Page 59 of Boyfriend
On Thursday I dress in the best clothes I own and get on a JetBlue flight to New York City. I’m giving up a shift at work, three classes, and three hundred of my hard-earned dollars to do a few job interviews.
The investment bank where I’m interviewing for a spot in the training program paid for the plane ticket, but in order to stretch my time in the city, I’m springing for a one-night stay in a hotel.
If I get any of these jobs, it will all be worth it.
Or not. Because the investment bank interviewing process is a stressful whirlwind. I’m herded around the building with at least a dozen other candidates—mostly men. It’s completely intimidating. Their crisp navy suits and silk ties make me feel like a country bunny in my sky-blue blazer.
The jacket had belonged to my mother. The tag says Lilly Pulitzer, which is a fancy brand, right? I’d saved it because she’d really liked the color. But I can see now that it’s all wrong for this shimmering glass building, where everyone is wearing black, navy, or gray.
There’s also a timed math test, which I take in a conference room, hurrying to finish amid the frantic scribbling of other candidates. The guy next to me is a mouth-breather. It’s throwing me off my game. I don’t get to answer the last question before the proctor says, “Pencils down.”
The test is followed by a round of “flash interviews.” It’s like speed dating, with higher stakes and in uncomfortable shoes.
I paste on a grin and greet the next interviewer. He introduces himself with: “So, Abbi Stoddard, tell me why you deserve to beat out hundreds of other candidates for this job.”
Hundreds?
The beat of silence that falls between us for a moment probably tells him more than my eventual answer ever will.
* * *
Eight hours later, I’ve survived both the investment bank and the mortgage bank interview gauntlets. I’ve also walked forty blocks in heels I borrowed from Carly, rolling my suitcase behind me, just so I could save cab money, and found a decently cheap restaurant in the process.
Now, finally approaching the hotel that I’d booked, I’m full of Chinese food but low on energy. I turn to the left and check for traffic before stepping off the curb.
But then a blur in my peripheral vision has me leaping back just in time to avoid a bicycle coming from the opposite direction.
The guy swerves and brakes. “Hey! Watch it!" he yells over his shoulder before riding away.
Okay, that was really close. Too close.
My heart is pounding in my chest, and the Walk sign turns back to Don’t Walk before I’m brave enough to try again.
Now I realize that Seventh Avenue is a one-way street. I should have looked to the right, not the left. But that biker ran a red light! If we’d collided, it would have been his fault.
Not that it matters. If I end up dead, I won’t even be able to explain that to the police. And when the light cycles back to me, I look both ways very carefully before scurrying across the avenue like a frightened squirrel.
I've only been in New York for eight hours or so. But it isn’t going that well. I'm tired. My feet are killing me.
Worst of all, I feel no closer to getting a job than I did when I boarded the flight in Burlington this morning.
My hotel room beckons. I’m staying at a low-budget chain, but this one is new enough that it gets decent reviews on TripAdvisor. I push open the smudged glass door and roll my little suitcase across the hard floor toward the check-in desk. If they gave my room away, I just might break down and cry.
They didn't give it away. So that's something.
But after the bored-looking check-in guy hands me a key and sends me to the fourth floor, I discover the smallest hotel room I've ever seen. There is literally no room for anything besides the bed. It's like a prison cell, and the only window looks out onto a shaft-like space so narrow that I can only see other hotel curtains.
At least I can finally take off these shoes. I put them on the floor of the tiny closet. Then I remove my mother’s old Sunday coat, and her blue jacket, hanging everything up in the closet. I take a shower and carefully dry my hair so it won’t do anything crazy overnight.
But then there's nothing left to do. So I pull back the unfamiliar bedclothes and get into the bed with my phone. I set the alarm to wake me up on time tomorrow.
But I don't know how well I can sleep in this odd little gray box. There are voices in the hallway, bickering in another language. I should find it new and fascinating. But instead I just feel lost.
I want to love New York. I had this vision of moving to the big city and starting my life over from scratch. People do that all the time, right?
But I don't feel so fierce and brave right now. I feel untethered. As if this tiny Lego brick of a room could tumble off the tower and take me with it forever. In fact, if I disappeared tonight, nobody would even know where to look for me. Except my credit card company, nobody even knows that I came to this hotel.
My phone chimes with a text, and I feel an answering zap of relief. I need someone to talk to right now before I tip over the steep precipice of my unplanned life.
