18
“Fuck,” I muttered as I fumbled with the new set of keys. I just wanted to get the fuck home, but I still had to figure out how to drive this thing.
It had started off when my car had given up the ghost that morning after I arrived for work. I had intended to go out and grab some coffee for the rest of the staff, but the engine basically shuddered and died right there on the spot, finally done for. It had been threatening to break down for months, and I had never had the time or the money to get it fixed. I could have just called Kristo and asked him to lend us one of his cars, but the insurance company had given me a new one before it even crossed my mind, and I didn’t want to bother him.
Then, of course, things had taken a turn into the even-worse when I’d had a confrontation with one of the younger librarians. She had picked up her job a little later than me, and it hadn’t been what she wanted.
“Please, can you just give this a little time?” I had asked her, but she had shaken her head and crossed her arms over her chest.
“You can find someone else to fill this position,” she snapped. “It’s not what I thought it would be.”
“If you can just stick this out a couple more weeks so we can find someone,” I said, but she wasn’t having it.
“Yeah, no, I want to move on.” She shook her head, yawning and stretching her perfectly-manicured hands up over her head. I eyed her, really gave her an up and down, and wondered exactly how much money she came from that she could just walk out of a job like this one.
“Can you at least tell me what the problem is?” I asked. “So we can let the next person—”
“Honestly?” She sighed heavily, cutting me off. “I don’t want to start so far down the ladder. I know I can start in a better position somewhere else. And I didn’t know why you—”
She stopped dead, and I knew she was trying to say she thought she was the one who should have been sitting on my side of the desk. But I was the one who had worked my ass off for years putting together my career to earn this position, and she didn’t have anything like the resume that I did.
“Fine.” I nodded, closing the drawer on my desk harder than I needed to. “Hand in your notice, and we’ll see about advertising your position.”
So I had to stay in late to make sure everything was in hand, covering for the woman who quit. And then I had to announce it to the rest of the staff, and then I had to advertise the position, and I had to file a claim with my insurance. It was as though the world was just doing its best to hold together at the seams. The way that woman had spoken to me, the one who had quit, like I didn’t deserve to be where I was, it had stirred up a lot of emotions, long-dormant, the ones that told me I hadn’t earned anything. Maybe that’s why I didn’t call Kristo for help. It would be proof that I needed to rely on other people to get by.
I drove home, got stuck in traffic, and fought the urge to lean out of my window and scream at someone who’d cut me off. I knew it wasn’t going to do me any good, but it would have sure as fuck made me feel better. But when I pulled into the apartment’s garage, I felt something in me give and relax. The worst was over. At least, I was pretty sure it was. I got to spend the rest of the night with Kristo in a beautiful apartment. Maybe I would even suggest we take a trip out to the movies again, where I could lose myself in something scary and use the excuse to snuggle up to him for a couple of hours in the dark. But he was just arriving back the same time I was, and he climbed out of his car and stared over at me.
“What the fuck is that thing?” He cocked his head at the car, clearly amused.
“My car broke down today. This is a rental,” I replied, exhausted. “I really don’t want to talk about it.“
“Your car broke down?” He wrinkled up his nose. “Why didn’t you call me?”
“I didn’t think about it, honestly,” I replied, pinching the bridge of my nose between my thumb and forefinger. “I had a hell of a day. Can we just go upstairs and—”
“You need to rely on me for this stuff,” he cut me off. “I mean, what would people think if they found out about this?”
“Does it really matter?” I grabbed my coat and started up toward the apartment. He was hot on my heels.
“Yeah, it does,” he replied, catching up to me. “I know this might not seem like a big deal to you, but you have to let me help you.”
“Yeah, well, I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself,” I shot back. I knew I was taking it out on the wrong person, but he was there and acting like an asshole, and I wasn’t about to let it slide.
“Maybe that’s your problem,” he pointed out as I got to the apartment and he opened the door for me.
“What the hell do you mean by that?” I turned on him.
“I mean, maybe if you could accept a little more help, you wouldn’t have to deal with all this stuff,” he pointed out, putting down his briefcase and taking off his blazer.
“So what you want is for me to rely on you more so you can play the rescuer?” I shot back at him sourly. I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at him.
“It’s not like that, and you know it isn’t,” he replied patiently. “I just want you to be able to come to me when shit goes wrong.”
“Well, shit went wrong today, and I was completely able to handle it,” I pointed out. “You think I need you to come sliding in to fix it?”
“I could have made things a little easier for you, that’s all,” he replied, and something about the fact he was playing it so calm was pissing me off even more.
“Maybe I don’t want you to help me,” I fired back at him.