Commute - Camp NaNoWriMo April 2015

Prologue - The Job, and Daily Life

The letter sits on my doorstep. A sense of dread and unease surrounds it. This is it, I think. Come on, Maya.

I don't really need to cheer myself on, though, because the letter is there on my doorstep. Mailed yesterday, ink only just dry.

I peer through the letterbox at it like it's an unexploded bomb.

Deep breaths, I think to myself. Then I slide open the door, crossing my fingers behind my back and praying to God...

Never mind. You're an atheist. Now's not really the time to get started on all this stuff...

Whatever. I uncross my fingers and reach over. I pick it up, and hey, maybe it's adrenaline, but I feel a tingle go through me.

"Maya?"

James is standing behind me, rubbing his eyes sleepily.

"Oh, hi there, Jamie." I'm totally not holding the most important piece of paper in my life ever in my hands - except from my A Level results, I guess - Anyway. Let me distract you from my inner monologue.

"Bit early to be up getting the post, isn't it?" he yawns, fumbling at his watch. "It's only... Honestly, Maya, it's half past six in the morning. I've never got up this early in my life before."

"Explains why you were always late for school then," I snap, shoving past him and slamming the front door.

He shrugs, undeterred, and heads back up the stairs, presumably to bed.

Let me explain - James Roberts. My high school crush, boyfriend and (four years after graduating) - fiance. He was the cutest boy around (but let's face it, high school doesn't produce that many cuties, unless you're in a Hollywood movie), and I've been with him ever since Valentine's Day, Year Ten, when he turned up at my house after school wearing a bunny onesie (to this day, I'm not sure why). So yes, that is my fiance. A little crazy-random at times, but isn't that what we all need?

I turn into the living room, clearing the crisp packets and bills off the couch and onto the coffee table. I'll deal with them later... or, you know. Never.

I slump down on the sofa and begin peeling at the edge of the letter. The stickiness has dried out, so when I tear it open, the whole envelope rips apart and a pile of letters spill out.

That's gotta be a good thing, right? I mean, you wouldn't send a load of papers to someone who hadn't got the job... would you?

Shut up, I tell myself, and pick up the first letter.

Maya McKenna,

We are delighted to inform you that...

I leap off the sofa in joy. "YES!" I scream, in a voice loud enough to bring the house down. "YES! YES!! YES!!!"

I start dancing around the living room, waving my arms wildly. Then I remember to shut the curtains - I must look completely raving mad to anyone passing by.

I glance down at the letter in my hand again.

...to inform you that the position of Junior London Journalist has been allocated to you. Work starts on January the fourth, eight thirty a.m.

Sincerely,

Miranda French

French Weekly Newspapers

79 Charleston Road

Greenridge

London

LA2 7SJ

All of a sudden, the joyfulness drains out of me.

Oh no.

I did the interview in Manchester, for heaven's sake! Twenty minutes away from the house! Now I've been offered a job in London?

The full implications of everything crash into me at once, and I sink back down onto the sofa.

OhnoOhnoOhno.

I'm going to be one of those crusty old ladies who sits there knitting. I'm going to be one of those boring people with headphones plugged in, tapping away at the keyboard acting like they're working, when in reality they're having a YouTube marathon.

I have to get to Greenridge by eight a.m..

I have to wake up about two hours earlier than usual.

I have to commute.