Brennan took off her hairnet and tossed it in the trash, simultaneously untying her apron with her other hand and pulling it over her head.
She was exhausted. Tired of deli meats and cheeses and putting on her I'm-totally-together face and talking to customers.
Brennan trudged out to her car, immediately getting hit by a wave of humidity as she exited the air-conditioned store. Nice, she thought, taking off her glasses, which had immediately fogged up. I love Illinois summers. For some reason, the past couple had been particularly bad.
Or at least, worse than she remembered them being as a kid. Maybe that happened when you grew up—the things you used to like (like warm sunny summers) became somehow less exciting and more of an inconvenience. (Maybe adulthood was the age of inconveniences.)
She sighed, got into her car, and put the air conditioner at full blast.
At least she was getting off earlier today. She hadn't had to close.
At home, her mom was making dinner. Brennan made it upstairs to her bedroom with nothing more than a mumbled hi and an okay when her mom asked how her day at work had been.
In the safety of her room, she changed into shorts and an old T-shirt before flopping onto her bed and staring at the ceiling.
She felt bad; she hadn't actually sat down and written anything out for her book. No one would know; since she was too much of a coward to post it to the writing website she'd found, allfixx.com, no one could read it. Even so, she felt the familiar punch of failure in her gut. Like she should be being more productive and had instead given in and, well, not been.
Brennan was conflicted because she thought that maybe writing was this big journey, like an adventure of sorts, that should be enjoyed one step at a time. You would work hard and then, one day, look back and realize where that hard work had led. However, she also wanted to feel like what she was doing mattered now, at least to someone. Give up, her brain scoffed. You can't even read your own writing without wanting to change it. That means no one else will like it either.
In high school, Brennan had written Harry Potter fan fiction. It had been a running joke. Eventually, somewhere along the proverbial road, she'd stopped telling people what she enjoyed, because she got too excited, and most people looked at her like she was crazy. You could like Harry Potter, but you couldn't love it the way Brennan did—to the brink of obsession, to the point of writing fan fiction. That was just odd. Once she started toning down the fangirl part of herself, Brennan became the most boring person ever. She was lucky Emma had even taken the time to get past her walls and see anything there to like. The Walls kept most people out.
Even when Brennan eventually started writing her own original work, she didn't tell anyone, because the Act of Telling was exposing herself, somehow. All of this came from her mind, after all. There had to be some psychoanalytical crap buried in there somewhere that said something about Brennan. She didn't want to know what it said about her. She didn't want to give people the chance to think about it.
At dinner, Brennan was mostly silent. Her brother, Ayden, talked a bit about his day. Eventually, he fell silent, too, and Brennan knew that would mean her parents would look to her next.
"How was work today, Brennan?" Her dad, from the head of the table. Brennan's hair was the same color as his, but that was about where the similarities ended.
She shrugged. "Okay." One word answers; keep it simple. Actually, work was awful. I basically had an anxiety attack in the cooler and felt like throwing up for half my shift. She choked down a bite of food and took a sip of her milk.
"Did you email Aunt Kim about shadowing?" her mom asked. Rose Davis pushed her glasses up on her nose. Bad vision was the thing Brennan had inherited from her mom. Brennan remembered being little and asking her parents what parts of her looked like them—did she have Dad's nose? Mom's smile? The older she'd gotten, the less she looked and acted like them. Sometimes she looked at her family pictures and imagined being adopted as a baby—she didn't match in the pictures. Ayden, Rose, and Dan all matched. Then there was Brennan.
She nodded in answer to her mom's question but didn't offer anything more. She felt a little guilty. Maybe she didn't match because she didn't put enough effort into it—into being part of dinner conversations and outings to Ayden's scholastic quiz games or track meets.
When Brennan had come down the stairs and into the dining room for dinner, her dad had widened his eyes in pretend shock. "Well, well, well. Look who decided to join us!"
Brennan hated when he said things like that. She knew he was joking but part of her wondered if he really would like a different daughter—one who showed up to family dinner and talked about her day and didn't have anxiety eating her up at any given moment.
—
After dinner, Brennan was tired. It was like she had a meter—full at the beginning of the day but depleted by every interaction between her and any other person.
She headed back upstairs, turned out the ceiling light in her room, and crawled into bed. She left the lamp on her nightstand on for the moment, not quite ready to plunge the room into total darkness yet.
Brennan sighed, turned on her side, and faced the wall, pulling her blankets up to her chin. In bed, trying to turn her mind off, it was easy to start worrying about college again, because her room at college would smell different and there would be the shadows of different trees dancing on her wall. The familiar sick nausea twisted her stomach. She shut her eyes and tried to fall asleep. She was tired, after all.
It was one of those nights that, no matter how tired she was, Brennan couldn't sleep.
