"Revelation Year"- part 6

A couple of weeks later I arrived at the library to find a note from my boss clipped to my timecard- “Emily, please see me at your earliest convenience.—Katherine.” My heart skipped a beat. I felt like I was being summoned to the principal’s office. What had I done wrong?

I knocked on Katherine’s door. “Hey, Emily, come on in,” Katherine said. “Have a seat,” she said, motioning to one of the two armchairs in front of her desk. She sat in the other one. “How are you doing? I haven’t talked to you in a long time.”

“I’m good.”

“Are you becoming accustomed to living with all those roommates?” She asked.

“Yeah. I mean, it’s not that difficult. I’ve lived with Adena for three years, and the boys are great. We’re almost like a family now,” I said, thinking of our dinner from earlier that month.

“That’s wonderful, Emily. And the house? How are repairs going?”

“Pretty well. I’ve been working on some stained-glass windows for the front hall. They’re taking longer than I expected. I don’t want to put them in until they’re all finished. I got the roof fixed, that was the major thing. We’ve got some minor plumbing issues, but that’s going to have to wait until I save some more money.” I realized I was rambling and blushed. “I’m sorry. I love my old house. I could talk about it all day. I just love fixing things, and making the place beautiful. I’m sure you didn’t ask me to come here just to talk about my leaky roof,” I said, laughing nervously.

“I don’t mind hearing about your house. But you’re right, I did call you in here for a specific reason. You may not know this because it’s not exactly common knowledge yet, but Susan has decided to pursue another job opportunity and will be leaving at the end of next month.” Susan was the library’s “administrative assistant,” which sounded like a secretary, but wasn’t. Susan did all the events coordination for the library and helped supervise the part-time clerks, besides doing all of Katherine’s administrative work. She had a huge job. I liked Susan a lot, and would be sad to see her go. “When Susan told me that she was leaving, I asked her if she had any recommendations for a replacement. She immediately suggested you, Emily.” Katherine paused to let that sink in. “I’m officially offering you the job, Emily. I would love to promote you.”

“Wow,” I breathed. “I thought I had done something wrong,” I said.

Katherine laughed. “Not at all. You’re one of our most valued employees, Emily. All the librarians just love you. They all say that when they ask you to do something, you do it and more. Barb told me that you’ve been training all her new clerks for a year,” Katherine said. I felt my face burn again. Barb was the circulation librarian and was my immediate boss.

“Well… um, thank you,” I said. Compliments had never been easy for me to take. “I love working here. It’s by and far the best job I’ve ever had.” That wasn’t saying much, really. I’d been a waitress at a local fish house for my last two years of high school, and in college I’d worked off and on at a smelly women’s perfume store for two years before landing my library job.

“What do you think? I won’t lie to you, Emily, this is an enormous job. You’ll have a lot of responsibility. There are good things about it too- you’ll be on salary, you’ll have a regular schedule, and you’ll be eligible for health benefits. I wouldn’t be offering you this job if I didn’t have faith that you could do it.” She reached out and patted me on the knee. “You can think it over for a few days if you need to. I don’t want to rush you into any decisions.”

“You’re not rushing me,” I said, and I knew immediately what my decision would be. “I want to do it.”

“Are you sure?” Katherine asked. I nodded. “Excellent! Oh, Emily, I’m so happy that you agreed to this. I know that you’ll do such a wonderful job,” Katherine said, and the look on her face said that she really meant it.

I got home that day bursting with my news. I had to tell someone, and the first someone I saw was Sam- in my room, no less. He was looking at my bookshelves when I came in. “Hey, Em,” he said nonchalantly. I was used to finding one of the boys in my room at any time, so I wasn’t that surprised- Jude thought of his CD’s as my CD’s and vice versa, Sam always needed to borrow books, and Patrick just didn’t have any notion of personal space.

Sam looked up at me. “Is this a good book?” He asked, holding up The Tesseract by Alex Garland. “It looks interesting, and I liked The Beach.”

