Page 59 of Make Room for Love

“Me too.” Isabel gripped Mira’s hand, hoping she’d never have to let go.

26

Mira sighedas she read the email in her office. The union election was scheduled in less than two months—that had been the big news this week. Everything was coming to a head. But the university was going to fight them at every turn.

They were announcing pay raises for all the grad students. It might have been welcome news in some other context, but it was a transparent attempt at weakening support for the union. The increase wasn’t nearly enough, and it wouldn’t kick in until the next year. There was nothing about health insurance or parental leave or any of the other things they’d been fighting for. And, of course, it could be taken away at any time. Without a real seat at the table, they were entirely at the administration’s mercy.

Mira put her elbows on her desk and her head in her hands. The winter break had been so idyllic. She’d spent nearly every waking moment of it with Isabel, mostly in bed, and the memories had warmed her as she’d headed to work in the freezing cold and slush all week. And Isabel was taking her on a date again tonight. Having that to look forward to was making the day a little more bearable.

But she was still fully back in the grind of work, whether she liked it or not. And the crushing fact bore down on her: If theydidn’t win the election to force the university to recognize the union, they’d lose everything they’d worked for.

The benevolent tone of the announcement was infuriating. Mira was still fuming when her office door opened and Shreya entered. “Do you have a second?” she asked. Mira nodded. “Come walk with me.”

Mira got up. “Is this about the announcement?”

“Not just that.”

They walked in the direction of the lounge. Shreya said, “You know that Leila has to step down as area captain for the Classics department soon.” Mira nodded. Leila was headed to North Africa for her research. “So, we want you to replace her.”

“What? Me?”

“Yes, I’m talking to you.”

A sense of dread came over Mira. They were in really dire straits if Shreya was askingher. “Why not Ifeoma or David? Or anyone else, for that matter.”

“Ifeoma’s too busy trying to finish her dissertation. And I’m already asking David to fill in for me on the international students’ working group.”

“Really? You’re not?—”

“Yeah, I’m too busy with my visa issues, ironically.” Shreya’s problems with her student visa had plagued her on and off for years. She had reluctantly set up a crowdfunding link a few months ago for her thousands of dollars in legal expenses, and dozens of other grad students in the union who were equally broke had chipped in, but there was no end in sight. “I’ll tell you about it later. Anyway, you’ve been part of the union for years and you’ve been canvassing regularly, and you know what’s going on.”

“Um,” Mira said. “I don’t know if I can do that.”

“Is something preventing you, or you just think you’re not capable?” Shreya had a way of getting to the point. She was a perfect VP, efficient and ruthless. Mira didn’t have that in her.

“Both. I’m not sure if I can keep up with it, for one thing.” She was under enough stress already. “What would I have to do? I know about leading trainings, but I don’t even know all the things Leila was doing.”

“It’ll probably be about ten or fifteen hours of work a week until the election. You’d run trainings, and they’ll become more frequent closer to the election when more people want to help get out the vote. You’d be updating the database and tracking down the people we haven’t talked to or are still on the fence. Oh, and, obviously, you’d be on the executive committee, which will be fun for you.” Shreya’s tone implied the opposite. “We meet every Tuesday night in addition to the Thursday meetings.”

Mira nodded to show she was listening. “There’s something else, too,” Shreya added. “We think what the administration is doing might be considered an unfair labor practice, which is illegal.”

“Wait, really?”

“They’re giving us a suspiciously timed pay raise, and claiming in their official communications that there’s no money in the budget for anything else regardless of whether we unionize. Which isn’t true, but it’s going to hurt us in the election. We’re talking to our lawyer about it. What it comes down to is that we might file a complaint to get the administration to stop their tactics, but it’ll delay the election.”

“For how long?”

“We don’t know. It could be until next semester. Or even later.”

“That doesn’t sound good.”

“Well, it’s not going to be good if we go ahead with the election, and we lose because the administration convinceseveryone that the union won’t do anything to help them.” That much was true. “Anyway, we’re going to discuss it in the committee and make a decision. Just so you know what we’re up against.”

“Uh, I don’t know.” Mira sighed. “Okay, I could make time for this. But I’ve never done anything like this before. I don’t know if I’m qualified.”

“Maybe not, but you’re the best person in the department who’s currently available, according to Leila. You’ll learn as you do it, which is what we all did.” Mira remained silent. Shreya continued, “You know, there’s no perfect candidate who’s going to appear out of nowhere. Someone in the Classics department is going to have to do it. It might as well be you.”

“Wow, thanks, Shreya. That’s really encouraging.”

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