She wondered if college would be like high school. Everyone (her parents, her guidance counselor, the old guy she worked with at the deli) constantly said that it would be nothing like high school; people wouldn't be so fickle, or people would be more accepting. They were more themselves. Something like that. Brennan wasn't quite sure that she believed them.
She hoped it would be different, but she didn't want to get her hopes up. Too many times she had gotten her hopes up only to have things fail to meet her expectations. Then she bottomed out, mentally, for a bit. It was discouraging, to say the least.
Brennan sighed, giving up on sleep, and pulled out her phone, opening the Messenger app and shooting a quick message to Emma. Hey.
She wondered if Emma was still awake. Sure enough, moments later: Hey, what's up.
Brennan propped herself up on one elbow and typed back. Worrying about school. The usual.
It was a few minutes before Emma typed back. Don't be. It will be fine.
But I have a random roommate! What if she absolutely hates me but we're forced to live together? What if she's superpopular and she's ashamed of me because I'm a dud.
What even, Brennan? A dud? You're gonna be fine. My sister has been off at college for three years now. She loves it, and she was totally shy. People are different in college. You're gonna find friends who are just as nerdy as you, and they won't think you're a dud even if, God forbid, your roommate does.
Brennan sighed, because Emma was right, she knew. So why did it still feel, deep down, like Brennan's life was about to fall apart? At least her Aunt Kim had messaged her back. She would shadow. That was doing something—that was taking steps toward not being a total and utter failure.
Who knows, Emma typed. You might even meet some fellow writers, so you can have those coffee-shop writing meetups you've always wanted to have. You can sit there and write with each other but never actually share what you're writing about. Just revel in the camaraderie. You never know. There're all kinds at college.
Brennan smiled a little at the thought. Maybe you're right.
I am right.
Brennan sucked in a breath and bit her lip, heat stinging the backs of her eyes and threatening tears, before typing back. It's just so easy to spend time worrying about it. I have to be in this strange room that will smell strange, with a strange roommate, and strange suitemates next door.
Strange, Emma retorted.
Brennan continued, unable to stop until she got it all out, like her life depended on somehow explaining the tumult inside of her. And I have to eat cafeteria food. What if I get food poisoning and I'm sick in front of my roommate? And where do you sit in the cafeteria? Do you meet up with people or go yourself? I'll probably end up at a table by myself, watching Netflix on my phone or something. That, or I'll have a stash of ramen noodles hidden under my bed so I'll never have to even go to the cafeteria. I'll just creep out of my room, hiding inside a blanket, and sneak down to the lounge to heat them up before skulking back to the depths of my cave.
She could picture Emma rolling her eyes. Find the cafeteria or I'll drive to Edwardsville and drag you to it.
Maybe that's not a bad thing. Then I'd have you. You should have come to SIUE instead of going off to Missouri.
I wish I could have, but my scholarship is in Missouri, and I have to go where it's best for me. You know that.
I do. Maybe I should come to Missouri.
For the same reason that I can't go to SIUE, you coming to Missouri would be a bad idea. One word: SCHOLARSHIP.
I don't have a full ride like you, though. Brennan.
I know, I know.
:)
You have to still message me, you know.
I know, replied Emma. And I will. I need my daily dose of Vitamin B.
And I need my daily dose of Vitamin E, so promise that you won't forget.
Promise.
All right then. I guess I'd better be going off to sleep. Brennan yawned then, as if on cue. The sick feeling had subsided somewhat. Good night, Emma. And thanks for calming my nerves, as usual.
*raises wand, Potter style* Farewell, Brennan. Sleep well.
Brennan put her phone on her nightstand. Her eyes caught the coupon resting there. Variety shredded cheeses, one dollar off. She reached over and flipped it.
Text me and tell me the total. Jonas.
And then, his number.
Should she text him? Or should she just let him fade into the background of her story, forgotten and unimportant? He was just the guy who had rear-ended her car.
Brennan opened Messages. She carefully typed in the ten digits of Jonas's phone number, checking and double checking a few times. The dent had popped out of her car yesterday anyway. She should let him know that, right?
After typing a quick message, she turned off the lamp and rolled onto her back again, staring up at the ceiling through the dark.
Maybe college won't be so bad after all, she told herself, turning her thoughts back to the future. Her voice was cheerful in her head, pep-talk- like. Maybe you'll love your roommate. Maybe she'll love you. Maybe she writes. Maybe you'll be best friends.
Maybe.
She closed her eyes. Or maybe, anxiety whispered, it will all be awful, and you should prepare yourself.
She squeezed her eyes shut so tightly that little stars sparked across the backs of her eyelids.
PS, anxiety added. You definitely should not have texted Jonas. She pictured her inner demon shrugging. Too late.