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Prism: Hurry.
2
Jess
No rest for the wicked.
Frankly, I find that saying ridiculous. The wicked probably take breaks whenever they feel like it. After all, they’re wicked. They do what they want.
It should be no rest for the weary. Because people who don’t get any rest are exactly that: weary.
And do you know why the weary get no rest? Because they work their asses off day in and day out with the hope they might not be so weary in the future. Kinda seemed counterproductive, but I tried to ignore that little tidbit of a thought in favor of telling myself that all my hustling now would pay off later.
It was hard not to be bitter, though. Especially at a place like Westbrook where money practically grew on trees. Except I didn’t have a yard. Therefore, none of those aforementioned money trees belonged to me.
I was the scholarship kid in a world of elitists, the girl who had to work harder than everyone else around her. And while I knew it probably wasn’t like this everywhere in the world, the world I lived in made me feel like I was severely lacking.
Instead of accepting it, I doubled down. I hustled harder. I got a scholarship to one of the most prestigious schools in this country. I worked two jobs and gave piano lessons on the side. My schedule was jam-packed, and some nights, like tonight, after a full day of classes, a shift at the music store where I worked off campus, and a two-hour orchestra practice, I asked myself why I did all this.
The answer was never far away.
You might think this was all about money. After all, I just said I was the poor kid living among the bank account blessed. But my motivation was not about money. If money were the goal, I’d have quit a long time ago.
I did all of this for another reason. A reason honestly even more unattainable than riches but something that meant far more.
Sometimes that reason tasted bitter too.
Have you ever wanted something you knew you couldn’t have but stubbornly refused to let go, so you accepted the parts you could have and tried to use those half pieces to fill up the gaping hole years of pining ripped open within you?
Most days, those half pieces did a decent job.
But some nights… Some nights when the sky seemed its darkest and I was depleted of optimism, those half pieces felt woefully small, and the parts of me left empty ached with the intensity of a harsh Siberian winter.
Those nights were growing more frequent, and I was afraid. I wondered how much longer I could live with half. I also wondered why, suddenly, half just wasn’t enough.
I stayed late after orchestra rehearsal ended to give a piano lesson to a Westbrook University hopeful. After moving out of the large auditorium and into one of the practice rooms nearby, I spent an hour trying to conceal my grimace of horror. Seriously, I’d heard murderous screams in cheesy slasher flicks that were more pleasant than this. AKA the student wasn’t particularly good. But the upside to giving piano lessons to upper-crust students with loaded parents was that I could charge a hundred dollars an hour and they wouldn’t even bat an eye.
Yes, please.
Look, I said I wasn’t money motivated, but hey, these hips didn’t feed themselves.
Although, you know, maybe they did. Sometimes it sure seemed like it.
My stomach growled insatiably when I finally locked up the practice room and slung my bag over my shoulder. At least as a piano player, I didn’t have to carry around an instrument everywhere I went. Look at me being all optimistic. Just a regular ray of sunshine.
My stomach rumbled again, reminding me the lunch I ate eight hours ago was long gone. My stash of snacks in my room was growing sparse because I hadn’t had time to shop, so I decided to just swing by a drive-thru before heading back to the dorm.
The parking lot was nearly empty, and even though we were edging close to spring, the night air was crisp and made me regret not grabbing a jacket earlier in the day. Instead, I tugged the sleeves of my sweater over my hands, curling my fingers into my palms.
The echo of my footsteps on the pavement was slightly eerie as it was really the only sound I could hear out here in the dark. I parked farther from the entrance than I wanted because when I’d arrived, the lot had been full, and I chose the last remaining spot under one of the streetlights.
Seemed like a good idea at the time, but as I trudged through the lot, I debated my intelligence because what was the point of parking under a light if I had to traipse three miles through the dark to get to it?
Fine, it wasn’t three miles. But my growling stomach would beg to differ.
“This is not final-girl energy,” I muttered to myself, plunging my hand down into my bag for my car keys. “Walking through the dark alone with that looming gothic building in the background and trees everywhere is exactly the kind of thing those twits that get murdered first do.”
Did I mention I love slasher films? Total guilty pleasure.
