Page 12 of Square Waves (Big Fan #2)

XI

I’m hoping that Ms.Palazzo won’t remember me—or that if she does, she’ll be the kind of person too disgusted by my notoriety to write back to an email.

But the universe isn’t on my side. Turns out, she retired last year, is “delighted to hear from” me, and is available for lunch on Thursday if that happens to work for me.

We meet up at a café a few blocks from the store. She looks exactly like I remember her: bright-eyed, with sharp cheekbones and exacting wardrobe details. Today, a crisp button-up with a set of slim gold bangles on her wrists. Her nails are done too, a cherry red, and she notices me noticing.

“I have time for a lot more personal upkeep now,” she says with a laugh. “My daughter and I get manicures together on Friday afternoons.”

“Oh, that sounds so nice,” I say with a grin.

But I feel a flash of guilt. My mom and I were close once, but we’ve lost that.

My excuse is that I live on the other side of the country, but really our distance is because I basically refuse to come home to visit and have declined to share anything sensitive or real about my life with her since Cooper.

I just don’t want her to worry. What that means functionally is that we hardly talk at all.

Ms.Palazzo wags her fingers. “Well, my daughter insisted on it, really. At first I thought she was being silly. What do I need nice nails for, at this point in my life? But then I realized it wasn’t about the manicure.

It was about giving me some structure. Three weeks into retirement, I was clinging to that appointment like a lifeline. ”

“It is hard to imagine you not working, Ms.Palazzo.” Back when I knew her, she never seemed tired or overwhelmed by all of the teenage nonsense that surrounded her. She had the unique trick of absorbing all of that nervy, hormonal energy and feeding it back to us as something that resembled calm.

“Jenny,” she corrects sternly. “It was hard to imagine myself not working.”

As we wait for our food orders, Jenny tells me about how she ended up in a high school English department in the first place, which involved dropping out of an English PhD program and doing a stint on Wall Street in the ’80s—which she doesn’t quite say but I think might have involved, like, a lot of cocaine—before landing where she did.

I am honestly shocked, and it takes a little work to keep my face from showing it.

Did I imagine her the way elementary schoolers think about their teachers—that they reside in their classrooms and have no lives outside of or beyond their work?

“It took me a while to realize that I did want to be in the academy, but not the ivory tower version of it,” Jenny is telling me as our sandwiches arrive. “I liked learning, but I didn’t want to spend my life in the archives, you know?”

I nod, still slotting all of the new pieces I have of her into place.

“But you haven’t even told me anything about you. What are you up to these days?”

I toy with my napkin while I try to figure out how to respond.

I’m past the point of my usual bullshit, I think; being semihonest with Willa—and then actually honest with Leon—helped me see that nothing will break if I admit that I’m struggling.

But I also haven’t figured out a new narrative.

And I’m not sure I know how to function without a narrative.

“I’ve been working for an antibullying nonprofit for about six years now,” I say. “But I’m actually thinking about leaving.”

“Are you thinking of leaving for something, or just... thinking that you need to leave?”

“That I need to leave.”

Jenny takes a sip of her water. She’s been open and friendly this whole time, but now her face shifts, and I see her slipping back into teacher mode. “Are you looking for advice?”

“Not even advice, just—I don’t know.” Suddenly I’m sixteen again, words spilling out of me. “I’m kind of flailing. I’m looking for anything right now. Do you remember thinking I would be good at something in high school?”

Jenny laughs, but it’s kind.

“This was my therapist’s idea,” I tell her by way of an excuse.

She nods. “Well, I think one of the things I learned early was that you never know where any given kid is going to end up. I mean, you have predictions, and sometimes you’re right. But people change so much. I’ve been surprised too many times to give my inklings any credence.”

“I can see that.” I’m thinking of burn-it-all-down Zeke, now a dad with a buzzed head and a nine-to-five.

Willa, an adolescent soccer star who hasn’t played in years.

Leon—well. Leon, who refused to invest much energy in anything at eighteen and now has more skills than I can remember, let alone name.

“I’m sorry I don’t have better advice for you,” she says with an apologetic smile. “The only thing I really know about adulthood is that everyone has to figure out how to do it for themselves. And almost no one gets it right on the first try.”

It’s not much, but it is a little reassuring. “I appreciate that. I know there’s no magic wand or whatever. And I think even just saying this out loud to you helps.” It isn’t until the words are hanging in the air that I feel their accuracy. “Anyway, tell me more about retirement. Any new hobbies?”

Jenny’s face lights up. And that’s when I learn my seventy-two-year-old former English teacher is training to become a competitive weight lifter.

At the end of the meal, she excuses herself to go to the restroom, and I check my email to find a note from Jo, the guy I met at Willa’s party.

Izzy gave me your contact info. Just wanted to say that it was so cool to meet you the other night.

And I’d love to connect about opportunities with some of the kids I work with, either officially or un-.

There’s one in particular who had a cyberbullying incident last year, and I think talking to you could be really meaningful for her.

But that’s a big ask, and if you don’t have the bandwidth, I completely understand!

I’m staring off into space when Jenny comes back.

“News?” she asks, gesturing to the phone still in my hand.

“Oh, no, but...” The question comes spilling out of me.

“Can I ask... isn’t it exhausting—dealing with other people’s personal lives?

Students and their problems, and then it’s like, a decade later and someone like me is contacting you out of the blue, thinking you’ll know what I should do with my life? Don’t you ever get—just tired of it?”

I expect her to say something gracious and saintly about the rewards of service.

Instead, she gives me a conspiratorial grin.

“All the time. Especially when I was a new teacher. I basically just collapsed into bed at the end of the day. But the longer I did it, the more I learned that people are actually pretty good at working out their own problems. I didn’t have to worry as much as I was.

But also...” She takes a sip of water.

“I think I got better at compartmentalizing. I created rituals. Simple things—just washing my hands when I was leaving for the day. Only wearing certain articles of clothing to work and never in my personal life. It’s never cut and dried, of course.

Some stuff will always follow you home. But I had to find a way to make space between the people who needed me at work and the people who needed me the rest of the time. ”

Then she levels me with a look I recognize: a You’d better remember this; it’s going to be on the test gaze.

“If you’re asking if this particular meeting is a burden—no, Cassidy.

I wouldn’t have said yes if I didn’t want to see you.

And if there’s one thing I am sure about—was then, am now—it’s that you’re tenacious.

You’re going to figure out what to do next.

It might take longer than you want, but you will. ”

Against my will, a warm glow sweeps through me. How did I get so lucky, to have the support of women like Jenny, and Tilly, and Maya McPherson, who see the best in me, even when I can’t see it in myself?

“I’ve had a weird life so far,” I say.

“Honey,” she says, cackling, “they’re all weird, all the way through.”