by Claire Cain
“Ugh!” I groaned aloud in frustration. I wanted to yell or bang symbols or do something reckless, but instead I stayed there, tossing and turning.
When I woke the next morning, I felt like an egg fried on a sidewalk and left to die. Or be trampled. Or whatever. I felt like I’d been scraped off the bottom of a shoe. I felt like my entire world had crumbled, and I wasn’t sure how to function now. The nasty part was that was true.
I took my time getting out of bed. At some point yesterday, I’d recognized there was no chance of me showing up to work, and since the project was in good shape and I didn’t have anything scheduled, I called Erin at the education center and told her I was sick and wouldn’t be in today either.
Once I got up and ate a real breakfast—eggs, toast, coffee, water—I got to work. I’d promised myself at some point in the night I wasn’t going to take this lying down, and one of the things I could do for myself was feed and water myself so I wasn’t an incapable mess when it came time to use my brain.
I started with researching law firms in the area, even branching out to Nashville. I called ten different firms to find the right match and quite a few weren’t willing to say much without meeting with me. I wasn’t sure I’d need them, so I didn’t do much other than simply thank them for their time. But one or two agreed to meet with me early the following week if I needed to. I desperately didn’t want to, but so far there was no movement from accursed CathMath77 and I suspected there would be none, at least that I could elicit. Maybe the agency or lawyer would be the ones to track her down… maybe.
It was late in the day when I received an email back from Mr. Berry at Quint Agency, and I didn’t know what to think when I saw it. It was a non-response. I’d sent him every bit of evidence I had to show that the work was originally mine, and he basically said, “Thanks, good to know.” Not, “We will avenge the dishonoring of your name” or, “It’s clear you are the original writer” or even, “That was very thorough, and we’ll be speaking with the other author and get back to you.” No, it was nothing but a receipt.
I also spent my day bursting out in sobs, much like my beloved Diane Keaton in Something’s Gotta Give after Harry (Jack Nicholson) broke her heart. I’d be fine, typing away at an email to another lawyer or searching what the crap the procedure for addressing plagiarism in non-academic circles was to begin with, when I’d bust out in inconsolable sobs that would last seconds at times, minutes at others.
I felt too full. I felt like I was stuffing a box full of Styrofoam peanuts, trying to contain the madness, but I kept finding more lying around on the floor, stuck to my pants, stuck to the box. Just when I thought I had it all boxed up, it’d burst open again, the flaps clearing the way for a staticky pastel-colored nightmare to cover my floor.
It was the knock on my door, an eerie replay from the day before, that had me snapping my computer shut and springing off the couch, my home base for crisis central.
My body was on full alert, my mind a riot of energy and emotion, and I almost choked with relief when I saw it was Alex, not Jake, standing at my door.
“Whoa, are you ok?” she asked, grabbing me by the shoulders. I closed the door then grabbed her. I hugged her like it mattered, her familiarity the only medicine for the utter crap-attack that was my week, my life.
“No,” I said, and I could hear the raw sound of my voice, that I’m about to cry strain obvious. Alex pulled back from the hug and walked to the couch. She left me my spot, the indentation of hours spent there clear, and rested a hand on my shoulder when I sat.
“What’s going on? Dimmi.” Her eyes were wide and her face was pained. At the sight of her, of her deep empathy and love for me so evident and right there near the surface, I lost it again.
Once I cried out the worst of the tears, and calmed down so I was only intermittently blubbering, I told her about the rejection of the grant application, about the refusal to let the project expand. I told her about the plagiarism accusation and who I was certain it was, and everything I’d communicated to the agency and learned over the last thirty-six hours.
“What the hell? What on God’s good Earth are they thinking, accusing you without evidence? And now with all of the evidence showing it is your work? I don’t understand how they can possibly claim it’s not yours when you have all of those drafts and the proof of having worked with effing CathMath.” Her indignance made me smile, then ache. Even through her gesticulating she must have seen my sadness.
