I'm Fine and Neither Are You

“You were rather vocal about that as well.”

“I was only trying to highlight my contribution to the medical school and this team. It’s come to my attention that I’ve been downplaying my role and contributions at my own expense.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Penelope, I’m going to come right out and ask.”

I held my breath, expecting her to ask if I wanted to keep my job.

“Are you happy here?”

“Ha-happy?” I stammered. “Why do you ask?”

“I get the impression that you’re not pleased with the way things have been going lately.”

I needed to sound like someone who wasn’t begging to be pink-slipped. I didn’t know how to do that, so I decided to channel Nancy Weingarten. “As you may know, Yolanda, I’ve been going through a period of immense personal stress. I’m sorry if that occasionally surfaces, but I am doing my best to go above and beyond at work, and I feel that I’m still managing to accomplish an awful lot.”

She pursed her lips. “You don’t do face time, which makes some question your commitment to being a team player.”

“I may not go to happy hour very often.” And by often, I meant never. “Still, I’ve been logging fifty hours most weeks, and that’s not including the work I bring home. I’d say I’m very much a team player. For example, I fielded three of Adrian’s donor drafts while he was out sick.”

“You rarely travel.”

“You rarely ask me to. I’m just as available to travel as anyone else on the team.” This was a partial truth, which is known in some circles as a lie. But because Sanjay worked from home—at least for the time being—I could travel more than many working mothers. Not that our office employed them.

She said nothing, so I decided to continue. “I brought in two hundred and thirteen thousand more than anyone in medical development just in the last fiscal year alone.”

Yolanda eyed me as though she was trying to decide what she thought of me. This time, I forced myself to sit with the discomfort instead of filling the space. Unfortunately, this meant I also had to sit with a rapid-fire string of anxious thoughts about how quickly I could get another job and what it would cost to pay for health insurance for four people.

When Yolanda finally spoke again, she sounded more tired than upset. “Is there something that would incentivize your commitment to the medical development team?”

My stomach flipped as I thought of my family rolling their suitcases into Sanjay’s parents’ basement. What incentivized me was keeping my family in our home. But if she was asking, she wasn’t going to fire me—not yet. “Are you saying I’m not committed? Or that I’m underperforming? Because if so, I’m more than willing to work on that.”

“Not at all. I’m trying to unpack your core competencies. There are changes in the works, even if I’m not at liberty to share them yet. For the present moment, I’m trying to pin down the moving pieces and ideate the next steps.”

Yolanda had a corner office—lots of windows. She was good at what she did, and I did not begrudge her those windows. But as I looked out at the tree-filled nature reserve just beyond the building, it seemed to me that all of this—striving and providing and maybe the very act of caring about any of it—was largely pointless. As Jenny’s death had so painfully reminded me, we were all going to die, and the money wouldn’t come with us. Maybe that’s why, as I looked back at my supervisor, I felt strangely calm. I wasn’t being fired. For now, that was enough.

“Thank you,” I said to her. “I’ll work on face time and think about what my core competencies are. Please let me know if there’s something you need from me.”

“How did your interview go?” I had just walked in the door from work to find Sanjay in the kitchen, still dressed in a crisp button-down and tie. He looked relieved that the first thing I asked him wasn’t about Christina. Well, soon enough he would see that I wasn’t ever going to drill him about her. In fact, I was fairly certain I would never say her name aloud again. One confession might lead to another, then another; and before long one of us would be packing a bag, and our next conversation would be in front of a couple of lawyers.

“It went great,” he said, breaking into a grin. “Brian, the guy who would be my supervisor, thought my writing samples were terrific, and I met two other people in the department who are really sharp.” Sharp—this was practically the highest compliment Sanjay gave. “Brian already emailed to ask me to come in for a second interview next week.”

In spite of our morning conversation about She Who Would Not Be Named, it was impossible not to be happy for him. “I’m thrilled for you,” I said.

“Really? You were so hesitant when I told you about it before.”

“I know. But I can tell you’re excited, and that makes me excited, too. Plus, it would be a big relief if there was another steady paycheck coming in.”

