Page 11 of Square Waves (Big Fan #2)

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I question whether one late-night conversation is actually going to change the tenor of things between us in real life. But when I arrive at the store on Monday morning, Leon gives me a nod and says, “Hi, Cassidy.”

So, without prompting, I offer to help him paint the pedestals on Tuesday.

We don’t talk while we do it; he turns on the radio, and we both hum along as we work in companionable silence.

Willa has been out picking up furniture from an estate sale—a curio cabinet that’s her best find so far—and when she gets back and sees us, she just stands there for a minute, watching.

“This is—I’m almost scared to jinx it,” she says finally.

“If you get tired of ceramics, you have a future in mediation.” I wink at her. “Maybe you could get, I don’t know, Giants fans and Dodgers fans to paint a dugout in peace and harmony.”

“I thought you weren’t a Giants fan,” Leon teases.

“I’m not.”

“So you’re the Dodgers fan in this analogy, then.”

“Oh god no.I would never root for a SoCal team.”

“At least you have some loyalty in that cold little heart of yours.”

I can tell Willa is bracing for impact at Leon’s taunt.

But I just shrug it off. “As long as we can agree that the Yankees are garbage, I’m fine.”

Leon nods solemnly. “No one,” he says, “likes the Yankees.”

“Well, except Yankees fans,” Willa observes.

“Garbage,” Leon and I reply in unison.

Willa throws up her hands and goes to the back without saying another word to us, though I catch her muttering something about parallel universes as she walks by.

I try to take the good vibes home with me when I leave for my call with Tilly. It’s been a week, and I was very much hoping to have something to tell her besides that I’m still not following her advice. That, in fact, instead of relaxing, I have taken up physical labor.

The clock ticks over to 4p.m., and Tilly’s office blinks into focus behind her on Zoom: its familiar, soothing, pale-pink walls. Her degrees lined up in a neat row, assuring me that at least one of us knows what the hell she’s doing.

She starts off with a tough one: “How did relaxing go?”

“Um.”

“Right. What did you do instead, exactly?”

“I sort of went and got a part-time job?”

Tilly throws up her hands, and I can’t help laughing.

“It’s not paid.”

“Does that make it better or worse?”

I rack my brain. “Better? Because I’m not doing it for capitalist profit motive?” I twist my hair off my neck. “It’s a good deed. I’m helping out a friend.”

“Sure. But where and how are you making time for you while you do that?”

“I have the evenings alone.” I can feel myself putting on my Cassidy has it all sorted voice, and I try to tamp it down. “And... I don’t know. It’s been mind-clearing, honestly. To get out of my head for a little bit.”

Tilly makes a face that I know by now means, You are being avoidant, Cassidy . But all she says is, “Does it make you think you might want to work in retail at some point? Or art?”

“Oh god no. But I did make a new list. Of, like, qualities I would want in a job. Stuff I value. Things like that.”

“What’s on it?”

I give her the rundown: Meaningful work. Flexible schedule, maybe not a traditional office job. I like interacting with people, but I don’t want to do it in public anymore.

“Did writing that bring to mind anything you did when you were younger that used to satisfy those desires?”

I shake my head. In high school, I was mostly just.

.. good at being in high school. National Merit Scholar, student government, that kind of thing.

I prided myself in how many plates I could keep spinning: landing good grades, having fun, and getting into college.

And once I ended up in DC, I let the city, practically a one-industry town, dictate what I did next.

My silence drags on for too long. “No,” I say, finally. “I don’t know. I’ve never had a dream job.” I sigh. “I think the problem is that I don’t like anything right now.”

“Well, that’s burnout for you.” Tilly considers our options. “I’m wondering if maybe we should try looking in another direction. Do you have any mentors there in Berkeley, from growing up?”

Another I don’t know isn’t going to cut it, so I reply with the first name that comes to mind.

“I guess an English teacher, Ms.Palazzo.” I sort of worshipped her.

Ms.Palazzo was older—in her sixties when I knew her—but the kind of older that made aging seem like it might actually be cool and interesting.

“It might be helpful to just... go all the way back,” Tilly says. “Reconnect with yourself from then. As long as we’re talking about values—where did yours come from? How did you develop them?”

The idea of revisiting the past makes me shudder.

I don’t want to reconnect with Before Cassidy.

What could she possibly have to teach me?

The goal is to move forward, ideally into uncharted territory.

But I’ve refused or ignored basically every other piece of advice Tilly has given me, so I know I owe her one.

“I’ll try,” I say, with considerably more optimism than I feel.