“Hey… hey. We’re going to figure this out. There’s no way this novel isn’t getting published under your name.” She soothed me with a gentle squeeze to my wrist.
“I don’t know. I really don’t. But thank you for believing me.” My voice was watery and I looked at the ring where I’d set my coffee mug earlier, now only a dried brown circle on the white coffee table.
“What? You don’t have to thank me for that. I know you’d never plagiarize, and I know how hard you’ve worked. Anyone who knows you would know that, no question.”
“Don’t be so sure about that…” I wrapped my arms around my knees and hugged them to my chest.
“What are you talking about?” She gave me a hard look, impatient for me to tell her whatever it was I was hinting at. I didn’t want to—didn’t want to deal with this failure too, but I couldn’t keep this from her.
“Jake. He came over yesterday afternoon, knew I was upset, I told him what I told you.”
“And?”
“And then instead of… of… declaring it insane and hugging me or pounding his fist through the wall at the injustice of it all, he asked me if I’d done it.” My voice was raised, tight. If it was a line, it’d be a wavy one, chasing either side of the page.
“What?” She burst out of her seat and stood facing me, eyes wild, waiting for the rest of the story.
“He literally asked me, ‘Did you plagiarize?’” I clinched my jaw and felt the strong urge to spit. At the same time, repeating that was like taking a backhoe to my ribs. I hugged my knees tighter.
She looked at me, frozen, her mouth agape. I knew she was thinking. I could see her eyes shifting back and forth, quickly curving around the room in a moment, and then back to me. “There’s no way he was actually asking you that like he didn’t know the answer. I can’t believe that. I don’t.”
“Well that’s what he said—”
“And it was an idiot thing to say. But I have no doubt he respects you, and I know he wouldn’t actually think you had. I have no idea why he’d be so dumb, but I don’t think—”
“It doesn’t matter now.” I felt my shoulders sag and rested my head on my knees.
“What does that mean?” she asked, caution in her voice.
“I’m done here. I’m going to have to move again, wherever I can find a full-time faculty job, and it’s just… it’s obviously not going to work anyway.” The words faculty job were bitter ash in my mouth.
“Ok, there is so much to deal with in that statement and so little time. First—why would you have to move? There are like fifteen colleges within an hour of where you are right now. Get on staff with one of them. I’m sure you’d be an appealing novelty item for them, coming from the big city and being interested in military life, or whatever.”
I broke out of my little ball of sadness and stood. “I don’t want my life to be like that. I don’t want the pressure, and the constant competition—”
“Stop. Just stop talking about this like whatever happens in the next five minutes is going to be for the rest of your life. I understand you wanted to move and change things and be a writer and leave academia behind, but you’re also a damned good teacher. I know you hated the drama and the old boys’ club, but it doesn’t have to be like that. Become an adjunct, or—”
“The pay is terrible. There’s no benefits, and there—”
She shook her head as she grabbed my shoulders. “Stop. Seriously. Ellie. I love you, but you’re spiraling. You’ve set up a lovely little pity party he
re, but I’m not drinking your specific brand of poor me tea. So, listen.” She gave me a hard, motherly look. She was the youngest of three, but you’d never know it—she’d been bossing me around for years.
I pursed my lips to show her I wouldn’t interrupt again.
“You could teach part time. Maybe you can even get a job on post if you’re finding you like that. Or you can apply for fifty more grants and fund your project another way if you want to stick with that.” She let her hands drop from my shoulders but didn’t step away.
“I don’t think I can. I…” I paused and took a deep breath. My chest fully expanded, and I felt the truth of what I was about to say. “I think they might be right. Whatever I find out at other bases is likely to mimic what I found here. They’ve got what they need to push for more time for soldiers, for certain ways for the contracting schools to cooperate. That’s all good and I’m genuinely proud of the work and participants, and I’m hopeful they’ll make things easier on soldiers now… it sucks. It’s honestly one of the first things I’ve ever been told ‘no’ about, and it stings.” I hated admitting that, but I knew she understood me when I said it. I walked toward the kitchen so I wouldn’t have to see her take in my flushed cheeks, and of course Alex followed.
