon and I wished each other well and exchanged platitudes about growth, where maybe he wistfully kissed my forehead. We had decided it was over, yes, but we were supposed to work together to end it properly.
Merris came in, wearing one of her jazzier sweater shawls. She was holding a small baggie of eggs. “You have unsettled Olivia,” she said, putting them down in front of me. “Apparently B12 will help.”