“Well, you know how confusing The Beach was at the end?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“Well, The Tesseract is all like that, but ten times worse because there’s like, eight stories going on at once.” Sam chuckled and put the book back on the shelf.

“I think I’ll pass,” he said.

“It’s still a good book,” I defended.

“I know, I just need something that’s not going to make me feel like I’ve had a neurological exam with a garden hose afterwards.”

“Here. This is what you need.” I handed him So Yesterday by Scott Westerfeld. “It’s short, sweet, and to the point. You can practically read it in one sitting.” I plopped down on my bed and pulled my laptop out of my momma-bag.

“Thanks,” he said. He sat next to me. “What are you grinning about? You look like the proverbial cat who ate the canary.”

“I got promoted today!” I said, unable to keep it in any longer.

“Wow! That’s awesome!” Sam said, hugging me hard. “What are you going to be doing?” He asked.

“I’m going to be the new administrative assistant. I’m so excited. All my anal-retentiveness is finally going to be put to good use!” I said. I told him a little more about what my duties would be, and then we heard thumping footsteps running up the stairs. Natalie burst into my room, screaming and crying. She threw herself on Sam and me.
I was scared to death. “Nat, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she heaved out. “I-I talked to my English professor today, you-you know, Dr. Bell?” She asked, wiping her nose on my bedspread. I cringed, but let her go on. “He-I-”

“Nat, breathe first and then tell your story,” Sam said. He rubbed Natalie on the back. She calmed down a little, then began again.

“Remember how I took Dr. Bell’s senior seminar on fiction writing even though I was just a junior?” She asked. I nodded. She had stressed herself out over that class. It had been worth five credit hours and had met every day. “Our assignment was to write a novella. Well, he liked mine. A lot.” She took a deep breath. “When the class was over at Christmas, he told me to revise what I had written and bring it back to him in March, and if he liked what he saw, he would give it to his agent,” Natalie said in the most miserable tone possible.

“You didn’t tell me that, Natalie, that’s awesome!” I said, but guardedly, because I didn’t know how she felt about it.

“Yeah. Well, I did what he asked, and he took it to his agent in April. And the agent liked it, too, she told me she wanted to represent me. She showed my book to an editor and now it’s going to be published,” Natalie said, all in a rush like it would hurt her if she didn’t let it out. “I’m going to be a published author,” she said, like she still couldn’t believe it.
Sam and I just looked at her for a moment. “This is a good thing, right?” Sam asked.

“Yes! Of course! I just can’t believe it!” Natalie said, and burst into tears again. Sam started laughing and threw his arms around both of us.

“Man, what a red-letter day for the Wade sisters,” he said, squeezing us tight.

“Both of us? What happened to you today?” Natalie asked, and she seemed under control now.

“Oh, it’s not a big deal. I got promoted. But really, Nat, this is such great news! When is it happening?” I asked.

“I don’t know. Amee, my editor, said that it might be published in the spring. If everything goes according to schedule. I can’t believe this, I’m so excited!” She squealed, bouncing up and down on the bed a little.

“This calls for a celebration. Where’s everyone else? We should go out,” Sam said.

“Jude’s at the hospital until nine. Patrick is at class, and Adena should be back from the coffee shop any minute,” I rattled off. Natalie and Sam stared at me. “What?”

“It’s just that I never realized you had all our schedules committed to memory,” Sam said in astonishment. “Anyway. We need a fancy dinner. I’ll go call Jude and tell him to meet us at Domenico’s when he gets off,” he said, and jumped off the bed.

There was an ear-splintering breaking of wood, and suddenly Sam was screaming on the floor. “Em! What the snot just happened?” He cried.

“Uh… I think you went through the weak spot in my floor,” I said, trying to keep a straight face. Sam straightened up and looked down at his leg. Sure enough, he was up to his knee in floor.

“Well. This is just great,” Sam muttered. “Why does this kind of thing always happen to me?” He asked.

