I'm Writing A Book - The First Unedited Paragraphs

The other night I had a dream so profound that it shaped my entire path forward. 

For the last six weeks, I've spent literally all of my downtime job hunting, soul searching to pinpoint what it was that I wanted to do next, what was important to me, and how I was going to be intentional about making my own happiness a priority. And it was then that inspiration struck as it so often does in the middle of the night: I was going to write a book. 

I've entertained this notion dozens of times over the years. The first time I tried to earnestly write a book was about ten years ago, some couple hundred pages still sitting idly on my hard drive. Every now and again, I'll pick up where I left off only to lose sight of my goal with that story, trying to figure out what my main character would be doing now. Maybe that book will never be finished. 

But this one might. 

The story seemed so clear now, so obvious. They say that you should write what you know and what you like and what I liked was non-fiction. I loved stories about people: what motivates them, incentivizes them, why they act. 

This would be my way of fixing myself. I would write my way through my own therapy, document the journey of reinventing myself both mentally and physically.

The morning after I'd had this dream, I stirred awake in bed staring at the ceiling. The feeling was still there, lingering and insistent on its own validity. Was this even a good idea? How could I afford to take such a risk? To probably no one's surprise, I spent the morning weighing out the pros and cons, reviewing my budget, and seeing where I could make cuts to stay within my means. I even pitched the idea to all the people in my immediate support system, vying for their advice, all while going through the motions of my daily routine of job hunting and self-pity. 

The truth was that I might not ever have an opportunity like this ever again. My unemployment would (hopefully) be kicking in soon enough and I would have the means to cover my overhead while working on this dream, this probably insane but wild dream. 

Nervously, I ran the idea by Tom, wondering how he would feel about me taking a break from working altogether, knowing that if it came down to it, he might have to cover some more of our living expenses for a while. Without hesitation, he told me to pursue it immediately. My god, I love that man. 

I could fail. I could be a terrible writer. I could lose motivation and decide to go back to a 9-5 gig but even if all that happens, at least I will have given myself the chance to try it. I have to. With Tom's stamp of approval and unconditional support, I started writing - slow, unsure, and certainly in desperate need of refinement due to the lack of practice I've had in recent years. 

So, without further ado, here are the first paragraphs of my yet-to-be-named debut novel. 

The line inched forward, in what felt like a deliberate attempt to irritate me, and I impatiently dug my fingernails into my steering wheel, little crescents following in their wake. My car was a loathsome thing that hummed quietly beneath me. I hated my car. It was boxy and annoying and sat so low that the front bumper had a propensity for catching on any moderately raised surface, as evidenced by the way it hung precariously unattached on the right-hand side. You couldn’t even open the doors without guaranteeing it would hit whatever thing was next to it – another car, the wall, a small child. Nothing was safe from its wide berth. Sure, it was mechanically sound and more importantly paid off but I despised the thing. The car in front of me edged forward just slightly, waiting to order next and I glanced at the clock – 11:26 PM. It was then that a rank stench caught my attention and I curled my nose, pulling open my boyfriend's Darth Vader hoodie to smell myself. I’d forgotten to put on deodorant - “for the third day in a row”, I thought sullenly. After five days of not showering, wearing the same set of clothes for an unknown amount of time, and my hair an absolute tangled mess sitting high on my head in an unkempt top knot, I looked and felt like a fucking disaster. Shit, I was even wearing my only pair of slightly too small black sweatpants, a cardinal rule which I never broke. Never in all of my thirty-two years of existence had I ever left the house wearing sweatpants. I viewed them as being a house-only garment and had always considered the kind of people who wore them in public as being lazy. Even if I was only leaving the house for something small like the grocery store, I never went anywhere without taking at least a teeny bit of pride in my appearance. Though I didn’t consider myself a vain person, taking pride in one's appearance was always important to me because it communicated character and confidence. I suppose then it was fitting then as I absentmindedly scratched at some stain on my pants, a remnant of what was probably that morning's breakfast, that I possessed neither confidence nor character.  

A hefty ten pounds heavier than my heaviest weight had ever been, a slovenly 218 pounds, I was that lazy person - a degenerate who was unceremoniously about to shove as much food into my fat gob as I could. The car in front of me lurched forward and it was finally my turn to order. I hadn’t eaten in twelve or so hours and only begrudgingly agreed to leave the house at the behest of my angry and gurgling stomach. Finding the energy or desire to cook at this late hour was beyond my capability at the moment so I deigned to leave the house in my pajamas, a fashion sin that I never committed previously.  