She paused in the doorway. “I get it. Getting rejected sucks pigeon feet, and there’s no way to escape that. But you’re acting like you have no alternative. You’re acting like the fact that you have a life here you like means nothing and you have to go somewhere else for money rather than stay here and fight for what you want. That’s not you. That’s a steaming pile, and you know it.” I didn’t feel any sense of humor yet, but I felt my mouth crack a smile at her stern look, her hands on her hips, the determination blazing in her eyes.
“Aren’t you the one who was all about putting the job first?” I reached into the fridge and grabbed a block of sharp cheddar cheese.
“Yeah, well, I learned, didn’t I? Or, I’m working on fully learning it. You can make your life look a lot like what you want it to be, but sometimes something’s gotta give. In this case, for you, it might be you have to teach a little until your writing takes you to where you can support yourself.”
“You’re right.” I exhaled loudly and let her sense of determination fill me with hope. Then I sliced a half-inch wide slice of cheddar. “But if we set that aside, and we say ok, I’m going to figure out how to support myself so I can stay here, then what about the writing?” I raised an eyebrow at her in reference to the cheese.
She leaned over to see the package—Kraft—and jumped back with a slight shudder and curt nod “no.” She leaned against my counter while I took a large bite. “This plagiarism charge is nonsense. You’ve got the proof, and it’s impossible this woman is going to claim your book. So, if the lawyers at the agent’s office can’t see that, then you are going to litigate.”
“I don’t think I can afford that. I don’t have a great sense of what it’ll cost yet, but I don’t want to put myself in debt for this.” I moved back to the couch, half the slice of cheese on a small, floral plate. Alex stayed standing.
“Ellie, I know you don’t. I am going to have faith you won’t have to. But I hereby banish the tone of defeat in your voice on this matter. You have appointments with lawyers set up next week if you don’t get good news from the agent tomorrow, right?” She was still standing, but her posture was more relaxed.
“Yes. I meet with two firms on Monday, and that’s all I wanted since I’m hoping I won’t have to litigate. If I have to, I don’t want to have too much input unless neither of the two I’m meeting with seem like they’ll work.” I watched as she plopped down next to me.
“Ok then. There’s a plan there too. I know this sucks, and I’m not trying to make it seem like planning how you’ll handle it negates the very real emotion of feeling upset and sad and betrayed. But let’s go forward.” She grabbed me by my shoulders and pulled me in for a hug. My eyes welled up with tears, and I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude for her.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. This is what we do for each other. But now we have to deal with Jake.”
“Jake?” His name felt awkward in my mouth, the “k” sound too hard, the “j” too mushy. And I felt the shimmering sense of peace that had settled over me moments ago evaporate.
“Hold please,” she said and held up a finger while she put her phone to her ear. Then she spoke into the phone.
“I can’t come until later. Ellie needs me, and I can’t leave yet. Eat without me, and I’ll come over in a bit.” Her eyes were light, and she had a smile so wide her cheeks looked like they might burst.
I turned away, not envying her love for Luke, but witnessing it in this moment was too painful. I heard her whisper, “I love you” and some kind of promise, and then she was back to attending to me.
“Ok. I don’t know why Jake said what he did, but let’s rewind. Before this, you guys were good, right?” She curled her legs up into a tailor sit on the couch.
I didn’t know what to say. Were we good? Not really. I’d essentially told him I didn’t know how I felt about him. “We were okay. I guess… I had already kind of busted things.”
“What makes you say that?” Alex asked, her eyes narrowing a bit like it’d help her figure out my response.
“Well, I went over to dinner earlier this week to say goodbye to Henry. He referred to Jake as my boyfriend, and I felt weird about that. And then Jake walked me home, and said he wanted me, and he’d wait for me to be ready for him.” I didn’t look at Alex, but I could feel her hard stare.