Natalie was just staring at Sam, wide-eyed. “I don’t know what to say. I thought things like this only happened in movies. You know, like that movie The Money Pit? The one where the couple buys the house that needs all the repairs-”

“Nat, you’re not helping,” I said.

“Sorry. I get side-tracked. “Can you get out, Sam?”

“Uh, no. And I think my leg has been impaled by a piece of floor. You two are going to have to pull me out.”

“Hey, everyone, I’m home!” Adena yelled from downstairs.

“We’re in Emily’s room!” Natalie yelled back.

“Well, most of us is in Emily’s room,” Sam said darkly. “Part of me is in the downstairs hall.”

“Actually, I think it’s the bathroom,” I said.

“Whatever. Just get me out of here!” Sam barked.

Adena stopped short in my doorway and started laughing. She didn’t just chuckle for a second, either. She laughed hard, and with abandon. “That has got to be the bar-none funniest thing I’ve ever seen,” she said, leaning against the door frame.

“Are you going to help them get me out, or are you just going to stand there laughing at me?” Sam asked.

“A little of both,” she said, but came over to us. “You want I should go get the ladder and push from the other end?”

“You have got to be kidding me,” Sam muttered.

“That might be a good idea. And be careful, he’s got some floor sticking into him,” I said. Adena saluted me and ran for the ladder.

It took a good twenty minutes of pushing, pulling, and manipulating, but we finally got Sam out. He had knocked a hole about eight or ten inches in diameter in my bedroom floor/bathroom ceiling and was bleeding profusely from a big splinter-gash in his leg.

“As much as you’re going to hate hearing this, we have to take you to the hospital,” I said, touching the giant piece of my floor that was still sticking out of his left calf. “I don’t want to pull this out on my own, and I think you’re going to need stitches.”

“Fine. Can you at least get me another pair of pants before we go?” He asked crankily. “I’m not wearing a pair of those hospital jammies home, no matter how much joy it would bring Adena.”

“Sure. Nat, will you go get the pants? Adena and I will help him out to the car,” I said.

I looked for Jude once we got to the emergency room, but I didn’t see him milling around the front desk. I figured he was with a patient. “Hi. This is Sam Snider, he’s got a giant splinter sticking out of his leg,” I said to the man sitting behind the desk. His name tag read “Gordon.”

“Wow. That is disgusting,” Gordon said, peering over the edge of the desk at Sam‘s leg. He handed us some papers. “Have a seat over there, and we’ll call for you in a minute,” he said, not unkindly.

“Oh, and we’re friends of Jude Watson’s,” Natalie said. “So, if he’s free, could you let him know that we’re here in a non-emergency capacity?”

“This isn’t an emergency?” Sam asked in indignation. “I’ve got a piece of Emily’s bedroom sticking out of me, and you say it’s not an emergency?”

“You’re not dying, you big sissy,” Adena said. “Go and sit down.”

Jude came out not much later, concern etching his face. “What’s going on? Who’s hurt?” He asked frantically. He looked down at Sam’s leg, which he had propped up on the chair opposite of him. “Oh. That’s disgusting.”

“That’s what he said.” I gestured to Gordon at the reception desk.

“What happened? It looks like you got your leg caught in a wood chipper.”

“I fell through the weak spot in Emily’s bedroom floor,” Sam said, obviously miserable. “Why do these things always happen to me?”

Jude just shrugged, like people came in every day with bits of flooring sticking out of them. Actually, he had probably seen weirder things. “Anyway, I can take you back to an exam room. Alan will be there in a few minutes to yank that out and stitch you up,” Jude said. “Can you walk, or should I get you a wheelchair?”

“Oh, just get him a wheelchair. He’s being an enormous baby about it,” Adena said.

“Shut up, Adena. I’ll walk,” Sam said to Jude, who helped him back to an examination room. I was proud of Jude; he had handled that entire conversation without cracking a single smile. I guessed that was one of the things that made him such a good nurse.