 
The sound of Simon’s tires grew steadily in my ears as I rolled down the window and came to a soft stop. A monotone young voice greeted me, the crackle of the intercom buzzing to life a few seconds later. “Hi, welcome to Taco Bell. What can I get for you?” It was easy to picture this kid as a twenty-something college student who may or may not be stoned while at work because in a post-covid world, employers were desperate enough to look the other way.  

As cheerfully as I could manage, which was to say barely, I poked my head just outside the window to get closer to the intercom: “Yes, hi, good evening. Can I get two cheesy bean and rice burritos and...” pausing, I pulled out my phone as though I were checking the imaginary order for someone else, the guilt of ordering all this food for myself painting my cheeks red with shame. “...and three spicy potato soft tacos. Oh, and my boyfriend would like a small root beer.” Spoiler alert: it was not for my boyfriend. He was working.  
 
Cracking a small and earnest smile, I had a temporary moment of pride knowing that even though I was incredibly depressed, at least I still managed to be polite. Growing up, my grandparents owned a restaurant that almost literally raised me. Every day of my formative years was spent in that building; every important moment of my childhood from the time I was three until nineteen when they retired had been spent between those walls. As a result of growing up around food service, my family had always instilled in me the necessity of being kind to retail workers, especially now in the wake of a post-covid world. Fast food staff in particular had borne the brunt of mass entitled behavior – the anti-makers, Karens, and anti-vaxxers of the world spreading their particular brand of self-obsessed and narcissistic bullshit.  

Bzzt. “Your total is $8.63 at the first window. Thank you.”  

Snapping back to attention, I fumbled for the zipper on my purse, a faded cross body bag that was literally falling apart at the seams, structure boning peeking out and threads coming undone, and reached for my wallet while pulling up behind the car in front of me. Anxiously, I whipped out my phone and checked my bank app. “$234.66 is what I have left.” I thought, wondering if depression was enough justification for spending just shy of nine dollars on what was arguably the least healthy thing I’d eaten that day. Or probably all week.  

It had been forty-two days exactly since I’d been fired from a job I loved. On the day that it happened, our boss Maria walked into the office chatting away in her succinct and quick manner with someone who was probably an owner. She was a tiny thing, just barely over 5’ tall, long brown/blonde hair, and carried herself as though she were Amazonian. Staff at our home office often referred to her as a bulldog because she was a straight, to the point, and no-frills sort of person. I respected her deeply. For five years, I’d been working in the property management industry and for the most part loved it. It was a fair mix of things I enjoyed doing, like administrative work and at times customer service, with the added benefit of a challenging environment that could eventually pay me a decent living all without the necessity of a college degree. Standing at my desk, clad in one of my favorite work outfits – a pair of burnt orange trousers and a black button down, classic office attire – she sat down near me and ended her call, placing her cell phone on the desk and crossing her legs at the ankles.   
 
I laughed softly, chit chatting with one of my residents who had called in to get an update on her maintenance request. “Oh, yes! I love that show, too.” We had been catching up and had found some common ground in our mutual love for the show ‘The Good Place’. This tenant in particular was a staff favorite – always very sweet, often brought us chocolates or would sometimes just pop in to say hello. “You’ll have to let me know what you think about the finale after you’re finished with it! Well, anyway, let me get in touch with our maintenance guy Matt and see if he can give me a time frame. I’ll give you a shout as soon as I’ve heard back!” Setting the phone down on the receiver, I whipped up a couple of quick notes, and turned my head over to Maria. “Hello! How’s your day been?” Accustomed to multi-tasking, I craned my head back towards my monitor, the ping of a new email from a resident warranting my attention.  

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her shoulders raise and settle back, her gaze leveling with me intentionally and directly. This felt familiar. My gut sank and I could feel my heartbeat echoing a gentle thump thump thump in my ears. “So, we’ve had another meeting with the owners and we’re going to have to let you go today. It’s just not a good fit.”  
 

Not even having been given a response to my question, my mouth opened and closed a few times, the air uncertain how to make any sound. What. Are you fucking kidding me. “This is a joke, right?” I ventured disbelievingly. How could a job I loved be firing me?  
 
