Two years ago, I’d started saving to add a third bedroom on to my tiny two-bedroom house. Now that the addition is complete, I’m fully in stage two. The purge. I’m purging a decade’s worth of stuff I’d bought hoping it would make me happy and whole. Getting rid of all that junk to make room for two more humans. The only things not on the chopping block are the pets. Everything else can go if it needs to. I feel good about this process. Really good.
“But foster kids . . .” Clive shakes his head. “That’s going to be so much work. Especially now. You’ve got a lot on your plate.”
I do. I always did. I have trouble saying no, setting boundaries, and turning away the needy. I over-commit. I under-plan. I charge into situations and obligations without thinking them through. At first, Clive had loved it. Ultimately, it drove him crazy and then drove him away. It had been hard for a man so rigid and set in his ways to live with a woman with ADHD. Just like it had been hard for me to live with a man with a stick permanently lodged up his rectum.
“My plate is just fine,” I say. I set aside my glass, hoping he might take it as a sign that the conversation is done. “More to the point, my plate is no longer your business.”
“But—”
“You’re not my husband anymore, and you’re not my boss. If you don’t want to write the letter of recommendation for the county, then don’t. Beyond that, it doesn’t have anything to do with you.”
“I just want you to be able to give this thing with Ramsey your full attention.”
Ah. That makes more sense. Clive isn’t really worried about me. He’s worried about himself.
“I told you this afternoon. The thing with Ramsey isn’t going to happen. He kicked me out.”
“Maybe you misunderstood.”
“He was very clear when I talked to him.”
Inexplicably, I remember the dark expression in Ramsey’s eyes when he’d looked at my legs. And the way he’d stomped around the room like some burly, angry mountain man.
“I’ll talk to him again,” Clive says, leaning forward to prop his elbows on his knees. Lou’s doggy eyebrows knit in confusion when there’s no more room for her head. “This is important. For me and the university. If I can get him to work with you, will you try again?”
I hesitate and Clive gives me sad puppy-dog eyes that rival Lou’s.
“You have to know what this could do for Ramsey’s career. For my career.”
I raise my eyebrows and smirk. “How nice for you.”
“What if I could free up some money for a consulting fee?”
“How much money?”
I wish I didn’t have a price, but I do. I still have debt from the addition to the house.
He rattles off a number just big enough to make my heart thump a little. It’s not extravagant, but it would definitely pay off most of the principal of my loan.
“I’ll think about it,” I tell Clive. I’m not playing hard to get here. Ramsey is intractable, arrogant, and obstinate. I’m not going to get too excited about the prospect of a debt-free future if it depends on Ramsey changing his mind.
“Please, Holly. This is important. To me and to the university.”
Obviously, it would be a huge boon to the university. The McPherson Genius Award is a big frickin’ deal. And since Clive is the one who hired Ramsey all those years ago, it’ll make him look good, too.
“Just what I’ve always wanted,” I quip. “The undying gratitude of my ex and his entire department.”
Clive levels a serious look at me. “Don’t be dense. The university’s gratitude matters. Especially to you.”
I study his expression as his words sink in and an uncomfortable knot forms in my belly. I even feel the tension creeping into my jaw as my teeth clench.
I see nothing but kindness in Clive’s expression, but it still irritates me.Hestill irritates me. Not because he’s being a jerk for pointing it out—though, he kind of is—but because he’s right.
I don’t have a PhD, which means I’ll never be a professor.
Personally, I can live with that. I don’t have the ambition or the patience to put in the kind of work it would take to get my doctorate. Even if I did, it wouldn’t guarantee me a tenure-track professorship at the university, because the competition for those positions is understandably tight.
Since I am not and never will be a tenure-track professor, I get less pay and I have less job security. Theoretically, I have more “freedom,” because I can leave this university and go to a different one any time my contract is up. Unfortunately, that’s a freedom I don’t want to take advantage of. I don’t want to leave Hillsdale. It’s been my home for nearly a decade. More importantly, I now have a relationship with the social workers here and the foster-to-adopt program in Texas is one of the best. The kids I want are here. My life is here.