By the time Sam got all stitched up, it was almost time for Jude’s shift to be over. We decided to forgo our fancy dinner at Domenico’s for another night, and instead of going home with Sam, Nat, and Adena, I waited for Jude in the emergency waiting room.

“Hey. What are you still doing here?” He asked. He had changed out of his scrubs and was wearing a long-sleeved t-shirt, another short-sleeved t-shirt over it, tastefully holey jeans, and his Docs. I had started to think of this as “Jude’s uniform.”

“I thought I’d wait for you. How was work?” I asked.

“It was… work. It was good. No twelve-car-pileups, hotel fires, or other disasters. It was a good day.” He shifted his backpack to his other shoulder. “I’m tired though. Let’s go.” We walked out to the parking lot- the night had gotten cold while I’d waited for Jude, and I had forgotten my coat in all the excitement at the house. Silently, Jude put his thick wool coat around me. I was a big girl, but Jude was bigger and his coat swallowed me. “So. Sam told me the good news,” Jude said, like we had been talking about it all along.

“Yeah, isn’t it great? Natalie said that her book should be on the shelves by the spring.”

“That is great, but I was talking about your news. You got promoted?” He asked, and inside, a little part of me melted. It made me love Jude even more, that he thought about my promotion before anything else.

“Oh, well, it’s not anything next to Nat’s news. I’m going to be the administrative assistant. It’s pretty much the perfect job for me. I’m going to get paid to organize things. That was just a hobby before.”

Jude laughed. “I’m so proud of you. Have you told your parents yet?”

“No, not yet. I want Natalie to be able to have the spotlight. Her news is extraordinary; I don’t want to detract from that in any way.”

“What about you?” Jude asked gently. My face burned a little. “Do you ever get the spotlight?”

“It’s not important,” I said.

“I think it is,” Jude contended.

“They won’t think it’s that important. They’ve never liked that I work at the library. All they can see is that I was an art major in college and now I work at a library, not using my degree. Not that they think much of my degree in the first place,” I said. “But anyway. That’s just my stupid family issues.”

“Don’t downplay it like that. If you need to talk about it, talk about it. You always say that you’ve got these issues with your mom and dad, but you never get it out. It sounds like you need to,” Jude said. “I’m here. I can listen.”

I sat looking out the window for a long time, vaguely aware that Jude was driving in the opposite direction from Glendale. I didn’t much care; I liked being with Jude, and this made for a nice change from the living room couch. “My parents thought I was retarded when I was growing up,” I said.

“There’s no way they thought that,” Jude said.

“Seriously. They did. They thought I had a behavioral disorder. Most of it was my grandmother’s fault; she convinced my parents that since I was quiet and I didn’t make friends easily that there was obviously something wrong with me.” Jude didn’t ask why I was telling this story, he just respected that I needed to tell it. I could feel him moving into “counselor mode.”

“Was there? Did they find anything wrong?” He asked.

“No. They tested me for everything from Tourette’s to ADD to Asperser’s syndrome, and didn’t find anything. Mentally, I was normal.” I pulled my knees up to my chest. “It would probably have been easier if there had been something wrong with me. As it was, they thought I didn’t have any excuse to act the way I did.”

“How did you act?” Jude asked.

“Like I said, I was quiet. And I didn’t have any friends. Natalie would be running all over the neighborhood getting dirt in her hair with the other kids, and I would be sitting in my bedroom making a scale model of the Eiffel tower with Popsicle sticks and used staples. I kept things like broken plates and picture frames without the glass in them. No wonder they thought I was retarded. I was a mess, even back then.” I looked over at him. “What were you like when you were a kid?”

Jude thought for a while, and I figured that this would just be one more thing that I wouldn’t know about him. He turned into my favorite park, even though it was technically closed for the evening. He parked behind the dumpster (so his car wouldn’t be seen from the street) and opened the door. “Want to go swing?” He asked.

“Of course.” We walked down to the swing sets and swung like little kids for a while. I was acutely aware that Jude hadn’t answered my question.