Despite my protest, Maria didn't offer any additional explanation instead opting for her tried and true stoic demeanor. It’s just not a good fit. We’re sorry. Her words echoed in my head, hanging on the air empty and unapologetic. Handing her my keys, I couldn’t even look her in the eye and began hastily digging through one drawer, pulling out the things that were mine, and shoving it closed. My eyes darted downward, the vinyl messenger bag I brought from home sat next to my desk and as quickly as I could, I threw whatever items I needed to in, not bothering to stack anything neatly. Erratically, I moved about the office, double checking the back for dishes or food that was mine, zipping through my computer for any personal documents, all while scanning the office hurriedly, the implicit feeling of being unwelcome crushing the air in my lungs. I was on the verge of tears but nothing would come. Maria watched me idly, checking emails on her phone while I continued to pack in a haze fueled with anger and confusion. After several minutes, my direct supervisor, a younger woman named Kaley that I loved working with opened the adjacent gym’s door, pale and wet streaks falling down her cheeks and I stopped near her. Though she was a number of years younger than I was, I admired her a lot. She was the kind of person that believed in doing the right thing for the sake of doing so and held an ardent desire to treat people with a respect that I so often lacked. Kaley and I got along incredibly well. It was almost uncanny how many things we had in common, often joking that we were basically the same person. Glancing once more around the office, I regarded her with uncertainty. She eyed me sadly, seeing that I had already finished packing my things and was preparing to take the last bits out to my car. I did the only thing I thought I could. “Would you like a hug?” Nodding through her tears, I wrapped one arm around her shoulder, the other one cradling a bag of my things and the desk calendar I bought myself perched in my hand, I squeezed her lightly. Though I felt as though I should say something, that I wanted to say something because Kaley had been my coworker, my confidante, my friend, no words came out. Throwing open the office door, I didn’t even bother to close it behind me and left, hoping that my silent action would be my way of saying “Fuck you”.  
 
Now, whenever I pass by the building, I flip them off in solidarity.   

Since then, my routine has devolved into sitting on my ass for sixteen hours a day job hunting and then on a constant rotation of movies, TV, or video games. Even some of my previously loved downtime activities of spending time with my friends, going out for drinks, or playing board games had disappeared in a weed fueled fog. Lately, I was more or less getting stoned from the time I woke up to the time I went to sleep, feeling like it didn’t matter anyway because I couldn’t afford to go anywhere or do anything. What poor habits I had before getting fired had amplified and in that six weeks’ time, I’d managed to turn myself into someone that I didn’t like; I had become the thing that I despised: a lazy, unmotivated stoner. And on top of all that, I’d gained a stupid amount of weight. That was probably also a contributing factor for tossing out my golden rule of never wearing sweatpants in public: none of my fucking clothes fit. Of all my pants, I had one pair of jeans that actually managed to cover my enormous ass (and just barely at that) but even I couldn’t justify wearing them out in public, their odor offending anyone that might come near me.  

 
Pulling up to the window, the chill of a late October night cooled my inflamed cheeks. My suspicions were confirmed as young twenty-something guy with shaggy brown hair that just barely peeked out from underneath his company ball-cap opened the window and repeated my total: “Looks like your total is $8.63 today. Did you want any hot sauce?” 
 
“Mild, please.” I said without preamble. These days, I was finding it difficult to be a person, to act as normal people do in these types of situations. Handing him my debit card, secretly wondering if I begged enough if they’d give me the food for free, I watched as the other employees scrambled behind him. Living in a college town, and less than a few miles from the university's campus, usually meant that places like good ol’ TB were open late and often busy. Just in the time I’d pulled up, four more cars had materialized behind me, likely ordering food after having left the bars. God, I missed bars.  
 
An overstuffed brown paper bag emblazoned with Taco Bell’s logos and marketing bullshit was handed to me. I doubt the employee actually thought that I was ordering for two people and it is likely the case that he didn’t care either way. We all know fast food workers are on the lowest part of the totem pole for workers who get treated or paid fairly and they don’t make enough to give a shit about why people order what they order.  
 
Grabbing the bag, I did my best to communicate my thanks with my eyes knowing that he wouldn’t actually be able to see me smile. A black fabric mask only partially covered in dog hair that I’d ordered from amazon adorned my face, hiding what was half of a thoroughly resigned countenance. My county had reimplemented a mask mandate the previous day and I was already tired of the whining and spurning from the would-be Karens of the world, bitching about their rights or whatever. I never actually stopped wearing my mask, even after the mandate had been lifted, but then again I had reason more than others to be cautious. Almost three years prior, I’d been diagnosed with a type of leukemia and though treatment continued to go well, I always had to maintain a level of caution that others didn’t. The downside of having an incurable cancer is that even if my treatment was going well, I was still at risk and out of an abundance of caution, chose to wear it all the time regardless. Who knew how long this pandemic thing would last? At this point, I was nearly convinced I’d be wearing a mask in public forever anyway.   

“Thanks so much man. Have a good night!” I waved. As I drove away, rolling up the window since it was only forty degrees out, I sighed, not out of relief but out of resignation. This was the life that I’d made for myself.