Page 10 of Inflame

“I want to be happy too,” I say with a half smile.

Angie leans over and gives me a hug. We met as roommates and have been best friends ever since. “I need to go. I promised Graham I would eat lunch with him.”

“I need to check the mail, so I’ll walk you down.”

I grab my set of keys from the dish near the door and lead Angie to the elevator bank. I’m glad the maintenance worker got it fixed again. Although I do prefer the stairs for some added exercise, carrying up bags upon bags of groceries is a drag when it is out of service.

Collins is waiting for us in the lobby and waves to me with a smile. He is Graham’s driver, bodyguard, friend, and groomsman, but Angie basically considers him family. “Nice seeing you, Miss Nettles.”

“Same to you, Collins,” I greet.

“Claire, let me know if you need anything,” Angie says, waving a final goodbye and heading out the door with Collins right by her side.

Sadness washes over me as I watch my best friend leave my building. I get so lonely here waiting for Ethan to sometimes show up, depending on his work schedule or last-minute changes with who is watching Finn. Being in the real world without classes and studying taking up the majority of my brain puts me in a vulnerable state with my self-esteem. The more free time I have, the more minutes I spend in the day questioning if staying in Portland was a good idea. It’s the doubt and uncertainty for the future that eats at me. I need to stop my past endeavors from haunting me, reminding me of all I left behind.

I find my apartment number on the mailboxes and pull out a stack of mail. Every piece is addressed solely to me. I shuffle through it, while making my way toward the stairwell. I squeeze in a leg workout while I climb the flights leading back to the apartment.

Out of breath and feeling the fire in my calves, I push myself through the door and head to the cupboard to get a glass to fill with water. Downing the entire thing in just a few gulps, I set the empty glass on the top rack of the dishwasher and then do a few stretches to avoid stiffness and pain later on.

I carry the non-junk mail over toward the window seat overlooking the city and plop myself down onto the fraying cushion. I spend a lot of my time in this very spot in the apartment, often thinking about what I need to do to get my life back on track. It is all about making achievable goals and sticking to the steps needed to reach them.

I break through the first envelope’s seal and pull out the paper that illustrates the amount I owe in student loans. I stare at the document, seeing this for the first time. I check the name on the front of the envelope and verify that it is in fact me that it is addressed to. My parents have been paying my bills for college all along, so this must be a mistake. They agreed to fund my tuition and living costs while attending River Valley University, in addition to sending me what I refer to as “guilt money” for basically ignoring me and staying on the East Coast while I was on the West Coast. They are not big travelers, so sending money probably helped rationalize their decision to not ever visit. Plus, they had a restaurant to run. Not everyone has as much free time as I now have.

My eyes scan over the bill until I find the amount that is accumulated over time. My eyes bulge out and my lungs deflate with a gasp. There is no way I can owe $304,323.

I find the sheet that has the breakdown of cost. How did I allow myself to be so naive when it came to the actual cost of my education? Out-of-state tuition is drastically more than in-state. At slightly over $45,000 per year, I owe $180,748 just for my bachelor’s degree alone. Add on my master’s at a whopping $123,575, and if I follow the twenty-year payback plan, I willonlyowe roughly $57,000 back in interest.

I am going to throw up.

I shove the papers back into the envelope and lean my face against the cool glass window, looking out into the city. If I knew I had to pay for my entire duration of college on my own, I would have waited until I had a steady job before moving forward with my master’s degree. In hindsight, knowing now that no one wants to hire me, I probably wouldn’t have even tried to get one in the first place. What’s the point of a fancy degree, if there’s no fancy job to justify it?

I grab my phone and dial my mom’s number. She answers on the fifth ring, and the noise in the background is a telltale sign she is working at her restaurant in northern Virginia, just south of Washington, D.C.

“Hey Mom, it’s me,” I mutter into the phone. “I was calling because I got this random bill in the mail.”

“I doubt it’s random, Claire.”

I swallow hard and clear my throat. “I thought you and Dad were going to pay for my tuition like you promised.”

“Bill and I,” she starts, but pauses to correct herself. “Your father and I are getting a divorce. Been working toward that for the past decade anyway. He is still angry with me over you.”

Tears fill my eyes. It’s not my fault my mom cheated on her spouse and conceived me. She couldn’t even pass me off as Bill’s, since the man she cheated on him with, during a one-night stand, was a Filipino touring America for the first time on a visitor’s visa. Coming out with darker hair and slightly tanned-looking skin threw Bill for a loop, so he apparently demanded a DNA test when I was only three days old.

Nothing says, “welcome to the world, little one,” like betrayal. It’s as if my birth put a stain on their relationship. I made it dirty.

It is hard growing up with a dad who was in my life only as a default and the stigma I put on my own self for being a byproduct of infidelity. Being mixed race in a public school is hard enough. Being conceived from lust rather than love is another hard pill to swallow. Kids teased me and called me names. Everyone assumed I was adopted, as if that is something bad.

It is of no surprise that at this stage of the game, Bill is reneging on his offer to pay for my university. Why would he want to anyway? Mom is probably going to try to get everything she can out of the settlement.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” I finally say, after the long period of silence. “Mom? You still there?” I glance down at the phone and realize that we disconnected minutes ago. Dammit. I toss my phone onto the seat bench and cry into my knees.

I must have dozed off because I wake to a kink in my neck and Ethan making his way through the door with his briefcase. I rub at my muscles to remove some of the tension, sliding off the window bench to greet him.

I stand on my tippy toes and give him a hug and kiss. “Hey baby, glad you’re home. How was work?”

“Good,” he says, moving his attention toward the kitchen. “Is dinner still in the oven?”

I pull back and frown over his words. I’ve been on a very restricted diet this week during my cleanse. “I really wish you would warn me in advance on what your expectations are of me, so I’m not blindsided.”

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