He picked up the conversation where we left off. “I was a serious kid. I took everything literally. I mean, sarcasm was completely lost on me, “he said wryly. “I must have made my parents miserable. I could never tell when anyone was joking. Not surprisingly, I didn’t have a lot of friends, either,” he said. “We lived on a farm in the middle of nowhere. There weren’t even any neighbors for miles. I was home-schooled. The only people I saw were my parents and my cousins.”

“Wasn’t that lonely?” I asked.

“A little. It was just what I knew, you know? I was used to it. I was less lonely there than I was later, when I was at public school and I didn’t know anyone.” He pumped his legs really hard and went higher and higher. “Watch this!” He yelled, and jumped out of the swing. He flew I swear a hundred feet and landed in a heap on the grass.

“You idiot. You could have broken your face,” I said, skidding out of my swing and running over to him. “Are you okay?”

“Never better. Talking about childhood got me all worked up to act like a kid, I guess.” He flopped back on the grass and looked up at the stars. I sat down next to him, looking up. “I haven’t been a little kid for a long time.”

“Me either.” I destroyed my childhood pretty fast when I started starving myself. Nothing says adulthood like counting calories when you’re fourteen. “Why did you start going to public school? I thought you said you lived out in the country.”

“I did, when I was a little kid. My parents died when I was thirteen. I moved to the city to live with my aunt Maryanne and went to public school when I was in junior high.”

“Oh, God, Jude, I’m so sorry.” I reached over and took his hand.

“It’s okay. It’s been a long time.”

“Why don’t you ever talk about them?”

“Well, it’s hard. You didn’t want to talk about your parents, either, until I made you,” he reminded me.

“True.”

“It was a long time ago. Fifteen years. That’s crazy, isn’t it? It’s been fifteen years since my parents died. It doesn’t feel that long. They died in a car accident. A bad one. A gas tanker ran off the road in front of them and exploded. It took their car with it.” Jude looked up and the stars but I knew him- he was seeing their accident for the thousandth time. “I used to think about them all the time. Now, I don’t so much. I don’t know whether that’s good or bad. I used to miss them so much that it felt like a part of me was rotting and falling off. Then it turned into a dull ache and now… well, it doesn’t hurt as much anymore. I kind of wish it did.”

He sat up and pulled a long chain with two pendants out of his collar. “Have I ever shown you this?” He asked. I shook my head and gestured me over. “This is a St. Jude’s medal,” he said, showing me the first of the two charms. “My mom wasn’t religious. She saw this in a thrift store; it had my name on, so she bought it for me. I was just a little kid at the time, only six or seven years old, but I still wore it every day.” He dropped the medal and picked up the other. “This is something that my dad made for my mom just before she died.” It was just a regular washer, the kind that you would find in any hardware store, but it had the words “Eric loves Tina” scratched on it. “He wasn’t the great artist, she was. But he still loved her. I can still see him at the kitchen table, scratching on this thing with his Swiss army knife. She wore it all the time, but for some reason, she didn’t wear it the day she and Dad were in the car accident. That’s why I have it. I found it lying on the sink in her bathroom. I slipped it off the chain it was on and put it on mine, and it’s been here ever since.”

I looked up from the necklace. “That may be the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard. You must have really loved them.”

“I still do.” We were silent for a while, just looking up at the stars. Finally, Jude looked over at me. “Emily, have I told you what a good friend you are?”

“I think so. I sure do like to hear it, though,” I said. He smiled.

“You’re wonderful. Can I take you for a celebratory milkshake? To commemorate your promotion?”

“What, right now?”

“Yes, right now.” He stood up and helped me up with him. I was still wearing his wool coat, and we both had grass all over us. “Thanks.”

“For what?”

“For listening when I talked about my Mom and Dad. No one else knows. It’s not something I talk about to just anyone,” he said, not letting go of my hand.

“Ditto on that. Thanks for listening to me, too.” We walked back to his car. I wished every night could be like this.