The thought lodged a physical pain inside me. It was a senseless suggestion, like telling a lesbian to just be with a man. I raised my cuticle to my teeth. I had begun biting my nails again, an impulse I hadn’t had since lockdown. It started after my aunt went back to New York, the reality of my home situation clarifying. The past week had involved helping my dad change his bandages, reminding him to mind his pain meds, him not listening to me. Stressed from work and her move, my mom had clocked out: dishes piled up, food was going bad, grime accumulated between the bathroom tiles. If all this was a lesson, I was failing with flying colors.
I praised the actress’s performance, which I knew would shift the energy of the conversation.
Milan rolled her eyes. “Usually Ryen has his actors spend time together outside of filming, you know, to build a rapport, but the girl wouldn’t do it.”
“How much are they getting paid?”
She pierced a cube of chicken with her fork. “You don’t do this shit for the money. You do it to get credits to your name.”
I saw then she was angrier about not being cast for an on-screen part than she’d let me believe.
Chapter 53
The university canceled the Palestinian writer’s lecture after several donors pulled their funding but, frankly, that was the least of our worries. Columbia lost its funding and had conceded to the White House’s demands. Everyone was waiting to see what this meant for the rest of the schools, but the dominos were already falling in the wrong direction. A second international student had been arrested that week. Another got her student visa revoked, fleeing the country after ICE knocked on her door. It was beginning to feel like March would never end even though we were halfway through it. It was one of the longest months of my life.
Below Janine’s office window, students protested. Someone spoke into a bullhorn; it sounded like a deep wail.
Poking a cigarette in her mouth, Janine stared wistfully at the students on the lawn. “I’ll be glad to be gone from this place soon.”
“You mean dead?”
She snapped her head around. “No! I mean away from university politics.”
A loud noise blasted from her phone.
“Hello?” she answered. “What do you want, Stew?… I’m with a student… No, she’s not… Why would she be in my office?… Well, it’s notmyfault she’s not answering you… I’m sure she’s off doing whatever it is twenty-somethings do these days, drugs, rapping in their basements.” She made a funny face at me. “Oh, calm down… no, no, now just wait a minute… Do you ever just listen? If you would justlistenyou’d see I’m trying to help you… No, I won’t… Fine… FINE.”
She hung up and apologized. “Do you feel like you’re learning anything?”
“Like in… life?”
“No, in the program.”
“Oh, sure.”
She lifted her tea. It trembled in her hand. She set it down. “I try to be optimistic. It feels like mydutyto not let my doubt corrupt the optimism of my students.” She glanced out the window, sighing.
“What are you doubting?”
She looked at me carefully. “This institution. This country. Though that’s not new, is it? Sometimes it hits you with renewed force. But enough of this. How’s your writing coming along?”
“It’s…” I paused. I wasn’t entirely sure how it was coming. I’d applied her feedback, but with a robotic remove, not taking stock of how the story was changing. “Good.”
“I have something for you.” She dug around her drawer, pulling out a purple paperback. It was a craft anthology for Black writers. I wanted to throw myself out the window—I hated stuff like this.
Peering over her glasses, “People think you should learn completely by osmosis, that there’s some sort of purity in that. But remember those decisions we talked about that writers must make? You can’t make them if you don’t know all the choices you have.” She bent down to look beneath her desk. “Now where’s that silly cat?”
My phone buzzed with an email from the university. It said my scholarship had been impacted by the donor exodus. I’d no longer receive financial support from the school starting that fall.
On cue, the cat leapt from the bookcase, yowling.
I scrambled out of the humanities building late for work. Dizzy, I tripped going down the stone steps and scraped my knee. I didn’t have time to wash it off. What the fuck was I going to do next year? (And the eight years after that?) I didn’t want the evil donors’ money, but I wantedsomebody’smoney.
Hearing my name shouted, I turned, still walking, but didn’t see anyone. My phone read 3:20 p.m. I had ten minutes to get to therestaurant. I bit the skin around my nails because I had no more nails to bite. They were becoming bloody with abuse, but the relief was too big to stop. I was already on Leigh’s List, which—spoiler!—wasn’t an invitation to an extravagant patio party.
When I looked up, Nia and Tristan were walking toward me. My feet stuttered. Tristan and I hadn’t spoken since the night at his place. I wanted to drill a hole into the ground and fall into it.
“Hey, are you protesting?” Nia was wearing a Palestinian flag draped like a shawl.
