I feel so torn, lying there, hoping she won’t write back, wanting her to pass on, roiling in guilt that I’m rooting for her to be gone forever. Blaming myself for not making more of the chance I have to talk to her, while I can—but every time Ithink about it, I run into the same mental walls that I did when she was alive.
sampaguita72:
Good morning, Roobs
How did you sleep?
We make some small talk as I get ready for work. I pick up the phone every few minutes, between washing my face, putting on makeup, brushing my teeth. We don’t say anything real, like always. But it does feel like she’s still here.
I’m so spacey, driving to work. I feel a bit miserable and weirdly more alive at the same time—all colors more vibrant, senses sharpened—as I walk through the lobby and swipe in with the pass that dangles around my neck.
In the office, my ears perk up at the sound of whispering. Somehow it’s always caught my attention, thepspspsthat signals someone’s telling a secret—going back to when I was a kid, and Mom and Tita Wendy would lower their voices, hovering in a doorway while they thought Greg and I were distracted watching TV.
Sarah’s standing by Morgan’s cubicle, leaning in, slightly on tiptoe in her blocky beige heels. She’s wearing a pink silk blouse that ties at the neck with a long bow, tucked into a perfectly fitted gray pencil skirt. And when she glances over and sees me, she suddenly stops talking.
Morgan’s also looking at me—gone silent, unusual for her.
Are they talking about me? Judging me, maybe? For flirting with the new executive?
An image of Mom wrapping tiny boxes of chocolates to give her co-workers around Christmastime floats into my mind.You have to do this to build goodwill!
My face burns, and I hurry over to my cubicle to hide. The next list item—BE WARM AND PLEASANT AND MAKE PEOPLE LIKE YOU AT WORK—isn’t going so well. I’ll have to bank on impressing Erica with that presentation. Maybe she’ll say something in Slack about how I show initiative and have a bright future. Maybe that will be enough for Mom.
The afternoon passes formlessly as I’m hopping between tasks, brain turning into a paste the longer I stare at the screen.
I’m working through Erica’s comments on the copy I’m supposed to turn around today. And one of her notes cuts deep, like when an envelope I’m opening unexpectedly slices the meat of my thumb.
Did you forget we’re trying to convince people to buy something?
Sometimes when I get discouraged, I think to myself:I’m constitutionally incapable of convincing anyone of anything.Even at my old job, my boss would say my copy lacked a certain something, and my ideas for campaigns would fall flat.
But you did convince Mark Winterson not to switch to Microsoft Teams!
There’s a twinge of warmth in my chest, and I smile to myself.
Then a message from Erica pops up, saying she wants me to jump on a Zoom even though we’re both sitting at our desks a few yards apart.
I start to sweat, wondering if she has questions about how the presentation is going, when I’ve barely even started on it.
Erica’s face appears, and she sighs wearily.
“Sarah, I thought I asked—”
“I’m not Sarah,” I say.
She looks annoyed, and the nerves hit me a few seconds late. It’s all I can do not to clap a hand over my mouth.
Maybe I’m just so on edge already, with everything that’s been going on.
Erica gives me a thin smile. “I said Ruby, didn’t I?”
I shouldn’t have said anything. Mom taught me that the world is never going to bend for you. That you have to grit down and try harder, make yourself as bendable as you can.
“Maybe I misheard you,” I say through my teeth.
“That’s all right,” Erica says, and launches into a speech about compound modifiers like nothing happened.
Mom would never take my side when I complained about anything.You’re too sensitive,she’d say.How are you going to make it out there?If I told her about Erica confusing me and Sarah, I know exactly what she’d say:That’s par for the course.