“Umm… ok. I’m going to need clarification.”
“On what?”
“Well, let me recap. You have Jake Harrison, extremely good-looking neighbor, highly successful soldier, amazingly well-educated, and evidently super into you. You also mentioned you guys definitely have chemistry. What am I missing?” She was genuinely bewildered.
“I know it sounds crazy. He’s really pretty perfect. Well, no, he’s not perfect, and he’s got a lot of crap to deal with, but who doesn’t, so it’s not like that’s an issue. I like him. I really, really do. But all of this time we’ve been friends, I’ve had him in the ‘no no’ file in my brain. I could let myself fall for him a little bit without having to actually… risk anything, because I knew he didn’t want a future, and that’s what I’ve been saying I wanted. It’s backwards, I know, but the whole time I was wishing he’d want something, it was safer to want because I knew he didn’t.”
“Right. You want long term. You want the big shebang. And I happen to know despite your claim you have no maternal instincts, you want babies.”
“But now…” How could I explain something that didn’t even make sense to me?
“Now, what? He told you he’s interested in you, and you’re worried he doesn’t mean it? Or he means for now, but isn’t open to marriage?” She kept digging. I knew she wouldn’t let this alone until she got to the bottom of things. I both loved and loathed her for that.
“I would never doubt anything he said because the man is genuine. If he says something, he means it, and I know that. But what if I’m misunderstanding him? Or, what if…” It was then I realized it. “What if I’m not misunderstanding, and he does want those things, and he thinks he wants them with me?”
She watched me for a minute, and it felt like every noise in a one-mile radius had ceased. I desperately wanted her to answer my question, and I could tell she was composing it, thinking about how to respond.
“Then I think you tell him what you want. And then you ride off into the sunset and make passionate love and have his babies.” I could see the smile growing and the excitement in her face beaming. “Yep. Little Jake and Ellie babies. They’ll be little bad- ass geniuses.”
“You skipped a few steps. I’m over here feeling awkward about him being my boyfriend, and you’ve already got crib sheets picked out,” I said with an annoyed voice, hiding the little jolt o
f pleasure the thought brought me.
“I know. And yes, you should start with regularly dating and enjoy that, but from what you’ve said, he doesn’t strike me as someone who’s going to want to move slowly now that he’s made up his mind.”
“That’s what scares me. It’s not like I doubt him. Or even me. On the surface, it seems unreal, and I don’t know how to handle that. I feel like a fourth grader trying to go to high school. I feel ignorant and scared and awkward because I haven’t had a relationship in a while and the ones I did have were me reluctantly participating.”
“I think you tell him that. You have to tell him that,” she said, her voice soft and warm. She patted my arm gently.
“Ugghghhgghhh. This is the worst.” I ran my hands through my hair and clutched my head for a moment before looking back at her. “But I know I have to. The alternative is me saying goodbye to him. And if I’m honest, part of my being upset about losing the grant is because I don’t want to move because I want to be near him.” I looked at her, waiting for a hint of judgment or anything other than support to cross her face, but nothing did. “I hate admitting that—it seems cliché to move somewhere for your boyfriend or whatever, but… it’s true.” I let my head hang a little and then glanced up to find her shaking her head at me. Shaking her head and rolling her eyes—oh good.
“You are ridiculous. I love you, Dr. Kent, but you are far less pragmatic in your life than you’d like to think. If you end up with Jake, you’re going to be moving all over the country until he retires, so factoring him in now is good practice.” She smiled knowingly at me.
“And see? That. That. Can I be an Army wife? Me? I don’t know the first thing about what that looks like.”
“Don’t even start with me about that. You’ve been transitioning your career into what is arguably the most military-friendly career a spouse could have, and you value what he does. The details, the ins and outs, the customs and courtesies—those will come. We can learn together,” she said and hugged me again.