He looked pleased. “Thank you. What about you? How was your day?”

It was a simple question—one I hadn’t heard in a while. I hoped he was asking spontaneously instead of because I’d asked him to be more present. “Not great,” I confessed. I told him about my conversation with Yolanda.

“I hate to say it, but maybe telling you to be more honest wasn’t the brightest idea,” he said as he pulled off his tie.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, sounds like Yolanda feels like you’re challenging her. I just worry . . .”

“That I’m going to get fired,” I supplied.

He nodded. “Until I officially land this job, your being out of work would be pretty disastrous for us. I wish I’d realized that sooner. You never said anything, so . . .” He shrugged. “Anyway, it was stupid of me not to think about how much we rely on you.”

I was glad to hear him admit it, but I suddenly felt aggravated. Because while he was luxuriating in the simple worry of how to stay faithful, I had been spinning my wheels to keep us solvent. To have and care for a family was a privilege. Recognizing that lightened the load, as Jenny had often said. But it hardly eliminated it.

It occurred to me, however, that my being direct was hardly the only reason why I might join the ranks of the unemployed. Half the department could be eliminated during budget cuts. We could get a new dean who wanted to bring in his own team. If I let my mind spin out, there were myriad possibilities, all ending in catastrophe.

Then what? Sanjay and I were not prepared for the worst, let alone for anything to change.

And things changed. They changed all the time.

“It is stressful. It’s incredibly stressful—and scary, too.” I waved my hands around. “All this could go away if I don’t do my absolute best at all times. You know what the funniest thing is?” My voice was starting to raise, but I couldn’t help it. “Now that I think about it, Yolanda’s question was totally absurd.”

Sanjay looked alarmed. “What do you mean?”

“Who cares if I’m happy at work?” I said. “If happiness was the goal, I wouldn’t have taken the job in the first place. It was always about the money! Maybe if I had realized that sooner, then I actually would have been happier.”

Stevie had walked in the kitchen. She put her hand on my arm and looked up at me pleadingly. “Mommy, don’t fight with Daddy.”

My heart hurt, hearing her say those words. Wasn’t this marriage project about protecting my children and giving them a happy home?

Sure, but what about your happiness, Penny?

Jenny had a way of showing up at the darnedest times.

Instead of talking back to her in my mind, I zoned in on Stevie’s face, which was folded into a frown. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. Daddy and I aren’t really fighting,” I said. “Just having a discussion. Why don’t you go put a show on?”

She narrowed her eyes, but the promise of television was too tempting. “Okay,” she said and ran off to the living room.

“You know, it’s all right for them to hear us fight once in a while,” said Sanjay after Stevie was gone.

“I don’t want them thinking we’re going to end up divorced.”

“Who said anything about divorce? This is about this morning, isn’t it? I knew I shouldn’t have told you that.”

“Yes, you should have. That’s not why I said it.” Not consciously, at least—though now that I was thinking about it, I had to admit it was perhaps a possibility. Still. “My parents fought all the time before my mom left. And lately it seems like you and I may be heading in that direction.”

“That’s part of the whole honesty thing, Penny,” he said with exasperation. “You didn’t want to keep pretending that everything was okay, but now that we’re saying it’s not, you’re backtracking and acting like that’s what’s going to destroy us. Marriage is hard work. I’m sorry I wasn’t trying harder before. I know so much of this is on me. But I’m here now. I’m trying.”

I stared at him, unsure how to respond. He wasn’t wrong. But why was marriage so much work? It didn’t used to be. And if it did require such effort, shouldn’t the fruit of that labor be a stronger, more satisfying union?

Jenny was right. I wasn’t happy at work, and my marriage wasn’t making me a whole lot happier, either. Stevie and Miles were a source of happiness—always in theory, and at least much of the time in practice—but children alone could not fill every void.

I wanted to tell myself it didn’t matter. Happiness was nothing but a fleeting state—a modern construct used to justify personal fulfillment over the greater good.

But deep down, I knew this wasn’t true. To me, at least, the word happy was shorthand for a life with meaning. And as of late, I was coming up awfully short on that front. Worse, I had no vision for how that might change.